Committee on Liberal Education

The Committee on Liberal Education thinks deeply about the roots and ideals of liberal education and its relation to politics and culture. Through monthly readings and dinner conversations, we recover and engage the noblest conceptions of this institution we call “college” in the history of western civilization. We hope this exercise in reflective inquiry will invigorate our studies and continually renew Bowdoin’s commitment to the highest types of learning imaginable.

On April 19th, 2008, Ms. Eva Brann, the Dean at St. John’s College visited Bowdoin and spent an entire day with members of the Peucinian Society. She challenged members to think about meaning and preconditions of Liberal Education. Employing Bowdoin’s sacred dedication to the common good, she asked us to consider the common good of liberal education. This lecture has become a foundation for the committee and will be available on this site shortly.

The Committee meets once a month on Sunday evening at 5pm in Thorne in the Mitchell Dining Room. All staff members and students are invited and those who attend are expected to complete a short reading during the month. We intend to bring in several speakers to deliver orations on their conception of liberal education. Exact dates will be announced before the end of the school year.

Fall 2008

September: Michael Oakeshott: “The Conversation of Mankind”

October: Eva T.H. Brann: “The Mode of Inquiry”

November: Leo Strauss: What is Liberal Education?

December: Martin Heidegger: Ontological Education

Spring 2009

February: Richard Rorty: General Studies, Hermeneutics, Education

March: John Henry Newman: The Idea of a University

April: Friedrich Nietzsche: The Future of Our Educational Institutions

May: W.E.B. DuBois: The Souls of Black Folk

Spring 2008

February: A.N. Whitehead: “Communal Romance and the Aims of Education”