Learning to Flourish

Book excerpt: Learning to Flourish offers a lucid, penetrating, philosophical exploration of liberal learning: a still-evolving tradition of theory and practice that has dominated and sustained intellectual life and learning in much of the globe for two millennia. Daniel R. DeNicola weighs the views of both advocates and critics of the liberal arts, and interprets liberal education as aimed supremely at understanding and living a good life, as a vital tradition generating five competing but complementary paradigms that transcend theories of curriculum and pedagogy and are manifested in particular social contexts. He examines the transformative power of liberal education and its relation to such values as freedom, autonomy, and democracy, reflecting on the importance of intrinsic value and moral understanding. Finally, he considers age-old obstacles and current threats to liberal education, ultimately asserting its value for and urgent need in a global, pluralistic, technologically advanced society. Offering a bold yet nuanced theory of liberal education, this study will be of great interest to educators as well as those specializing in Philosophy of Education.