Abstract
Wittgenstein was a passionate and inspired teacher and philosopher. He taught elementary school in rural Austria from 1920 to 1926 and philosophy at Cambridge University from 1929 to 1949. His early pedagogical practices exemplified Austrian school reform principles. Rote learning was replaced by Arbeitsschule or ‘learning by doing’, a method that guided students to self-activity through integrated instruction. ‘Learning by doing’ could also serve as an apt description of Wittgenstein’s later philosophy, a philosophy he composed viva voce while teaching in Cambridge. Although it is commonplace to speak of Wittgenstein’s early and later philosophy, it is not yet common to speak of his early and later teaching. While the former is defined by difference, the latter is surprisingly consistent and coherent. This suggests that one of the most fruitful ways to approach Wittgenstein’s life and work is not through attempts to render his early and later philosophical texts more consistent or coherent, but to recognize the continuity and development of his early and later pedagogical practices. While the relationship between Wittgenstein’s philosophical and pedagogical practices remains controversial, there is growing recognition of its significance and importance.
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Notes
- 1.
Hänsel was later to become a well-known educator in Austria , and he remained one of Wittgenstein’s close friends. For further details and discussion, see Monk (1990).
- 2.
Foremost among these was the conviction that a democracy required citizens capable of critical thinking. Although not the dissemination of specific doctrines or bodies of knowledge, encouraging and enabling critical thinking for both boys and girls (of all backgrounds ) was not without political, economic, and social implications. Bartley notes that ‘the majority of the villagers among whom [Wittgenstein] lived came to regard him and his new teaching methods as dangerously threatening to their way of life’ (Bartley 1985: 80). For example , in rural farming communities, school often came into conflict with farm work.
- 3.
This paper is indebted to Ernst Papaneck’s study, The Austrian School Reform: Its Bases, Principles and Development—The Twenty Years Between the Two World Wars. Papaneck was a young teacher during the years of Austrian school reform. He later settled in the United States, where he taught at City University of New York (CUNY), Queens College (Kilpatrick 1962: vii).
- 4.
He was allowed to enter at the fourth and final year of the training program.
- 5.
Bartley notes that other teachers also moved frequently between schools in the district (Bartley 1985: 87–88).
- 6.
Many of the first-hand accounts of Wittgenstein’s years as an elementary school teacher (provided by former students, colleagues, administrators, and friends) were collected and recorded by Luise Hausmann, a retired secondary school teacher from Kirchberg am Weschel. In response to a letter from the district school administration requesting information about Wittgenstein shortly after his death, she gathered information from her neighbours in Otterthal and Trattenbach over a ten-year period and made several journeys to Puchberg am Schneeberg (Hausmann 1982: 16). Some of her work appears in Bartley’s publications during the 1970s before it was translated and published in English in 1982.
- 7.
Arbeitsschule means ‘work school’ and Arbeitsmethode ‘work method’, but they are usually translated as ‘learning by doing’ and ‘activity method’, respectively. Arbeitsschule was contrasted with Drillschule (which emphasized drill without advance preparation) and Lernschule (which stressed memorization or rote learning).
- 8.
These included the theories and ideas of the Freuds, Adler, the Bühlers, Aichhorn, and Birnhaum (Papaneck 1962: xi).
- 9.
These daily discussions, which took place over the period of almost a year, attest to Wittgenstein’s active and ongoing engagement with pedagogical issues. His position in Puchberg represents the midpoint of his Austrian teaching career.
- 10.
The skeleton of a cat Wittgenstein assembled at Puchberg was still in use as late as 1953 (Hausmann 1982: 23).
- 11.
According to Bartley, such excursions (as well as the expenses being covered by the teacher) were not uncommon in Austria at this time.
- 12.
According to Bartley, ‘Wittgenstein often poked fun at the reform program’s more vulgar slogans and projects’ (Bartley 1974b: 61). It is worth noting that he also made similar comments about philosophical slogans. For example , Redpath writes: ‘Wittgenstein intimated that the dictum ‘in a great number of cases it is advisable to put “use of a word” for “meaning of a word”’ is a slogan. Sometimes the slogan is ridiculed, sometimes it is boosted: in both cases, in his opinion, wrongly…Slogans are easy and stick in the memory. If the use of the slogan goes, but the slogan remains, it is ridiculous’ (Redpath 1990: 85). Papaneck also notes that Austrian school reform was ‘in the best sense of the word, eclectic…[and] creative in its own right’ (Papaneck 1962: 68).
- 13.
Bartley quotes this passage from Robert Dottrens’s The New Education in Austria (1930) (New York: The John Day Co.) p. 59.
- 14.
His dictionary does not contain definitions, so it is more accurately described as a word book or spelling book.
- 15.
The production and binding of this spelling book foreshadows the composition and binding of The Blue and Brown Books . The Blue Book and the Brown Book were originally composed of remarks dictated to students, which were then mimeographed and bound together. They got their titles from the colour of their covers.
- 16.
Following convention, titles for Wittgenstein’s works are abbreviated (Lectures and Conversations = LC, Philosophical Investigations = PI, The Blue and Brown Books = BB, Lectures on the Foundations of Mathematics = LFM, Wörterbuch für Volksschulen = WV, Remarks on the Philosophy of Psychology = RPP, Wittgenstein’s Lectures = WL, Culture and Value = CV, Zettel = Z, Philosophical Grammar = PG, Lectures on Philosophical Psychology = LPP, Philosophical Occasions = PO), with section (§) or page number (p.), with full citation and initials in the References.
- 17.
The speed and relative ease of publication stands in stark contrast to the travails associated with the publication of both the Tractatus and the Philosophical Investigations .
- 18.
His preface is dated 22 April 1925 (Otterthal). It was omitted from the final printed version.
- 19.
For further examples and a discussion of Wittgenstein’s dictionary , see Burkhardt (1984: 30–41).
- 20.
These viewpoints are strikingly similar to those found in his later philosophy, including the concept of family resemblance .
- 21.
Bartley suggests that Wittgenstein did not abandon philosophy after the First World War but attempted to put into practice the ethical portion of his earlier writings , while at the same time beginning to formulate the concerns that were to dominate his later philosophy (Bartley 1974b: 4–5).
- 22.
Elsewhere he speaks of ‘auxiliary lines’ of investigation: ‘In these considerations we often draw what can be called “auxiliary lines”. We construct things like the “soulless tribe” [or children learning ]—which drops out of consideration in the end. That they dropped out had to be shown’ (RPP: II 47).
- 23.
Bartley’s interpretation remains more theoretical than the one presented in this chapter, but he does acknowledge the methodological influence of Wittgenstein’s teaching on his later philosophy in broad terms.
- 24.
‘He, of course, never read his lectures; he had not, in fact, written them out, although he always spent a great deal of time in thinking out what he proposed to say’ (Moore 1993: 50–51 and 113–114).
- 25.
This is the description provided on the dust jacket of the 1964 (second) edition of The Blue and Brown Books .
- 26.
These include Wittgenstein’ s Lectures: Cambridge 1930–1932, Wittgenstein’s Lectures: Cambridge 1932–1935, Lectures and Conversations on Aesthetics , Psychology and Religious Belief, Wittgenstein’s Lectures on the Foundations of Mathematics 1939, and Wittgenstein’s Lectures on Philosophical Psychology 1946–1947. G.E. Moore also wrote notes on classes he attended.
- 27.
Fann notes that Wittgenstein emphasized that his method could not be learned by hearing lectures: discussion was essential. Fann compares this to the Socratic method and also draws attention to the fact that the Investigations takes the form of a dialogue (Fann 1969: 54).
- 28.
Wittgenstein became acquainted with members of his classes by having them individually to tea (Malcolm 1984: 28). Anyone could attend his gatherings if they arrived on time and made the commitment to continue attending throughout the year, but it was not possible to do so anonymously.
- 29.
Malcolm also acknowledges that Wittgenstein could sometimes be a frightening person during class (impatient and easily angered), but he attributes this severity to a passionate love of truth: ‘Primarily what made him an awesome and even terrible person, both as a teacher and in personal relationships, was his ruthless integrity, which did not spare himself or anyone else’ (Malcolm 1984: 26).
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Savickey, B. (2017). Wittgenstein’s Philosophy: Viva Voce . In: Peters, M., Stickney, J. (eds) A Companion to Wittgenstein on Education. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-3136-6_4
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