Pragmatism, postmodernism, and complexity theory

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Stuart Parker

This is a book about two stories of education. In one story there is a vocabulary of means, efficiency, bureaucracy, inspection and science; in the other, one of autonomy, democracy, emancipation and action research. One is the story of positivist managerialist approaches to education, the other is the story of reflective teaching. This book displaces both of these stories. By applying the techniques of deconstruction, Stuart Parker overturns the assumptions common to both of these positions and, in doing so, jettisons some widely cherished beliefs about education, autonomy and rationality. Moving beyond current debates, this book articulates a new manifesto for education in postmodernity and highlights the implications for educational practices and institutions.

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[edited by] Ronald Barnett and Anne Griffin

This study questions whether it is possible to identify a justified, secure and coherent base for our knowledge of the world and of ourselves. Science no longer enjoys an unquestioned pre-eminence in providing objective knowledge, and the social improvement brought about through rational thought has been recently attacked by postmodernism. Higher education is therefore placed in a precarious position, based as it is on the acquisition of knowledge and understanding. This book explores the various dimensions of this crisis of confidence in science and higher education, showing how thinkers in the various disciplines are reacting to this challenge, and how they are re-evaluating the basis of their forms of enquiry.

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Walter Orenstein

Through a series of letters from a father to his college-age daughter, Dr. Walter Orenstein traces the role and the history of women in the Torah and shows, through text and commentary, that in traditional Jewish society the status of women is equal to that of men, though their function is often quite different. Letters to My Daughter: A Father Writes about Torah and the Jewish Woman introduces the reader to the Oral Law, to the exciting realm of Halakhah, and to some of the essential principles of Jewish philosophy. Although this work is addressed to a college student, it is meant for all women and men regardless of their backgrounds. Those who have a limited background in Jewish studies and seek an understanding of the principles of Jewish belief and the way that these principles impact upon her or his life will find this book a useful beginning to the world of Jewish scholarship. Those students whose Jewish education has taken them far beyond the rudiments of Torah knowledge but who are concerned with the status of women in Orthodox Judaism and lack the training to probe the sources on their own will find this book enlightening. This book also addresses itself to the Jewish man or woman who was raised in the secular world but who now searches for truth, meaning, and purpose in the Torah, hoping that its words will provide spiritual guidance, personal insight, and divine wisdom.

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Russell Kirk

Attorney Hugh Logan leaves Canada for Scotland to negotiate the purchase of Carnglass Island and the castle Old House of Fear for his employer, Duncan MacAskival. Logan is continually thwarted and threatened on his journey. But no matter how bad his travels, his arrival onto the island brings much worse trouble. Carnglass is under the control of evil genius Dr. Edmund Jackman, a Soviet-educated political revolutionary convinced that Logan is a spy who must die. Will Jackman's plot be thwarted? Will Logan be able to rescue the lovely niece of the noble owner of Old House? Will anyone get off the island alive?