A Is for Arson (eBook)

A History of Vandalism in American Education

Campbell F. Scribner (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2023
240 Seiten
Cornell University Press (Verlag)
978-1-5017-7074-6 (ISBN)

Infos

In A Is for Arson, Campbell F. Scribner sifts through two centuries of debris to uncover the conditions that have prompted school vandalism and to explain why attempts at prevention have inevitably failed. Vandalism costs taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars every year, as students, parents, and even teachers wreak havoc on school buildings. Why do they do it? Can anything stop them? Who should pay for the damage? Underlying these questions are long-standing tensions between freedom and authority, and between wantonness and reason.

Property destruction is not simply a moral failing, to be addressed with harsher punishments, nor can the problem be solved through more restrictive architecture or policing. Scribner argues that education itself is a source of intractable struggle, and that vandalism is often the result of an unruly humanity. To understand schooling in the United States, one must first confront the all-too-human emotions that have led to fires, broken windows, and graffiti.

A Is for Arson captures those emotions through new historical evidence and diverse theoretical perspectives, helping readers understand vandalism variously as a form of political conflict, as self-education, and as sheer chaos. By analyzing physical artifacts as well as archival sources, Scribner offers new perspectives on children's misbehavior and adults' reactions and allows readers to see the complexities of education—the built environment of teaching and learning, evolving approaches to youth psychology and student discipline—through the eyes of its often resistant subjects.

Autor

Campbell F. Scribner is Assistant Professor in the College of Education at the University of Maryland. He is the author of The Fight for Local Control and the coauthor of Spare the Rod. Follow him on X @ScribnerUMCP.

Inhalt

Introduction: A Few Words on Senseless Destruction
Essay: Vandalism as Political Resistance
1. Populism and Property Destruction, 1790–1890
2. Modern Education and Its Discontents, 1890–1930
3. Diagnosing Delinquency, 1930–60
4. Vandalism and the Security State, 1960–2000
Essay: Vandalism as Self-Fashioning
5. Books and Boredom
6. Desks and Nostalgia
7. Walls and the Taboo
8. Windows and Euphoria
Essay: Vandalism and the Historical Sublime
9. Shards
Epilogue: Reflections on Unruliness and Education

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 15.7.2023
• Reihe/Serie: Histories of American Education
• Reihe/Serie: Histories of American Education
• Zusatzinfo: 20 b&w halftones, 1 map
• Verlagsort: Ithaca
• Sprache: englisch
• Maße: 150 x 150 mm
• Themenwelt: Schulbuch / Wörterbuch ► Schulbuch / Allgemeinbildende Schulen
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Ethnologie
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Pädagogik ► Allgemeines / Lexika
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie
• Schlagworte: school vandalism, school graffiti, crime at school, police in school, school arson, student discipline, student vandalism, American educational policy
• ISBN-10: 1-5017-7074-8 / 1501770748
• ISBN-13: 978-1-5017-7074-6 / 9781501770746