Gareth B. Matthews, The Child's Philosopher (New York: Routledge, 2022) is the second volume in Routledge's Philosophy-for-Children Founders book series. Edited by Maughn Rollins Gregory and Megan Laverty, this is a novel and welcome series. As the 10 enthusiastic endorsers of the Matthews work insist at the beginning of the volume, this is a book well worth reading. It celebrates Matthews’ pioneering efforts to find a solid place for children in the world of philosophical inquiry, including parts of that world that, until quite recently, have failed to recognize and value what children can contribute to it. The book includes many of Matthews’ original essays that explain and support his work in support of the natural philosophical curiosity of children and the loss both children and adults suffer when this curiosity is not recognized and valued. It also provides accounts of the broad range and considerable depth of Matthews’ contributions in other, more established areas of philosophy (such as Ancient and Medieval philosophy and philosophy of language).
Marked by what he identifies as whimsy, children's philosophical thinking is expressed in much children's literature (such as Arnold Lobel's Frog and Toad stories). Matthews devoted nearly 60 concise articles in Thinking (the Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children's (IAPC) official periodical) over a period of more than 20 years that carefully discuss philosophical dimensions he found in that literature. He invites readers to join him in engaging with the samples he selected. Although in this capacity he worked well with IAPC's leader, Matthew Lipman, Matthews always kept his distance from IAPC's unique programmatic approach to philosophy with children. For example, he did not share Lipman's disdain for including illustrations in literature used with children. (Lipman's novels for children did not include any pictures.) Also, Matthews did not share IAPC's concern to direct its materials toward a mastery of, say, the essentials of Aristotelean syllogistic reasoning or improved scores on standardized logic tests for elementary through early college students. He did not oppose such improvements, but they were not among his objectives in discussing ideas or sharing literature with children. His main objectives were to acknowledge and welcome children's philosophical curiosity and to invite them as children (not simply as future adults) to share their curiosity with those already accepted into the philosophical world of adults. He firmly rejected what he called a ‘deficit conception’ of children, a common view of adults that fails to acknowledge and fully respect the philosophical potential of children as children. Thus, Matthews earned his recognition as ‘the child’ philosopher’.
Matthews writings offer delightful examples of children posing philosophical questions about their world that are very like questions that continue to fascinate and puzzle adults in the grip of philosophy. Matthews wrote 4 books on philosophy and children (all published by Harvard University Press) that describe and analyze the untutored pursuit of philosophical questions posed by children. Gregory and Laverty offer selections from these books that illuminate the respect that Matthews argues is due to children as such, as distinct from their being future adults. Subjected to severe criticism by Matthews are the psychological views of Jean Piaget. Matthews's main objection to Piaget's celebrated views of child development is that he failed to recognize the philosophical merit of children's statements.
Matthews’ writings are admirably clear and well-argued. Supplementing these writings are strategically placed commentaries on Matthews by the editors, Stanley Cavell, Karin Murris, Stephanie Burdick-Shepherd and Cristina Cammarano, Peter Shea, Jennifer Glaser, Walter Omar Kohan and Claire Cassidy, Susan M. Turner, Susannah Sheffer, and Jana Mohr Lone. Although each of these supplementary writings provides valuable contributions to the reader's understanding of Matthews, several conclude with extended reflections of their own views that unfortunately are very hard to follow in that context. Readers may be encouraged to pursue those reflections elsewhere in the authors’ other writings, but it is not obvious that this promises to provide further illumination of Matthews's ideas.
Occasionally, commentators in the Matthews volume subject him to criticisms that seem unfair or otherwise to miss the mark. For example, he is faulted for underestimating the contributions of continental philosophers. But, in response to the question of where he regarded the work in philosophy with children to be best represented, one of the two places he identified was Hamburg, Germany. In 2007 he said, ‘The experts and researchers in this great Hanseatic city form a community, which is unmatched in the promotion and spreading of the philosophizing with children’.Footnote 1 Matthews, fluent in German, spent much time in Germany (and around the world, for that matter), and he was very popularly received. It is likely true that there is much in the history of continental philosophy (and the history of philosophy overall) that supports the philosophical thinking of children but which is not discussed in Matthews’ writings. However, as those who engaged in discussions with Matthews can verify, his deep interest in and sensitivity to wider areas of philosophy was evident, and he would have welcomed new contributions, just as he never tired of fresh examples of children's philosophical thinking. It is true that his writings were focused more on so-called ‘analytic’ philosophy that prevailed in Great Britain and the United States than on the ‘continental’ philosophy of such philosophers as Sartre, Merleau-Ponty, and their followers. This does not mean that he was not familiar with their work – or that he shied away from trying to understand (and critique) their contributions. When when it comes to writing, of course, one cannot address everything (or everyone) one takes seriously in one's studies, conversations, or that one is exposed to at philosophical conferences. But, as those who had the privilege of engaging in extended conversations with Matthews (and this included philosophers of all kinds from around the world) would agree, he had a wide-ranging, sensitive, and deep interest in philosophical ideas in general.
At the outset of this book on Gareth Matthews, philosopher Harry Brighouse says, ‘A brilliant and imaginative book…. Everyone interested in philosophy and childhood should read it, and philosophers not interested in childhood will be if they read it’. This is not an overstatement. Jana Mohr Lone's ‘Afterword’ aptly closes the book, ‘With characteristic modesty, Gary told me more than once that he thought his contribution to philosophy for children and philosophy of childhood was quite minor, serving primarily as an invitation to other philosophers and educators to explore this terrain more fully. This book is a powerful counterexample to his belief that his contribution was limited…. His generous spirit led him to share his delight in children's philosophical thinking, and the results enriched us all’ (p. 261).
