Description
Book SynopsisThis book focuses on the development of civism as it contributed to ancient Greek culture, and helped shape the psychology of citizenship in the Western world. The strength of this work is its interdisciplinary examination of those trends and influences that combined to give new insights into the rise and the fall of democracy in the ancient polis of Athens. The author presents an extensive description of the intellectual forces that attracted international scholars and teachers to Athens, who in turn established important schools of higher learning as they labored to develop and advance the study of rhetoric and philosophy as competing alternative approaches for addressing the perceived weakness of the democratic system. This volume is an ideal supplement for instruction in courses in classical history, political science, philosophy, history of Western education, and advanced foundations of education.
Trade Review«As Thomas L. Dynneson’s pioneering research has demonstrated, we simply cannot understand the politics of any age without recognizing how each society uses laws, education, and social norms to promote a particular vision of civism. Dynneson continues his unparalleled work in civism by turning to ancient Athens as the source for state-sponsored education whose purpose is to cultivate people into citizen-subjects. Dynneson provides a rich account of the various intellectual and political forces, including those we now call sophistic and philosophical, that create a vision of how laws, tradition, and pedagogy function to produce the ideal citizen. This book will be of interest to any reader with a serious interest in civism, which ought to be all of us.» (Edward Schiappa, Paul W. Frenzel Chair of Liberal Arts, The University of Minnesota)
