A Quick Look at Fallace (2010)

I do apologize for the lateness of this blog post. Around my usual working time on Monday I was attending an academic conference concerning theories and best practices within the field of higher education administration, and specifically experiential learning. Although I do value this work very much, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to be the only undergraduate student amongst 100+ professionals!

I’ve bit the bullet of what we have comically named the “St. Dewey” attitude and decided to look into the work of Thomas D. Fallace. Specifically I am looking at Was John Dewey Ethnocentric? Reevaluating the Philosopher’s Early Views on Culture and Race. While I do admit that Fallace argues well, and that his points do coincide with his title well, I believe that they do not hold much water concerning our studies.

The first point that stands out to me is Fallace’s careful wording. As he states, [o]verall, I provide a nuanced, contextualized reading of Dewey’s views on culture and race during a critical period of his intellectual development (1895-1911) (471). Surely it is important to note that this is before Dewey’s revealing trip to China, and before the revision of How We Think. Fallace argues that the primary texts of Dewey’s philosophy that are used for education are taken from this early period, however. But is this a proper consideration, to avoid the later works of Dewey and simply focus on these earlier views?

“To study a philosopher” is truly an ambiguous statement. What are you studying? A living or dead body? Accounts of this philosopher written by other people? The writings of this philosopher? Who was this philosopher in the first place? A person, or a series of writings? Their past, or what they had become? Such questions of being are pointed out in Sartre’s existentialism. His philosophy is a bit off topic, but I will throw it into sum by stating that Sartre points out the paradox of human existence in that we are what we have been and something completely different at the same time. If I have been a waiter and I am waiting tables now, surely I am a waiter, but at the same time I am not a waiter since I have the innate freedom to be anything I wish to be. So if I am ethnocentric now, and yet I choose to purport myself in the future as not ethnocentric, am I still ethnocentric due to what I had argued in the past? If this waiter chooses to manage his own restaurant, or become a NASCAR driver, is he still a waiter?

In other words, it is confusing and illusory to throw human existence into something definite, for we are not definite. The entire idea of humanity is that a human being is constantly becoming something. To say “Dewey was ethnocentric” in general is to argue Dewey as some sort of object. Fallace’s careful choice to focus on specific writings of Dewey evades this paradox, but runs into another problem rather quickly.

What are these earlier views that Fallace points out? Dewey did not specifically address (472) views on race and culture during this time. Fallace points towards the verbiage of Dewey, indicating that such terminology is indicative of his views. To what degree can this be said to be true? Fallace alludes to the writing of historian Thomas Kuhn. [L]ook first for the apparent absurdities in the text and ask yourself how a sensible person could have written them (xiii). I believe that Fallace hits the wall with this quote. In looking for these absurdities that change the meaning of these texts, who is looking? Surely it is Fallace. How can this be said to be a fair presumption of absurdity? In trying to decipher the work of Dewey there is a profound culture gap. To regard these terms, savage, barbarian, primitive, as intellectually absurd and denotive of ethnocentric behavior requires a first-hand understanding of American intellectual culture at the time, modes of communication and acceptable terms. These words are indeed taboo in contemporary American culture, but surely they are not within Dewey’s culture. To label him as ethnocentric based on these assumptions gives ill-consideration to the situation. Labeling terms have been used throughout mankind (falling back to Sartre’s philosophy, terms that try to define humanity, which is indefinable by nature since it is always becoming). These terms help us to create the illusion of organization within our chaotic and insensible world. Every so often, these words are subscribed with hate within a culture, deemed as taboo, and done away with. Let us think to ourselves how often this happens and wonder how long it will be until words such as gay or lesbian receive this taboo. What is to become of the psychological academic writings that have used these words to describe these people? Shall we cast them into flames for using terms commonly accepted amongst society not to hate others but to identify them?

The second point Fallace makes within the methodology of his claims is that Dewey’s acceptance of this language and unvoiced opinions concerning culture and race reflect his statement of habitudes which lie below the level of reflection. Are race and culture included within these habitudes? I will admit that it is hard for me to find evidence against this point. I am inclined to believe that Dewey is not considering race and culture in this statement, but Fallace draws a painstaking connection that perhaps Dewey believes that words like savage are below the level of reflection.

I intend to look further into this piece and decide how well Fallace argues against the point I have brought up concerning the relevance of verbiage to the viewpoints of a person, and whether or not it is right to consider this philosophy (as a whole) as ethnocentric based on its early stages which had much influence on it, according to Fallace. 

Fallace, T. (2010). Was John Dewey Ethnocentric? Reevaluating the Philosopher’s Early Views on Culture and Race. Educational Researcher, Vol 39. No 6. 471-474