books about liberal education

Redesigning Liberal Education

edited by William Moner, Phillip Motley, and Rebecca Pope-Ruark foreword by Michael S. Roth

Redesigning liberal education requires both pragmatic approaches to discover what works and radical visions of what is possible. The future of liberal education in the United States, in its current form, is fraught but full of possibility. Today's institutions are struggling to maintain viability, sustain revenue, and assert value in the face of rising costs. But we should not abandon the model of pragmatic liberal learning that has made America's colleges and universities the envy of the world. Instead, Redesigning Liberal Education argues, we owe it to students to reform liberal education in...

Redesigning liberal education requires both pragmatic approaches to discover what works and radical visions of what is possible. The future of liberal education in the United States, in its current form, is fraught but full of possibility. Today's institutions are struggling to maintain viability, sustain revenue, and assert value in the face of rising costs. But we should not abandon the model of pragmatic liberal learning that has made America's colleges and universities the envy of the world. Instead, Redesigning Liberal Education argues, we owe it to students to reform liberal education in ways that put broad and measurable student learning as the highest priority.

Written by experts in higher education, the book is organized into two sections. The first section focuses on innovations at 13 institutions: Brown University, College of the Holy Cross, Connecticut College, Elon University, Florida International University, George Mason University, Georgetown University, Lasell College, Northeastern University, Rollins College, Smith College, Susquehanna University, and the University of Wisconsin–Green Bay. Chapters about these institutions consider the vast spectrum of opportunities and challenges currently faced by students, faculty, staff, and administrators, while also offering "radical visions" of the future of liberal education in the United States. Accompanying vision chapters written by some of the foremost leaders in higher education touch on a wide array of subjects and themes, from artificial intelligence and machines to the role that human dispositions, mindsets, resilience, and time play in how we guide students to ideas for bringing playful concepts of creativity and openness into our work.

Ultimately, Redesigning Liberal Education reveals how humanizing forces, including critical thinking, collaboration, cross-cultural competencies, resilience, and empathy, can help drive our world. This uplifting collection is a celebration of the innovative work being done to achieve the promise of a valuable, engaging, and practical undergraduate liberal education.

Isis Artze-Vega, Denise S. Bartell, Randy Bass, John Bodinger de Uriarte, Laurie Ann Britt-Smith, Jacquelyn Dively Brown, Phillip M. Carter, Nancy L. Chick, Michael J. Daley, Maggie Debelius, Janelle Papay Decato, Peter Felten, Ashley Finley, Dennis A. Frey Jr., Chris W. Gallagher, Evan A. Gatti, Lisa Gring-Pemble, Kristína Moss Gudrún Gunnarsdóttir, Anthony Hatcher, Toni Strollo Holbrook, Derek Lackaff, Leo Lambert, Kristin Lange, Sherry Lee Linkon, Anne M. Magro, Maud S. Mandel, Jessica Metzler, Borjana Mikic, William Moner, Phillip Motley, Matthew Pavesich, Uta G. Poiger, Rebecca Pope-Ruark, Michael Reder, Michael S. Roth, Emily Russell, Heather Russell, Ann Schenk, Michael Shanks, Susan Rundell Singer, Andrea A. Sinn, Christina Smith, Allison K. Staudinger, William M. Sullivan, Connie Svabo, Meredith Twombly, Betsy Verhoeven, David J. Voelker, Scott Windham, Mary C. Wright, Catherine Zeek

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This book is a treasure trove of innovative institutional examples and forward thinking about ways to increase the relevance and value of liberal education for both students and society.

The authors encourage colleges to imagine radically diverse ways to inspire students to recognize the value of liberal education for meaningful action in the world.

Redesigning Liberal Education builds its collective case for a new twenty-first-century liberal education. The key here is design: deliberate, iterative, focused on needs and goals. The authors show how to create learning conditions that help all learners develop flexible dispositions that address the real challenges of the twenty-first century.

A wide-ranging exploration of institutional and learning innovations, this is an illuminating study of how educators are transforming liberal education today. Even more importantly, it offers valuable perspectives on the future as liberal education must continue to evolve to meet the needs of learners in a rapidly changing world.

Redesigning Liberal Education explores the urgent question of how to give twenty-first-century students the sort of holistic, transformative learning they need and deserve. At once radically innovative and deeply grounded in the values of liberal learning, the collected case studies and essays offer a provocative, inspiring guide to the best possibilities of change.

Book Details

Foreword, by Michael S. Roth Acknowledgments Introduction. A Radical Vision for Redesigning Liberal Education William Moner, Phillip Motley, and Rebecca Pope-Ruark Part I. Case Studies Chapter 1. Problem

Foreword, by Michael S. Roth Acknowledgments Introduction. A Radical Vision for Redesigning Liberal Education William Moner, Phillip Motley, and Rebecca Pope-Ruark Part I. Case Studies Chapter 1. Problem-Focused Liberal Education in a First-Year Learning Community at the University of Wisconsin – Green Bay Denise S. Bartell, Alison K. Staudinger, and David J. Voelker Chapter 2. Attending to Local Context, Culture, and Language at Florida International University Isis Artze-Vega, Phillip M. Carter, and Heather Russell Chapter 3. The Experiential Liberal Arts: An Integrative Model for Twenty-First-Century Education at Northeastern University Chris W. Gallagher and Uta G. Poiger Chapter 4. Creating Connections: An Intentional, Integrated Liberal Education at Connecticut College Michael Reder and Ann Schenk Chapter 5. Building a Developmental, Interdisciplinary General Education Curriculum for the Future: Foundations in the Liberal Arts at Rollins College Emily Russell, Susan Rundell Singer, and Toni Strollo Holbrook Chapter 6. Exploring the Borderlands: Using Interdisciplinarity to Build Civic Literacy at the College of the Holy Cross Laurie Ann Britt-Smith Chapter 7. Redesigning Learning through Multidisciplinary Teaching: Voices from a Sophomore Core Experience at Lasell University Michael J. Daley, Dennis A. Frey Jr., and Catherine Zeek Chapter 8. Intergenerational Partnerships to Support Liberal Learning Goals at Brown University Mary C. Wright, Maud S. Mandel, Jessica Metzler, and Christina Smith Chapter 9. The Design Thinking Initiative at Smith College Borjana Mikic Chapter 10. Immersive Learning in the Studio for Social Innovation at Elon University Rebecca Pope-Ruark, William Moner, and Phillip Motley Chapter 11. Failing Forward: Writing, Design, and Organic Curricular Change at Georgetown University Maggie Debelius, Sherry Lee Linkon, and Matthew Pavesich Chapter 12. Educating Business Leaders for a Better World at George Mason University Lisa Gring-Pemble, Anne M. Magro, and Jacquelyn Dively Brown Chapter 13. Educating for Global Civic Participation and a Career: German Studies in the Twenty-First Century at Elon University Scott Windham, Andrea A. Sinn, Kristin Lange, Derek Lackaff, Anthony Hatcher, Evan A. Gatti, and Janelle Papay Decato Chapter 14. Pursuing Major Passions: Innovative Minors That Blend Professional Skills and Liberal Education Values for Civic Pursuits at Susquehanna University John Bodinger de Uriarte and Betsy Verhoeven Part II. Visions for the Future of Liberal Education Chapter 15. The Future Has Gone Soft on Skills: Why Campuses Should Be Working Harder to Cement Personal and Social Development with Learning Ashley Finley Chapter 16. Can We Liberate Liberal Education? Randy Bass Chapter 17. Aligning Liberal Education for an Age of Inequality William M. Sullivan Chapter 18. Slow: Liberal Learning for and in a Fast-Paced World Nancy L. Chick and Peter Felten Chapter 19. Shifting Paradigms: College Admissions as a Lever for Systemic Change in Liberal Education Kristína Moss Gudrún Gunnarsdóttir and Meredith Twombly Chapter 20. Scholartistry: Creativity and the Future of the Liberal Arts Michael Shanks and Connie Svabo Afterword. The Age of Connectedness Leo Lambert Appendix 1 Appendix 2 Contributors Index

William Moner

Phillip motley.

Rebecca Pope-Ruark, PhD

Michael s. roth.

with Hopkins Press Books

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31 Introduction

• Published: January 1996
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Liberal education has always had its full share of theorists, believers, and detractors, both inside and outside the academy. The best of these have been responsible for the evolutionary development of the concept of liberal education, for its changing tradition, and for the resultant adaptation of educational institutions to serve the needs of society. This book is the result of a meeting, primarily of believers, held at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in April 1994. The reason for calling it was not simply to consider the unpleasant omens for liberal education that have been appearing as the end of a millennium is reached. A pessimist would include among them the end of the long period of economic growth for colleges, the decline of public support, the discovery that financial aid for tuition can be an Achilles' heel in times of rising costs, and the increasingly uncritical dependence of the public on the mass media and information technology, as well as a host of other external pressures and internal confusions. The meeting was called primarily to inspire further reflection on how liberal education can best continue to serve the healthy functioning of democratic society despite these apparent obstacles, for this concept still deserves a central pedestal in the educational pantheon. Presidents and chief academic officers of eighty liberal arts undergraduate institutions participated in the meeting, along with a dozen scholars and a few leaders of educational associations. Nine of the presentations from the symposium are included in this volume, accompanied by a statement prepared by all of the participants representing their general agreement about liberal education. The four-day symposium was sponsored by the Educational Leadership Program of the Christian A. Johnson Foundation and the American Council of Learned Societies. The Educational Leadership Program conducts research and seminars for college and school administrators. The American Council of Learned Societies supports scholarly research in the humanities.

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Idealism and Liberal Education

An eloquent tribute to the value of the liberal education

Description

With refreshing eloquence, James O. Freedman sets down the American ideals that have informed his life as an intellectual, a law professor, and a college and university president. He examines the content and character of liberal education, discusses the importance of letters and learning in forming his own life and values, and explores how the lessons and the habits of mind instilled by a liberal education can give direction and meaning to one's life. He offers a stirring defense of affirmative action in higher education. And he describes how, in the midst of undergoing chemotherapy for cancer, liberal education helped him in that most human of desires--the yearning to make order and sense out of his experience. Part intellectual biography and part examination of the world of higher education, Idealism and Liberal Education is a quintessentially American book, animated by a confidence that reason, knowledge, idealism, and the better angels of our natures will further human progress. Freedman offers, as models for shaping one's life, profiles of some of his heroes--Thurgood Marshall, Alexander M. Bickel, Václav Havel, Louis D. Brandeis, Felix Frankfurter, Hugo L. Black, Flannery O'Connor, Eudora Welty, George Orwell, Edmund Wilson, Martin Luther King, Jr., George F. Kennan, Ralph J. Bunche, and Harry S Truman. This volume speaks to all Americans who are drawn to the power of liberal education and democratic citizenship and who yearn for the inspiration to lead thoughtful, committed lives. "This thought-provoking book should be required reading for young people entering college and for the people who advise them. Freedman explores the purpose and importance of a liberal education in shaping values, character, and imagination and convincingly argues for the need for the wisdom and perspective it provides, whatever one's chosen field."--Marian Wright Edelman, President, Children's Defense Fund "In this wide-ranging series of essays, Freedman reveals himself again as one of America's most erudite, articulate, and reflective university presidents. Students, parents, fellow presidents, and all who love learning will find something in these pages to ponder with profit."--Derek Bok, Former President, Harvard University Idealism and Liberal Education is an inspiring intellectual diary of James O. Freedman. . . . It is a forceful affirmation of liberal education as a social and cultural force in shaping the minds and characters of our youth as future citizens and leaders of our democracy. It is a tribute to the joy of learning."--Vartan Gregorian, President, Brown University "Beautifully written and a pleasure to read. At a time when the idea of the liberal university is under attack from all sides, Freedman has given a wondrous personal reaffirmation of its place in our lives."--David Halberstam James O. Freedman is President of Dartmouth College.

James O. Freedman is President of Dartmouth College.

"Beautifully written and a pleasure to read. At a time when the idea of the liberal university is under attack from all sides, Freedman has given a wondrous personal reaffirmation of its place in our lives." —David Halberstam - David Halberstam

"In this wide-ranging series of essays, Freedman reveals himself again as one of America's most erudite, articulate, and reflective university presidents. Students, parents, fellow presidents, and all who love learning will find something in these pages to ponder with profit." —Derek Bok, Former President, Harvard University - Derek Bok, Former President, Harvard University

"This thought-provoking book should be required reading for young people entering college and for the people who advise them. Freedman explores the purpose and importance of a liberal education in shaping values, character, and imagination and convincingly argues for the need for the wisdom and perspective it provides, whatever one's chosen field." —Marian Wright Edelman, President, Children's Defense Fund - Marian Wright Edelman, President, Children's Defense Fund

" Idealism and Liberal Education is an inspiring intellectual diary of James O. Freedman. . . . It is a forceful affirmation of liberal education as a social and cultural force in shaping the minds and characters of our youth as future citizens and leaders of our democracy. It is a tribute to the joy of learning." —Vartan Gregorian, President, Brown University - Vartan Gregorian, President, Brown University

School's out

A critical take on education and schooling

The 50 great books on education

Professor of Education, University of Derby

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I have often argued that I would not let any teacher into a school unless – as a minimum – they had read, carefully and well, the three great books on education: Plato’s Republic, Rousseau’s Émile and Dewey’s Democracy and Education. There would be no instrumental purpose in this, but the struggle to understand these books and the thinking involved in understanding them would change teachers and ultimately teaching.

These are the three great books because each is sociologically whole. They each present a description and arguments for an education for a particular and better society. You do not have to agree with these authors. Plato’s tripartite education for a just society ruled over by philosopher kings; Rousseau’s education through nature to establish the social contract and Dewey’s relevant, problem-solving democratic education for a democratic society can all be criticised. That is not the point. The point is to understand these great works. They constitute the intellectual background to any informed discussion of education.

What of more modern works? I used to recommend the “blistering indictment” of the flight from traditional liberal education that is Melanie Phillips’s All Must Have Prizes, to be read alongside Tom Bentley’s Learning Beyond the Classroom: Education for a Changing World, which is a defence of a wider view of learning for the “learning age”. These two books defined the debate in the 1990s between traditional education by authoritative teachers and its rejection in favour of a new learning in partnership with students.

Much time and money is spent on teacher training and continuing professional development and much of it is wasted. A cheaper and better way of giving student teachers and in-service teachers an understanding of education would be to get them to read the 50 great works on education.

The books I have identified, with the help of members of the Institute of Ideas’ Education Forum, teachers and colleagues at several universities, constitute an attempt at an education “canon”.

What are “out” of my list are textbooks and guides to classroom practice. What are also “out” are novels and plays. But there are some great literary works that should be read by every teacher: Charles Dicken’s Hard Times – for Gradgrind’s now much-needed celebration of facts; D. H. Lawrence’s The Rainbow – for Ursula Brangwen’s struggle against her early child-centred idealism in the reality of St Philips School; and Alan Bennett’s The History Boys – for Hector’s role as the subversive teacher committed to knowledge.

I hope I have produced a list of books, displayed here in alphabetical order, that are held to be important by today’s teachers. I make no apology for including the book I wrote with Kathryn Ecclestone, The Dangerous Rise of Therapeutic Education because it is an influential critical work that has produced considerable controversy. If you disagree with this, or any other of my choices, please add your alternative “canonical” books on education.

Michael W. Apple – Official Knowledge: Democratic Education in a Conservative Age (1993)

Hannah Arendt – Between Past and Future (1961), for the essay “The Crisis in Education” (1958)

Matthew Arnold – Culture and Anarchy (1867-9)

Robin Barrow – Giving Teaching Back to the Teachers (1984)

Tom Bentley – Learning Beyond The Classroom: Education for a Changing World (1998)

Allan Bloom – The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today’s Students (1987)

Pierre Bourdieu and Jean-Claude Passeron – Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture (1977)

Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis – Schooling in Capitalist America: Educational Reform and the Contradictions of Economic Life (1976)

Jerome Bruner – The Process of Education (1960)

John Dewey – Democracy and Education (1916)

Margaret Donaldson – Children’s Minds (1978)

JWB Douglas – The Home and the School (1964)

Kathryn Ecclestone and Dennis Hayes – The Dangerous Rise of Therapeutic Education (2008)

Harold Entwistle – Antonio Gramsci: Conservative Schooling for Radical Politics (1979).

Paulo Freire – Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1968/1970)

Frank Furedi – Wasted: Why Education Isn’t Educating (2009)

Helene Guldberg – Reclaiming Childhood (2009)

ED Hirsch Jnr. – The Schools We Need And Why We Don’t Have Them (1999)

Paul H Hirst – Knowledge and the Curriculum (1974) For the essay which appears as Chapter 3 ‘Liberal Education and the Nature of Knowledge’ (1965)

John Holt – How Children Fail (1964)

Eric Hoyle – The Role of the Teacher (1969)

James Davison Hunter – The Death of Character: Moral Education in an Age without Good or Evil (2000)

Ivan Illich – Deschooling Society (1971)

Nell Keddie (Ed.) – Tinker, Taylor: The Myth of Cultural Deprivation (1973)

John Locke – Some Thoughts Concerning Education (1692)

John Stuart Mill – Autobiography (1873)

Sybil Marshall – An Experiment in Education (1963)

Alexander Sutherland Neil – Summerhill: A Radical Approach to Child Rearing (1960)

John Henry Newman – The Idea of a University (1873)

Michael Oakeshott – The Voice of Liberal Learning (1989) In particular for the essay “Education: The Engagement and Its Frustration” (1972)

Anthony O’ Hear – Education, Society and Human Nature: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education (1981)

Richard Stanley Peters – Ethics and Education (1966)

Melanie Phillips – All Must Have Prizes (1996)

Plato – The Republic (366BC?)

Plato – Protagoras (390BC?) and Meno (387BC?)

Neil Postman – The End of Education: Redefining the Value of School (1995)

Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner – Teaching as a Subversive Activity (1969)

Herbert Read – Education Through Art (1943)

Carl Rogers – Freedom to Learn: A View of What Education Might Become (1969)

Jean-Jacques Rousseau – Émile or “on education” (1762)

Bertrand Russell – On Education (1926)

Israel Scheffler – The Language of Education (1960)

Brian Simon – Does Education Matter? (1985) Particularly for the paper “Why No Pedagogy in England?” (1981)

JW Tibble (Ed.) – The Study of Education (1966)

Lev Vygotsky – Thought and Language (1934/1962)

Alfred North Whitehead – The Aims of Education and other essays (1929)

Paul E. Willis – Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs (1977)

Alison Wolf – Does Education Matter? Myths about Education and Economic Growth (2002)

Michael FD Young (Ed) – Knowledge and Control: New Directions for the Sociology of Education (1971)

Michael FD Young – Bringing Knowledge Back In: From Social Constructivism to Social Realism in the Sociology of Education (2007)

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• Redefining Liberal Arts Education in the Twenty-First Century

In this Book

• Edited by Robert E. Luckett Jr. Foreword by William D. Adams
• Published by: University Press of Mississippi

Table of Contents

• Half-Title Page, Title Page, Copyright
• Foreword. A Robust Liberal Arts Education: Opportunities and Concerns in the Twenty-First Century
• William D. Adams
• Introduction. Collaboration and Interdisciplinarity in the Knowledge Economy
• Candis Pizzetta
• Part 1: Digital Humanities, Technology, and the Liberal Arts
• Chapter 1. Digital Humanities as a LEAP High-Impact Practice
• Seretha D. Williams
• Chapter 2. Technology in the Liberal Arts Classroom: Updating the Classroom Toolkit
• Monica Flippin Wynn
• Chapter 3. Teaching Art History to STEM
• Yumi Park Huntington
• Part 2: The Arts and the Liberal Arts
• Chapter 4. An Interdisciplinary Approach to Cultivating Visual Literacy
• Sarah Archino
• Chapter 5. Revisiting Erwin Panofsky's "The History of Art as a Humanistic Discipline"
• Floyd W. Martin
• Chapter 6. Dancing the Humanities: Engaging with Liberal Arts Education
• Lauren Ashlee Messina
• Part 3: Pedagogy and the Liberal Arts
• Chapter 7. Test-Oriented Pedagogy in the Teaching of Communication Skills
• Helen O. Chukwuma
• Chapter 8. Flexible Thought for the Test-Focused Student
• Kathy Root Pitts
• pp. 104-117
• Chapter 9. Developing a More Student-Sensitive Approach in the Liberal Arts
• Lawrence Sledge
• pp. 118-130
• Part 4: Writing and the Liberal Arts
• Chapter 10. Conversation in the Writing Center: Developing Student Rhetorical Awareness, Critical Thinking, and Translingual Dispositions
• Tatiana Glushko, Kathi R. Griffin
• pp. 133-151
• Chapter 11. Translingualism, Transhistoricism, and Shakespeare in a Freshman Seminar
• Eric J. Griffin
• pp. 152-168
• Chapter 12. The Liberal Arts Faculty Writing Boot Camp
• Preselfannie W. McDaniels, Byron D'Andra Orey, Rico D. Chapman, Monica Flippin Wynn
• pp. 169-180
• Part 5: Social Issues and the Liberal Arts
• Chapter 13. You Can't Say That: Warnings, Political Correctness, and Academic Freedom
• Rashell R. Smith-Spears
• pp. 183-195
• Chapter 14. Not All Apples Are Red
• Katrina Byrd
• pp. 196-207
• Chapter 15. Liberal Arts and Humanities as "Molders of Consensus" in the Public Arena
• Thomas M. Kersen
• pp. 208-222
• Part 6: The African American Experience and the Liberal Arts
• Chapter 16. Historical Memory and the Meredith Monument at Ole Miss
• Robert E. Luckett, Jr.
• pp. 225-242
• Chapter 17. [Re]Engineering a New Liberal Arts Experience: Future Studies and HBCUs
• Joseph Martin Stevenson, Dawn Bishop McLin, Karen C. Wilson-Stevenson
• pp. 243-257
• Conclusion. Redefining Liberal Arts Education: Challenges and Opportunities
• Mario J. Azevedo
• pp. 258-274
• About the Contributors
• pp. 275-280

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Reader's Guide to a Liberal Education (Harvard Classics Project) Kindle Edition

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• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B089723MH7
• Publication date ‏ : ‎ May 26, 2020
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• File size ‏ : ‎ 1535 KB
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About the author

Amanda kennedy.

Amanda Kennedy is a writer and editor who lives in the North of England. She is an advocate for lifelong learning, and has previously published Harvard Classics 365: A Liberal Education in a Year and an updated, extensively annotated edition of Lectures (volume 51 of The Harvard Classics) retitled: Lectures for a Liberal Education.

Currently, she is working on a long-term project to rekindle interest in the Delphian course of learning and a year-long devotional dedicated to classical female writers. Learn more about Amanda and her work at www.amandakennedy.co.uk

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The Great Books

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At the heart of the Thomas Aquinas College curriculum are the great books, the original works of the greatest minds in our tradition, both ancient and modern. The College’s syllabus is composed exclusively of the seminal texts that have, for good or for ill, animated Western civilization. Each one speaks to the reality at the core of human experience, a reality that transcends time or place.

Studied carefully and sequentially, the great books explore the workings of the natural world, consider the most profound realities about the human person, and culminate in a contemplation of the greatest mysteries of God Himself. Members of the faculty guide small groups of students in discussions of these works, but the ultimate teachers are the authors themselves, especially the Church’s Universal Doctor, St. Thomas Aquinas .

Yet the great books are not the objects of study at the College. Students here do not read these works — Homer, Shakespeare, Plato, Euclid, St. Augustine, Descartes, Newton, and so many others — as outstanding examples of the creativity of the human spirit (though that they certainly are). Nor do they read them to become more familiar with Western culture and civilization (valuable though that is). Rather, Thomas Aquinas College students read the great books because, more than any other works, when studied under the light of the teaching Church, they can open up the truth about reality.

By reading and discussing the great books, with their vigorous — and sometimes conflicting — arguments, students here learn how to discern the truth, how to distinguish it from error, and how to defend it. They become gradually ever more like Aristotle’s exemplar of the liberally educated person, “critical in all or nearly all the branches of learning,” able to live a truly free and humane life — a life lived in the truth.

“The Great Books … raise questions and pursue inquiries which arise directly from a wonder about things themselves. On this account, they are of the greatest importance to beginners, for they begin where thought itself must begin if it is to bear any fruit.”

— From “Why the Great Books?” by Marcus A. Berquist

© 2024 Thomas Aquinas College Board of Governors. All rights reserved.

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How To Get A Liberal Arts Education (Without Going To University)

While the Classical Liberal Arts typically fall at the bottom of the education hierarchy today, I think it’s one of the most valuable education curriculums you can follow to prepare yourself for an uncertain future.

Why? Because nobody can predict which technical or job skills will stay in-demand in a future that will be dominated by robots and artificial intelligence. But studying emerging trends, we do know that we will need to train the uniquely human qualities that can’t be replicated by machines.

These uniquely human qualities are what make us effective leaders and good communicators: creativity, empathy, social intelligence, curiosity, storytelling and adaptability.

The Liberal Arts has a bad reputation because it has the lowest barriers to entry of University degrees and it often attracts students that can’t get into the more competitive disciplines in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). In these technical disciplines, you will fall behind very quickly if you don’t diligently focus for long periods of time and complete the daily work assignments.

However, if you really dedicate yourself to studying the Classical Liberal Arts it can be one of the most challenging and helpful University degrees. There are few forms of higher education more effective at building individuals with strong character who are well-rounded and flexible in the face of disruptive change.

And now thanks to the Internet, you don’t necessary have to go up to a 100K in debt to get a Liberal Arts education. For a fraction of the cost of a University degree, you create your own own Liberal Arts education while traveling the world and directly experiencing the fascinating cultures, history and museums across the cultural mosaic of human civilization.

What Is The Meaning of Liberalism?

A Classical Liberal Arts education studying the Trivium and Quadrivium while reading the classical and modern work of literature and philosophy that form the generally agreed upon Liberal Arts canon in Western education.

Another important component is regularly debating the most important issues of our day and the human condition with other intelligent and informed people who can challenge you to see your own cogntive biases and reality tunnels .

While the classical meaning of liberalism is often bastardized by pundits in the media, a liberal is a someone who works to freed himself or herself from the bigotry, authoritarian attitudes and established dogmas.

Liberalism often gets a bad name because of the elitism attached to attaining a Liberal Arts education at a prestigious University. Many highly educated people perpetuate this elitism through their often thinly-veiled contempt for people of lower educational attainment and lesser financial means.

This is misguided. A real liberal is someone who seeks the freedom and equality of all people — everywhere in the world —  and does not allow him or herself to be caged by any institutional, ideological or class biases.

The 4-Year Liberal Arts Reading List

This 4-Year Year Liberal Arts reading list is a guide to many of history’s most important books at least from a Western perspective (please feel free to share a similar canon from other cultures that has been translated into English in the comments).

If you read the books on this 4-year Liberal Arts reading list you can learn directly from the thinking patterns of history’s greatest thinkers and I can guarantee it will transform your world and make you a better person.

This reading list has been reviewed yearly since 1937 by the Liberal Arts faculty at St. John’s College to create a generally agreed upon Liberal Arts curriculum that anyone can study in their own time.

The first two years span over 2,000 years of intellectual history and the last two years are from the last 300 years that have seen the development of the ideas that underpin the science and freedom we enjoy in the modern world.

The Liberal Arts reading list is organized in chronological order but you don’t necessary need to read these books in any particular order.

If you’re really determined, you can complete the entire Liberal Arts canon in about 4 years by reading a book every 1-2 weeks (some larger books will take longer to read though)

However, for most people this education may stretch on for decades as you read the books on the list that most interest you (and I’ve also created a 21st Century Reading List of other books I recommend reading as well).

1st Year: Greek Civilization and the Classical Liberal Arts

The foundation of Western Civilization was laid by the Greeks. Pythagorus, socrates, Plato and Aristotle created a liberal renaissance in the ancient European world.

The Socratic Method and The Trivium still form of the foundation of one the best systems ever created for critical thinking and rational debate.

• HOMER:  Iliad, Odyssey
• AESCHYLUS:  Agamemnon, Libation Bearers, Eumenides, Prometheus Bound
• SOPHOCLES:  Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone, Philoctetes, Ajax
• THUCYDIDES:  Peloponnesian War
• EURIPIDES:  Hippolytus, Bacchae
• HERODOTUS:  Histories
• ARISTOPHANES:  Clouds
• PLATO (SOCRATES):  Meno, Gorgias, Republic, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Symposium, Parmenides, Theaetetus, Sophist, Timaeus, Phaedrus
• ARISTOTLE:  Poetics, Physics, Metaphysics, Nicomachean Ethics, On Generation and Corruption, Politics, Parts of Animals, Generation of Animals
• EUCLID:  Elements
• LUCRETIUS:  On the Nature of Things
• PLUTARCH:  Lycurgus, Solon
• NICOMACHUS:  Arithmetic
• LAVOISIER:  Elements of Chemistry
• HARVEY:  Motion of the Heart and Blood
• Essays by: Archimedes, Fahrenheit, Avogadro, Dalton, Cannizzaro, Virchow, Mariotte, Driesch, Gay-Lussac, Spemann, Stears, J.J. Thompson, Mendeleyev, Berthollet, J.L. Proust

2nd Year: Roman, Medieval and Renaissance Periods

The Roman Empire lasted nearly 700 years before collapsing under the weight of its immorality and greed.

The period known as the Dark Ages followed, which was characterized by illiteracy and the authoritarian rule of the Catholic Church until the Italian Renaissance and birth of modern world.

• THE HEBREW BIBLE
• THE BIBLE: New Testament
• ARISTOTLE:  De Anima ,  On Interpretation ,  Prior Analytics ,  Categories
• APOLLONIUS:  Conic s
• VIRGIL:  Aeneid
• PLUTARCH: “Caesar,” “Cato the Younger,” “Antony,” “Brutus”
• EPICTETUS:  Discourses , Manual
• TACITUS:  Annals
• PTOLEMY:  Almagest
• PLOTINUS:  The Enneads
• AUGUSTINE:  Confessions
• MAIMONIDES:  Guide for the Perplexed
• ST. ANSELM:  Proslogium
• AQUINAS:  Summa Theologica
• DANTE:  Divine Comedy
• CHAUCER:  Canterbury Tales
• MACHIAVELLI:  The Prince, Discourses
• KEPLER:  Epitome IV
• RABELAIS:  Gargantua  and  Pantagruel
• PALESTRINA:  Missa Papae Marcelli
• MONTAIGNE:  Essays
• VIETE:  Introduction to the Analytical Art
• BACON:  Novum Organum
• SHAKESPEARE:  Richard II, Henry IV, The Tempest, As You Like It, Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth, King Lear, and Sonnets
• POEMS BY: Marvell, Donne, and other 16th- and 17th-century poets
• DESCARTES:  Geometry, Discourse on Method
• PASCAL:  Generation of Conic Sections
• BACH:  St. Matthew Passion ,  Inventions
• HAYDN:  Quartets
• MOZART: Operas
• BEETHOVEN:  Third Symphony
• SCHUBERT: Songs
• MONTEVERDI:  L’Orfeo
• STRAVINSKY:  Symphony of Psalms

 3rd Year: The Enlightenment in the 17th and 18th Centuries

The separation of the church and state led to the Enlightenment and a new golden age of scholarship and innovation for the modern nations who freed themselves from religious theocracy.

It also lead to the despiritualization of the Universe and the dehumanization of people who resisted the evangelical zeal of Western science and religion.

• CERVANTES:  Don Quixote
• GALILEO:  Two New Sciences
• HOBBES : Leviathan
• DESCARTES:  Meditations, Rules for the Direction of the Mind
• MILTON:  Paradise Lost
• LA ROCHEFOUCAULD:  Maximes
• LA FONTAINE:  Fables
• PASCAL:  Pensees
• HUYGENS:  Treatise on Light, On the Movement of Bodies by Impact
• ELIOT:  Middlemarch
• SPINOZA:  Theological-Political Treatise
• LOCKE:  Second Treatise of Government
• RACINE:  Phaedre
• NEWTON:  Principia Mathematica
• LEIBNIZ:  Monadology, Discourse on Metaphysics, Essay On Dynamics, Philosophical Essays, Principles of Nature and Grace
• SWIFT:  Gulliver’s Travels
• HUME:  Treatise of Human Nature
• ROUSSEAU:  Social Contract, The Origin of Inequality
• MOLIERE:  Le Misanthrope
• ADAM SMITH:  Wealth of Nations
• KANT:  Critique of Pure Reason, Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals
• MOZART:  Don Giovanni
• JANE AUSTEN:  Pride and Prejudice
• DEDEKIND: “Essay on the Theory of Numbers”
• “Articles of Confederation,” “Declaration of Independence,” “Constitution of the United States of America”
• HAMILTON, JAY AND MADISON:  The Federalist
• TWAIN:  The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
• WORDSWORTH:  The Two Part Prelude of 1799
• Essays by:  Young, Taylor, Euler, D. Bernoulli, Orsted, Ampere, Faraday, Maxwell

 4th Year: The Modern World In The 19th and 20th Centuries

The liberal ideals, laws and sciences provided the foundation for the modern world and many of the ideas and philosophies today come from much deeper roots.

These books can help you develop a better understanding the freedoms and flaws of the modern world.

• Supreme Court opinions
• GOETHE:  Faust
• DARWIN:  Origin of Species
• HEGEL:  Phenomenology of Mind , “Logic” (from the Encyclopedia)
• LOBACHEVSKY:  Theory of Parallels
• TOCQUEVILLE:  Democracy in America
• LINCOLN: Selected Speeches
• FREDERICK DOUGLASS: Selected Speeches
• KIERKEGAARD:  Philosophical Fragments, Fear and Trembling
• WAGNER:  Tristan and Isolde
• MARX:  Capital, Political and Economic Manuscripts of 1844, The German Ideology
• DOSTOEVSKI:  Brothers Karamazov
• TOLSTOY:  War and Peace
• MELVILLE:  Benito Cereno
• O’CONNOR: Selected Stories
• WILLIAM JAMES;  Psychology, Briefer Course
• NIETZSCHE:  Beyond Good and Evil
• FREUD: Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis
• BOOKER T. WASHINGTON: Selected Writings
• DUBOIS:  The Souls of Black Folk
• HUSSERL:  Crisis of the European Sciences
• HEIDEGGER:  Basic Writings
• EINSTEIN: Selected papers
• CONRAD:  Heart of Darkness
• FAULKNER:  Go Down Moses
• FLAUBERT:  Un Coeur Simple
• WOOLF:  Mrs. Dalloway
• Poems by: Yeats, T.S. Eliot, Wallace Stevens, Valery, Rimbaud
• Essays by: Faraday, J.J. Thomson, Millikan, Minkowski, Rutherford, Davisson, Schrodinger, Bohr, Maxwell, de Broglie, Heisenberg, Mendel, Boveri, Sutton, Morgan, Beadle & Tatum, Sussman, Watson & Crick, Jacob & Monod, Hardy

Since nearly all of these books are in the public domain, you can find them for free online. You can search any of these books on the Project Gutenberg and download them directly to your tablet, smartphone or e-reader.

I have also created guides to classic ebooks and audiobooks that I recommend reading. If you find this resource valuable, please share the knowledge of the Liberal Education canon with your friends and family.

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Thanks to this article, I’m now reading books that I would’ve never otherwise read. I noticed that you said the literature would be listed in chronological order but I couldn’t help but notice how Thucydides shows up on the list before Herodotus. Is this on purpose? Thanks!

Ever since I found this posting last , I’ve been systematically reading the books. (By January, I’ll be finished with the 1st Year’s works.)

And even though St John post’s their reading list on their site (albeit a slightly different, updated one), I’ve found the content useful in framing the utility and cultural nourishment reading, discussing and analyzing these works provides.

Wanted to just say thanks very much for putting this here, and am greatly looking forward to the next three years of the great Western Cannon!

Translations of Avicenna’s work, particularly ‘De Anima’ and the ‘Canon of Medicine’, should be included in Year 2, along with Averroes’ commentaries on Aristotle and Plato’s Republic. As for the 4th year, I cannot fathom how you have managed to leave out Foucault’s ‘Discipline and Punish’ and the first volume of ‘A History of Sexuality’. ‘A Secular Age’ by Charles Taylor, and Macintyre’s ‘After Virtue’ would be good editions to this section, as will Judith Butler’s ‘Gender Trouble’ and Edward Said’s ‘Orientalism’. It might also be worthwhile to add a number of critically acclaimed films to this section and an accompanying short textbook on film studies.

This is a great list! I added a lot of this to my Excel Sheet of books to read/buy in the next couple years. However, in my opinion, any list of Great Books must include Tolkien’s masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings. By far the most influential novel of the 20th Century. Thanks for putting this together! Like I said, I added a lot of this to my future reading list. Cheers!

Congrats Kyle, I too recently came upon your site and as I’m considering furthering my ‘light’ education, your reading list gives me a great starting point, it’s funny as today I visited my favourite 2nd hand book store seeking similiar titles to begin reading, sadly none were available. Many thanks and will be sourcing the books from other providers. Regards.

السلام عليكم And what about The Islamic Civilization its scientists and philosophers and …. like : al-Khwarizmi ( Algoritmi ), Ibn Khaldun ,Avicenna, Averroes, Ibn al-Nafis, Alhazen … etc Whose laid The foundation of Western Civilization too

I’m not familiar with them, feel free to share some of your book recommendations with our readers!

Kyle, thank you for this brother. Look forward to embarking on this journey, taking on your incredible curriculum. May life and the world grant you its gifts in abundance. I would appreciate any advice from you to make this journey as smooth as possible.

I think that it would be useful to include a study of anacycloses, since the curriculum deals extensively with history, and anacycloses is the study of time. with regards to this, I would refer to Polybius Ibn Khalduns Mukadiama and the political writings of Ian Dallas.

I also believe in addition to this curriculum a study of psychoanalysis is paramount since it gives a deep understanding of emotional drives that cause people to act in certain ways

And what about the India Civilization scientists and philosophers like Aryabhata, Brahmagupta, Sushruta who laid the foundation of Arabic Civilization (Like the so called Arabic numbers – originally derived from Indian Decimal System) and later on the so called Western Civilisation? 😉 Just google the names and you will get enough citations.

Just stumbled upon your website and I just have to say I love it so much. Love the articles, something that’s really up my ally being an autodidact myself. I really want to study the Liberal arts next and reading your article, it seems like you’re also studying it. How much time do you spend each day on studying them. Just curious. Oh have you read How To Read A Book by Mortimer Adler and The Well Educated Mind by Susan Bauer? I think they are good books to start with before starting the endeavor of studying the Liberal arts.

I’d recommend 1-2 hours a day. I find audiobooks also help to listen on-the-go. I haven’t read those books but I’ve heard the Well-Educated Mind is excellent.

Hello Kyle,

Though I appreciate the work that went into developing your, “How To Get A Liberal Arts Education (Without Going To University)” instructional web page, I just have one question. You mentioned, “A real liberal is someone who seeks the freedom and equality of all people — everywhere in the world — and does not allow him or herself to be caged by any institutions or class biases.” What I find interesting, more than what is included in your (suggested) four-year curriculum, is what is not included. If you insist that, in order to be, “a real liberal” one must not be “caged by any institutions or class biases”, than this list is dead on balls-accurate. But in order to acquire some sense of liberalism, you left out a plethora of figures who would help people to do just that. You left out thinkers such as: Abelard, Erasmus, Plotinus, Origen, Boethius, Bernard, Ockham, Bacon, Hume, John Stuart Mill, Burke, (William) James, Popper, and Hayek.

As an example, it’s important to understand, for instance, that HEGEL and HEIDEGGER, probably are the greatest influences toward moving pre-WWII German students squarely into the heart of Naziism, with such ideas like HEIDEGGER’S that existence is, “not for every man but only for the strong”, but then to not offer on your list another thinker who could provide a direct counter-point to that, for instance, Karl Popper.

In my opinion, Liberal-ism, (not just being a liberal), is a pursuit of a more classical ideal, rather than a pseudo-political ideal. Therefore, and having read most of what is on your list, in addition to the thinkers I suggested, it is important “never to have too much Plato and not enough Aristotle” (Herman), and vice-versa. People should be encouraged to read a great deal on both sides of thinking in Western culture, and always seek out the counter-point. I’ll leave it at that. Best to you and your endeavors.

Thanks for this! It’s really helpful 🙂

P.S I really like the site. Curation of useful content is a definite plus in my books! Thanks again

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