THE JOSSEY-BASSREADER ON

CONTEMPORARYISSUES IN ADULT

EDUCATION

THE JOSSEY-BASSREADER ON

CONTEMPORARYISSUES IN ADULT

EDUCATION

Sharan B. Merriam, André P. Grace

Copyright © 2011 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

The Jossey-Bass reader on contemporary issues in adult education / [edited by] Sharan B. Merriam,André P. Grace.—1st ed.

p. cm.Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-470-87356-4 (pbk.)1. Adult education—United States. I. Merriam, Sharan B. II. Grace, André P., 1954– III. Jossey-Bass Inc.LC5251.J775 2011374′.973—dc22

2010051344

Printed in the United States of Americafirst edition

PB Printing 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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The Jossey-BassHigher and Adult Education Series

Contents

Sources xiPreface xviiThe Editors xxiAbout the Contributors xxiii

PART ONEDEFINING A FIELD OF PRACTICE:THE FOUNDATIONS OF ADULT EDUCATION 1

1 For Those Who Need to Be Learners 7Eduard C. Lindeman

2 The Negro in America 12Alain Locke

3 Pedagogy of the Oppressed: Chapter 2 20Paulo Freire

4 Building a Knowledge Base in U.S. Academic Adult Education(1945–1970) 33André P. Grace

5 Adult Education at the Margins: A Literature Review 56Michelle Glowacki-Dudka and Lora B. Helvie-Mason

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viii CONTENTS

6 African Americans in Adult Education: The Harlem RenaissanceRevisited 67Juanita Johnson-Bailey

7 Ethical Issues and Codes of Ethics: Views of Adult EducationPractitioners in Canada and the United States 87Wanda Gordon and Thomas J. Sork

PART TWOPOSITIONING ADULT EDUCATIONIN A GLOBAL CONTEXT 107

8 Rediscovering Adult Education in a World of Lifelong Learning 113Peter Jarvis

9 Research and Policy in Lifelong Learning 120Colin Griffin

10 Social Movements, Class, and Adult Education 138Shirley Walters

11 Social Change Education: Context Matters 149Kathryn Choules

12 Adult Education and the Empowerment of the Individual in a GlobalSociety 170Cecilia Amaluisa Fiallos

13 Active and Inclusive Citizenship for Women: DemocraticConsiderations for Fostering Lifelong Education 186Patricia A. Gouthro

PART THREEADULT EDUCATION’S CONSTITUENCIESAND PROGRAM AREAS: COMPETINGINTERESTS? 203

14 Social Class and Adult Education 207Tom Nesbit

CONTENTS ix

15 Poverty Reduction and Adult Education: Beyond Basic Education 219Ruud van der Veen and Julia Preece

16 Aligning Health Promotion and Adult Education for HealthierCommunities 234Barbara J. Daley

17 Critiquing Human Resource Development’s Dominant MasculineRationality and Evaluating Its Impact 247Laura L. Bierema

18 Organizational Learning Communities and the Dark Side of theLearning Organization 280Phillip H. Owenby

19 Negotiating Democratically for Educational and Political Outcomes 291Ronald M. Cervero and Arthur L. Wilson

PART FOURTHE CHANGING LANDSCAPE OF ADULTLEARNING 311

20 Reflection Disempowered 315Michael Newman

21 A Theory in Progress 321Patricia Cranton

22 ‘‘Social Learning’’ for/in Adult Education?: A Discursive Review ofWhat It Means for Learning to Be ‘‘Social’’ 340Kim L. Niewolny and Arthur L. Wilson

23 The Meaning and Role of Emotions in Adult Learning 349John M. Dirkx

24 Adult Education and the Mass Media in the Age of Globalization 363Talmadge C. Guy

25 Non-Western Perspectives on Learning and Knowing 378Sharan B. Merriam and Young Sek Kim

x CONTENTS

PART FIVENEW DISCOURSES SHAPING CONTEMPORARYADULT EDUCATION 391

26 Attending to the Theoretical Landscape in Adult Education 395Valerie-Lee Chapman

27 Popular Culture, Cultural Resistance, and AnticonsumptionActivism: An Exploration of Culture Jamming as Critical AdultEducation 401Jennifer A. Sandlin

28 Toward a Postmodern Pedagogy 413Deborah Kilgore

29 Activism as Practice: Some Queer Considerations 424Robert J. Hill

30 Using Freirean Pedagogy of Just Ire to Inform Critical Social Learningin Arts-Informed Community Education for Sexual Minorities 436André P. Grace and Kristopher Wells

Name Index 459

Subject Index 467

Sources

Chapter 1

From Lindeman, E. C. (1961/1926). The Meaning of Adult Education. Montreal:Harvest House. pp. 3–9. Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications.

Chapter 2

From Locke, A. L. (1933). The American Negro. American Library Association.Used with permission from the American Library Association.

Chapter 3

Excerpted from Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Seabury.© 1970, 2000. Reprinted with permission of the publisher, the ContinuumInternational Publishing Group.

Chapter 4

Grace, A. P. (1999). Building a knowledge base in U.S. academic adult education(1945–1970). Studies in the Education of Adults, 31(2), 220–236. Used by permissionof the NIACE.

Chapter 5

Glowacki-Dudka, M., & Helvie-Mason, L. B. (2004). Adult education at themargins: A literature review. In M. Wise & M. Glowacki-Dudka (Eds.), Embracing

xi

xii SOURCES

and enhancing the margins of adult education (pp. 7–16). New Directions for Adultand Continuing Education, No. 104. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 6

Johnson-Bailey, J. (2006). African Americans in adult education: The HarlemRenaissance revisited. Adult Education Quarterly, 56(2), 102–118. Copyright ©2006 American Association for Adult and Continuing Education. Reprinted bypermission of Sage Publications.

Chapter 7

Gordon, W., & Sork, T. J. (2001). Ethical issues and codes of ethics: Views ofadult education practitioners in Canada and the United States. Adult EducationQuarterly, 51(3), 202–218. Copyright © 2001 American Association for Adult andContinuing Education. Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications.

Chapter 8

Jarvis, P. (2008). Rediscovering adult education in a world of lifelong learning.International Journal of Critical Pedagogy, 1(1). Used by permission.

Chapter 9

Griffin, C. (2006). Research and policy in lifelong learning. International Journalof Lifelong Education, 25(6), 561–574. Reprinted by permission of the publisher(Taylor & Francis Ltd., http://www.informaworld.com).

Chapter 10

Walters, S. Social movements, class, and adult education. In T. Nesbit (Ed.), Classconcerns: Adult education and social class. New Directions for Adult and ContinuingEducation, No. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 11

Choules, K. (2007). Social change education: Context matters. Adult EducationQuarterly, 57(2), 159–176. Copyright © 2007 American Association for Adult andContinuing Education. Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications.

http://www.informaworld.com

SOURCES xiii

Chapter 12

Fiallos, C. A. (2006). Adult education and the empowerment of the individual ina global society. In S. B. Merriam, B. C. Courtenay, & R. M. Cervero (Eds.),Global issues and adult education: Perspectives from Latin America, Southern Africa, andthe United States (pp. 15–29). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 13

Gouthro, P. A. (2007). Active and inclusive citizenship for women: Democraticconsiderations for fostering lifelong education. International Journal of LifelongEducation, 26(2), 143–154, reprinted by permission of the publisher (Taylor &Francis Ltd., http://www.informaworld.com).

Chapter 14

Nesbit, T. (2005). Social class and adult education. In T. Nesbit (Ed.), Classconcerns: Adult education and social class (pp. 5–14). New Directions for Adult andContinuing Education, No. 106. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 15

van der Veen, R., & Preece, J. (2005). Poverty reduction and adult educa-tion: Beyond basic education. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 24(5),381–391. Reprinted by permission of the publisher (Taylor & Francis Ltd.,http://www.informaworld.com).

Chapter 16

Daley, B. J. (2006). Aligning health promotion and adult education for healthiercommunities. In S. B. Merriam, B. C. Courtenay, & R. M. Cervero (Eds.), Globalissues and adult education: Perspectives from Latin America, Southern Africa, and theUnited States (pp. 231–242). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 17

Bierema, L. L. (2009). Critiquing HRD’s dominant masculine rationality andevaluating its impact. Human Resource Development Review, 8(1), 68–96. Copyright© 2009 Sage Publications. Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications.

http://www.informaworld.comhttp://www.informaworld.com

xiv SOURCES

Chapter 18

Owenby, P. H. (2002). Organizational learning communities and the dark sideof the learning organization. In D. S. Stein & S. Imel (Eds.), Adult learning incommunity (pp. 51–60). New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, No.95. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 19

Excerpted from Cervero, R. M., & Wilson, A. L. (2006). Working the planning table:Negotiating democratically for adult, continuing, and workplace education (pp. 80–102).San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 20

Newman, M. (1994). Defining the enemy. Sidney: Stewart Victor. Republishedonline 2007 at www.michaelnewman.info, Chapter 28, Reflection Disempow-ered. Used by permission of the author.

Lyrics for ‘‘Silver Dagger’’ copyright Chandon Music, used by permission.

Excerpt from Death and the Maiden by Ariel Dorfman used by permission of NickHern Books, www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Lyrics for ‘‘Joe Hill,’’ music by Earl Robinson, words by Alfred Hayes, copyright© 1938 (renewed) by Music Sales (ASCAP) and MCA Music Publishing forthe United States. International copyright secured. All rights secured. Used bypermission. Words and music by Earl Robinson and Alfred Hayes, Copyright ©1938, 1942 Universal Music Corp. Copyright renewed and assigned to UniversialMusic Corp. and Music Sales Corporation. All rights reserved. Used by permission.Reprinted by permission of Hal Leonard Corporation.

Chapter 21

Cranton, P. (2006). A theory in progress. In Understanding and promoting transforma-tive learning: A guide for educators of adults (pp. 39–56). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass,2006.

Chapter 22

Niewolny, K. L., & Wilson, A. L. (2009). ‘‘Social learning’’ for/in adult education?A discursive review of what it means for learning to be ‘‘social.’’ In R. L. Lawrence

http://www.michaelnewman.infohttp://www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

SOURCES xv

(Ed.), Proceedings of the 50th Annual Adult Education Research Conference. Chicago:National-Louis University. Used by permission of the authors.

Chapter 23

Dirkx, J. M. (2008). The meaning and role of emotions in adult learning. InJ. Dirkx (Ed.), Adult learning and the emotional self (pp. 7–18). New Directions forAdult and Continuing Education, No. 120. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 24

Guy, T. C. (2006). Adult education and the mass media in the age of globalization.In S. B. Merriam, B. C. Courtenay, & R. M. Cervero (Eds.), Global issues andadult education: Perspectives from Latin America, Southern Africa, and the United States(pp. 64–77). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 25

Merriam, S. B., & Kim, Y. S. (2008). Non-western perspectives on learning andknowing. In S. B. Merriam (Ed.), Third update on adult learning theory (pp. 71–81).New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, No. 119. San Francisco:Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 26

Chapman, V. (2005). Attending to the theoretical landscape in adult education.Adult Education Quarterly, 55(4), 308–312. Copyright © 2005 American Asso-ciation for Adult and Continuing Education. Reprinted by permission of SagePublications.

Chapter 27

Sandlin, J. A. (2007). Popular culture, cultural resistance, and anticonsumptionactivism: An exploration of culture jamming as critical adult education. In E. J.Tisdell & P. M. Thompson (Eds.), Popular culture and entertainment media in adulteducation (pp. 73–82). New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, No.115. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 28

Kilgore, D. (2004). Toward a postmodern pedagogy. In R. St. Clair & J. Sandlin(Eds.), Promoting critical practice in adult education (pp. 45–53). New Directions forAdult and Continuing Education, 102. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

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Chapter 29

Hill, R. J. (2004). Activism as practice: Some queer considerations. In R. St.Clair & J. Sandlin (Eds.), Promoting critical practice in adult education (pp. 85–94).New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, No. 102. San Francisco:Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 30

Grace, A. P., & Wells, K. (2007). Using Freirean pedagogy of just ire toinform critical social learning in arts-informed community education for sexualminorities. Adult Education Quarterly, 57(2), 95–114. Copyright © 2007 AmericanAssociation for Adult and Continuing Education. Reprinted by permission of SagePublications.

Preface

There’s something of a contradiction when speaking of the field of adult education.On the one hand, adult education programs are everywhere—in the workplace,hospitals, libraries, communities, colleges and universities, and online. On theother hand, adult education as a professional field of practice is nearly invisible,with many educators of adults unaware that they are part of a larger enterprise.This paradox also encompasses adult learners themselves. While the most recentU.S. survey revealed that 44% of adults participated part-time in formal adulteducation activities and 70% were learning informally (NCES, 2007), most adultsdon’t consider themselves learners unless they are ‘‘taking a class.’’

These contradictions are not surprising given that the field of adult educationhas never been easily captured within one definition, one history, or evenone theory. Whether we are talking about diverse adult populations, practices,philosophical perspectives, program planning models, or theories about how adultslearn, there has always been a colorful collage of various and sometimes competingcomponents comprising adult education as a field of practice. Professional adulteducators do believe, however, that there is some common ground that linksus together as a field. Learning, for example, is something human beings dothroughout their lives; it is indeed lifelong and lifewide. Further, adult educationcan be a positive force in our lives and can contribute to individual bettermentand a more just and equitable society for all.

As with professionals in other fields of practice, adult educators learn tobecome educators through experience and study. For example, a nursing supervisor

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in a hospital might be asked to develop a program to train others in the use of newmedication; a community resident might organize other residents to help educatethe community about safety concerns; an experienced worker might be tappedfor some on-the-job mentoring of a new employee; or a carpenter might teach awoodworking class at the local community school. These are all examples of adulteducation in practice in real-life situations.

While many do learn to be adult educators through experience, otherscombine experience with formal study, sometimes on their own, but more likelyas students in master’s and doctoral programs. It is in these programs that learnersare systematically exposed to the literature in the field. And as with the fielditself, there is a wide diversity of resources with which to study the field. Thereare numerous research and practice-oriented journals; magazines and newsletters;online resources; a Handbook of Adult and Continuing Education that is publishedevery ten years; a monograph series titled New Directions for Adult and ContinuingEducation; and dozens of textbooks on various aspects of the field includingprogram planning, adult learning, theory building, philosophy, and history. Thereis, however, no single volume that functions as a reader on contemporary issuesand trends in this very dynamic field of practice.

The Jossey-Bass Reader on Contemporary Issues in Adult Education is designedto be both a stand-alone reader for those self-directed adult educators who want tosample some of the thinking about adult education, and a reader that surveysan array of historical and contemporary issues important to study and critique inundergraduate or graduate courses in adult education. The Jossey-Bass Reader isparticularly appropriate for introductory, overview, or social context courses ingraduate programs of adult education. Such introductory courses not only providethe base for other courses in the curriculum, but they also typically explore issuesand trends in the field.

OVERVIEW OF THE CONTENTS

Two selection processes took place to develop The Jossey-Bass Reader on Contem-porary Issues in Adult Education. First, a panel of North American adult educatorswas invited to brainstorm a list of current issues and trends in the field. Theselists varied from four and five broad issues to more than twenty more specificpossibilities. A close study of these lists revealed five themes in common, and thesestructure the book. The next step was to decide on selections for each theme.

PREFACE xix

The two editors independently suggested possibilities for each theme; these listswere combined, and both editors read all the nominated pieces. Finally, the editorsdecided on selections to be included; this list had to be further adjusted to staywithin space allocations. There are a total of 30 selections distributed across fivetopics, each topic with between five and seven selections.

Part One, ‘‘Defining a Field of Practice: The Foundations of Adult Edu-cation,’’ contains selections related to social justice, ethics, and the historicalevolution of the field. Three pieces are by historical ‘‘giants’’ in the field— EduardC. Lindeman, Alain Locke, and Paulo Freire. Four pieces by contemporary schol-ars reflect upon the marginal place of the field in universities and society, AfricanAmerican adult education during the Harlem Renaissance, the evolution of theknowledge base, and ethics in the field.

Part Two is titled ‘‘Positioning Adult Education in a Global Context.’’While globalization, or the movement of goods, services, people, and ideas acrossnational boundaries, is not new, the speed with which this movement is occurringis unprecedented. Part Two contains readings that consider the position of adulteducation in today’s world from various perspectives including lifelong learning,policy, women’s roles, social movements, and individual empowerment.

Part Three, ‘‘Adult Education’s Constituencies and Program Areas: Compet-ing Interests?’’, presents a sampling of the diversity of constituencies and programareas. As there were dozens of possibilities for this section, we tried to selectpieces that went beyond description; rather, the selections we chose are thought-provoking, raising questions about an area of practice that we might not haveconsidered before. There are readings on social class and adult education, povertyand its link to adult basic education, the need to bring health promotion and healtheducation together, a feminist critique of human resource development, the ‘‘darkside’’ of the learning organization, and finally, program planning considered fromthe perspective of negotiating power and interests.

Part Four, ‘‘The Changing Landscape of Adult Learning,’’ addresses the heartof all adult education practice. Adult learning is the key to understanding how areasas diverse as adult literacy programs, continuing professional education, workplacelearning, and a nature hike in a national park could all come under the umbrellaof adult education. As with other parts in this reader, our selections are intendedto offer a sample of ways to look at and think about adult learning. There arereadings on the changing meaning of reflection, transformative learning, and sociallearning. The final three selections consider the role of emotions in learning, how

xx PREFACE

mass media is a global system of informal adult learning, and what non-Westernperspectives have to tell us about learning and knowing.

Part Five is a selection of readings that we’ve aptly titled ‘‘New DiscoursesShaping Contemporary Adult Education.’’ Adult education has always been adynamic and changing field of study and practice, one informed by variousdisciplines and philosophical schools of thought. In Part Five we offer a samplingof new thinking about our field. The first piece sets the stage by considering the roleof theory in adult education. The other four selections explore anticonsumptionactivism, what it means to engage in a postmodern pedagogy, queer pedagogy,and critical social learning.

Finally, in our prefaces to each of the five parts, we introduce each of theselections in more detail so that readers will have an idea of what to expect asthey engage in the readings. At the end of each preface, we have included severalreflection and discussion questions to further engage readers in issues germane toadult education today.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This reader is the brainchild of David Brightman, our editor at Jossey-Bass, whohad a vision of what this book might be. David and editorial coordinator AneesaDavenport have been enormously supportive in helping us bring this book tofruition. We thank you for your assistance throughout the project. We also wantto thank the panel of North American adult educators who helped us brainstormthemes and issues—Ralph Brockett, Tal Guy, Cathy Hansman, and VanessaSheared. Finally, we are indebted to our colleagues in adult education from acrossthe globe who authored the selections we chose for this reader. Without yourwork, this book would not exist, nor would our field be such an exciting anddynamic place to be!

Sharan B. MerriamAndré P. GraceJanuary, 2011

REFERENCE

National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) (2007). Adult education participation in2004-2005. Retrieved August 2010, from http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2006/adulted/

http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2006/adulted/

The Editors

Sharan B. Merriam is professor emeritus of adult education and qualitativeresearch at the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia, U.S. Merriam’s researchand writing activities have focused on adult and lifelong learning and qualitativeresearch methods. For five years she was coeditor of Adult Education Quarterly, themajor research and theory journal in adult education. She has published 26 booksand over 100 journal articles and book chapters. She is a four-time winner ofthe prestigious Cyril O. Houle World Award for Literature in Adult Educationfor books published in 1982, 1997, 1999, and 2007. Her most recent books areLearning in Adulthood (2007), Non-Western Perspectives on Learning and Knowing(2007), and Qualitative Research: A Guide to Design and Implementation (2009). In1998 she was a Fulbright scholar to Malaysia, and in 2006 she was a distinguishedvisiting scholar at Soongsil University in South Korea. From 2009 to 2010 shewas a senior research fellow at the Institute for Social Sciences, University PutraMalaysia.

André P. Grace is a professor in educational policy studies and director of theInstitute for Sexual Minority Studies and Services in the Faculty of Education,University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. He is a past president of the CanadianAssociation for the Study of Adult Education, and he is also a past chair ofthe Steering Committee for the Adult Education Research Conference in theU.S. His work in educational policy studies primarily focuses on comparativestudies of policies, pedagogies, and practices shaping lifelong learning as criticalaction, especially in the contexts of Organization for Economic Cooperation and

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Development (OECD) countries. Within this research he includes a major focus onsexual minorities and their issues and concerns regarding social inclusion, cohesion,and justice in education and culture. He and Tonette S. Rocco, coeditors of theJossey-Bass book Challenging the Professionalization of Adult Education: John Ohligerand Contradictions in Modern Practice, won the 2009 Phillip E. Frandson Awardfor Literature in the Field of Continuing Higher Education from the UniversityContinuing Education Association in the U.S. At the 2010 Standing Conferenceon University Teaching and Research in the Education of Adults, University ofWarwick, UK, he won the Ian Martin Award for Social Justice for his paperentitled Space Matters: Lifelong Learning, Sexual Minorities, and Realities of AdultEducation as Social Education.

About the Contributors

Laura L. Bierema is professor of adult education and human resource andorganizational development at the University of Georgia, Athens.

Ronald M. Cervero is professor in the Department of Lifelong Education,Administration, and Policy, associate dean for Outreach and Engagement in theCollege of Education, and codirector of the Institute for Evidence-Based HealthProfessions Education at the University of Georgia, Athens.

Valerie-Lee Chapman was assistant professor in the Department of Adult andCommunity College Education at North Carolina State University.

Kathryn Choules is social justice consultant for the Edmund Rice Institute forSocial Justice in Fremantle, Australia.

Patricia Cranton is visiting professor of adult education at Penn State Universityat Harrisburg and adjunct professor at Teachers College, Columbia University.

Barbara J. Daley is professor and department chair of the Department ofAdministrative Leadership at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

John M. Dirkx is professor of higher, adult, and lifelong education at MichiganState University and editor of the Journal of Transformative Education.

Cecilia Amaluisa Fiallos is a specialist in adult education and former NationalDirector of Lifelong Popular Education at the Ministry of Education, Ecuador.

Paulo Freire was a Brazilian educator and influential theorist of critical pedagogy.

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xxiv ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

Michelle Glowacki-Dudka is assistant professor of adult, higher, and communityeducation at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana.

Wanda Gordon is former program head of health sciences at University of theFraser Valley, Chilliwack, British Columbia.

Patricia A. Gouthro is a professor at Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifax,Nova Scotia.

Colin Griffin is Honorary Visiting Senior Fellow in the Department of Politicsat the University of Surrey, where he previously worked in the School ofEducational Studies.

Talmadge C. Guy is associate professor in the Department of Lifelong Education,Administration, and Policy at the University of Georgia, Athens.

Lora B. Helvie-Mason is assistant professor of communication studies at SouthernUniversity at New Orleans.

Robert J. Hill is associate professor of adult education at the University ofGeorgia, Athens.

Peter Jarvis is professor of continuing education at the University of Surrey.

Juanita Johnson-Bailey is professor of adult education and women’s studies atthe University of Georgia, Athens.

Deborah Kilgore is a research scientist in the Center for Engineering Learningand Teaching at the University of Washington.

Young Sek Kim is a lecturer at Dong-Eui University, Busan, South Korea.

Eduard C. Lindeman was an American educator, serving nearly all his years asa professor at the New York School of Social Work, later part of ColumbiaUniversity.

Alain Locke was an American writer, philosopher, educator, patron of thearts, and the chair of the department of philosophy at Howard University inWashington, D.C., for most of his career.

Kim L. Niewolny is assistant professor of adult and community education in theCollege of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Virginia Polytechnic Institute andState University.

Michael Newman is an educator, author, and consultant in the field of adulteducation.

Tom Nesbit is associate dean of continuing education at Simon Fraser University,Vancouver, British Columbia.

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS xxv

Phillip H. Owenby is an educator and consultant in Knoxville, Tennessee.

Julia Preece is professor of adult and continuing education and honorary seniorresearch fellow at the University of Glasgow.

Jennifer A. Sandlin is associate professor in the School of Social Transformationat Arizona State University, Tempe.

Thomas J. Sork is a professor of adult education and associate dean of ExternalPrograms and Learning Technologies in the Faculty of Education at theUniversity of British Columbia.

Ruud van der Veen is adjunct professor of adult learning and leadership atTeachers College, Columbia University.

Shirley Walters is professor of adult and continuing education and director ofthe Division for Lifelong Learning at the University of Western Cape, SouthAfrica.

Kristopher Wells is a researcher at the Institute for Sexual Minority Studies andServices, University of Alberta.

Arthur L. Wilson is professor of adult education and chair of the Department ofEducation at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.

P A R T ONE

DEFINING AFIELD OF

PRACTICE: THEFOUNDATIONS OF

ADULT EDUCATION

Giroux (1996) asserts, ‘‘History is not an artifact’’ (p. 51). From thisperspective, the history of adult education is alive, bringing issues of whois represented and who works for change to bear on theorizing, research,and practice. In our field of study and practice, a turn to history enables us toexplore people, politics, and ideas that have defined modern practice. It becomes away to reflect on what has been perceived as a divide exacerbating fragmentationof our field. On one side is adult education’s tradition as social education inthe spirit of initiatives like the Highlander Folk School and the AntigonishMovement. These social-learning endeavors variously focused on education forcitizenship, community building, recovering from economic and other hardships,and fighting oppression in the name of social justice. On the other side is the field’spragmatic tendency to respond to outside pressures to become more instrumentaland vocational in nature. However, we view engaging field history as more than

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2 PART ONE: DEFINING A FIELD OF PRACTICE

investigating this divide: It provides us opportunities to explore the degree towhich adult education can be spacious and filled with possibility as we set goalsto meet the instrumental, social, and cultural needs of learners. As well, a turn tohistory also enables us to think about what adult education might look like in thefuture:

At issue here is a vision of the future in which history is not accepted simply as a setof prescriptions unproblematically inherited from the past. History can be named andremade by those who refuse to stand by passively in the face of human suffering andoppression. (Giroux & McLaren, 1988, p. 176)

This vision, aimed at extending human possibilities, situates foundational studiesas dynamic, open, unsettled, subject to revision, and worth struggling over.

Such a view of history is reflected in the selections in this section thatincludes pieces from the original writings of three field icons: Eduard Lindeman,Alain Locke, and Paulo Freire. In Chapter 1, Lindeman, framing education as life,positions the field as a potentially liberating space for adult learners as he engageswhat adult education means. He provocatively suggests that adult education beginswhere vocational education ends. His work will appeal to reflective practitionersconcerned with holistic forms of learning and education that address currenteconomic, social, and cultural turmoil. Throughout his influential book TheMeaning of Adult Education, Lindeman (1926/1961) cast true adult education associal education that helps learners thrive as citizens living in community withothers. From this perspective, Chapter 1 considers motivations, concepts, andmethods that shape the learning process as it focuses on situations that requirelearners to draw on their experiences as they participate in problem solving.

In Chapter 2, Locke, a social and cultural educator who became the firstBlack president of the American Association for Adult Education from 1945 to1946 (Stubblefield & Keane, 1994), contests the historical notion of the BlackAmerican as a ‘‘problem’’ and speaks to the transformation of modern Blacks inearly 20th century U.S. culture through migration augmenting urbanization andthe intensification of race consciousness and solidarity. Locke’s work will speakto readers interested in the social history of recovery of Black morale throughpolitical participation aimed at attaining civil rights. Importantly for those interestedin revising the place of Black citizens in U.S. social history, his work explores theemergence of the Black American amid deterrents to this recovery including racialtensions, injustices, and the rapid spread of policies of segregation.