ABSTRACT
In a handbook on social foundations of education, the primary purpose of this chapter is to present an overview of philosophy of education. To begin, philosophy has always been connected to education; since the beginnings of formalized human thought, there has been systematic concern for persons, their social organization and their generation.1 Because “social foundations”has concentrated largelyon“educating educators,” the chapter’s scope is limited to a set of approaches that in part have constituted a modern “foundational field” of study and practice in which the two domains come together. Other approaches to philosophy of education have been and surely are possible. These include organization by sub-fields either of philosophy or education, for example ethics or educational research, and by relevance of philosophical traditions and movements such as postmodernism (e.g., see recent exemplary texts by Curren, 1998; Noddings, 1995, 2007; Phillips & Burbules, 2000; and Strike, 1993).
