Titone, Connie. (2004). Gender equality in the philosophy of education: Catharine Macaulay’s forgotten contribution. Reviewed by Jiwon Kim and A. G. Rud, Purdue University

Titone, Connie. (2004). Gender equality in the philosophy of education: Catharine Macaulay’s forgotten contribution. New York: Peter Lang Publishing. Pp. viii + 173 $29.95     ISBN 0-8204-5174-6 Reviewed by Jiwon Kim and A. G. Rud Purdue University May 12, 2005 Connie Titone explores the educational thought of a largely forgotten figure, Catharine Macaulay (1731-1791), a contemporary of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and best known as a political historian of eighteenth-century England. Titone seeks to understand why Macaulay’s work on education, seemingly so revolutionary and pioneering, has been marginalized and nearly forgotten. Titone, like Nel Noddings, Maxine Greene, Jane Roland Martin, and many others, strives to continually add women to the historical conversation about education, where their voices have been overlooked or forgotten. The book has two aims. First, Titone initiates an “informed conversation with contemporary readers about Macaulay’s work on education within its own historical context (p. 13).” Second, we are reminded of the “potentially powerful connection” between beliefs about human and divine Nature, and the impact of these on a philosophy of education, in particular, on curriculum, educational policies and practices (p. 13). Titone works to correct a history of educational thought that has been unchallenged for years. Macaulay is central to an understanding of the discussion of education at the time of Rousseau. Many philosophy of education courses assign his Emile as a canonical text. Titone shows how Macaulay both adopts, develops, and counters Rousseau. It is a discussion well worth examining, given the dominance of Rousseau, and his subsequent influence on Pestalozzi, Froebel, Montessori, Dewey, and others. We are both philosophers of education, and Rud has taught texts that do not challenge Rousseau’s views on women’s education. Rousseau is well known for prescribing that Sophie, Emile’s helpmate and companion, be dutiful and an accessory for Emile, whose education he writes about with more interest. Rousseau states that Sophie should be both subservient and pleasing to Emile, and such sentiments strike our modern ears as unrelentingly sexist. Titone is right in stating that the “true quarrel that existed at the time” (p. 4) is largely unknown to both scholars and students. Compounding this oversight is that feminist philosophy of education is a relatively recent accomplishment. Titone is concerned that many of us see philosophy of education as containing two parallel developments, one male, and longer, and the other female, shorter, and derivative, or worse, veiled or absent. Titone examines Macaulay’s Letters on Education with Observations on Religious and Metaphysical Subjects (1790), where she articulated her philosophy of education. Macaulay’s book integrates her metaphysical beliefs and epistemological view with pedagogy and practice, so that it is difficult for a modern reader to understand fully the connections. Titone, however, remains convinced that Macaulay’s work was underestimated and continues to be so today. The most important aspect of Letters on Education demonstrates the visionary and cohesive nature of Macaulay’s ideas about gender and education. The ideas can be broken down into two connected parts. First, Macaulay reconceptualizes human nature. In Part I of Letters on Education, she understands that human nature is separate and distinct from the manifest set of properties of boys and girls observed in society. Therefore, the attributes, as well as the behavior, of both boys and girls are redefined, enlarged, and refocused in order for each to enjoy a closer match between what is possible by nature and what it seen in conduct. She says that men and women, striving for a reflection of the totality of humanness, can both be more divine. This does not merely mean that women can be more like men if educated with them. For example, Macaulay insists on boys’ nascent emotional and moral equality with girls, and demands that young boys receive an education commensurate with the development of this aspect of their humanness. In Part III of Letters on Education, Macaulay gives a thorough explanation of her metaphysical views on human nature and the divine mind. Such a concept of mind comes from her interpretation of the nature of God, the one perfect divine Mind. In other words, she argues that education should help both genders approach the nature of God. She uses the terms, “justice,” “equity,” and “reason” on the other hand and “benevolence,” “sympathy,” and “tenderness” on the other to describe two types of attributes of the deity (p. 142). She sees both types as elements of God, and therefore as naturally occurring and equally valuable in human nature – what one could call “a masculo-feminine Nature” (p. 10). Herein is the problem of current education preventing both boys and girls from fulfilling their humanness and potential by distinguishing the nature of women from the nature of men. This insight is naturally connected to her other key idea, equal education for both genders. Titone sees the canon of philosophy of education dominated by works by men such as Plato’s The Republic, John Locke’s Some Thoughts Concerning Education, and Jean Jacques Rousseau’s Emile. Rousseau, for example, believes that male and female human beings possess two different and distinct human natures, which are predisposed toward the development of specific characteristics required to fulfill socially defined gender roles. Macaulay’s work on education, published only a few years after Rousseau’s Emile, convincingly refutes Rousseau’s simplistic and conventional views on gender and education. She claims that the ultimate goal of formally educating young people is to produce an educated person who attains the character, morals, and knowledge possible for individuals of both genders. She hypothesizes that the character of human is formed from the influence of education. The aims and purpose of education that Macaulay suggests are removing the “echo of the public voice” (p. 42) and “cultivating virtues” (p. 45). Macaulay presents the idea of benevolence as the supreme virtue. There are similarities here with Nel Noddings’s well known discussion of “caring,” and Carol Gilligan’s attention to the particular qualities of women’s moral reasoning, which requires attention to feelings, care, response, and relation rather than to merely justice and issues concerning the quality of life. Beyond this discussion, Macaulay claims that those virtues should be taught to not only girls but also boys for the individual fulfillment of their "Divine mind and potentials, as there is equal rationality in both, and this is not gendered." (p. 27) Chapter 5 gives the working details of her philosophy, namely to think independently and act benevolently. Like Rousseau, she believed that childhood should unfold and develop naturally, with children occupied by amusement and play early on, and not learning to read until later, and then to take part in a classical education, heavy on reading. Macaulay states that “(A)ll curricular decisions should be made…with an eye toward a particular character formation” (p. 98). Her ambitious curriculum develops thinking and the power of judgment. Like Locke, Macaulay gave primacy to moral development over rational knowledge. The keystone of moral development for Macaulay was benevolence. For Macaulay, benevolence meant being actively involved rather than just passively refraining from harm (p. 134). Benevolence must temper reason; otherwise, reason would be misused. And too, benevolence involves self care, rather than simply sacrifice for others. This is a hard thing for teachers and many other people to enact, especially teachers, who give to others continuously often at peril to their own mental and physical health. In the final part of the book, Titone investigates how Macaulay can be of use to teacher education. Titone sees that ethical maturity, as part of a transcendent view of education, should be a central part of the development of a teacher. This book will be useful to us as we teach the cultural foundations of education to hundreds of undergraduates each year. Teaching Rousseau’s Emile is always difficult, as many students wonder about the context of his extreme views on gendered education. Connie Titone’s book deepens one’s understanding of the beginnings of modern educational philosophy, and brings a forgotten figure forward to rejoin the conversation. About the Reviewers Jiwon Kim is a doctoral student in philosophy of education at Purdue University. Her areas of interest include aesthetic education and moral development. A. G. Rud is associate professor of educational studies at Purdue University. A philosopher of education, he edits the journal Education and Culture (http://digitalfocus.thepress.purdue.edu/eandc/).