Ralph Waldo Emerson, Friedrich Nietzsche, John Dewey, and the Creative Reader

• Název práce v češtině: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Friedrich Nietzsche, John Dewey a kreativní čtenář
• Název v anglickém jazyce: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Friedrich Nietzsche, John Dewey, and the Creative Reader
• Klíčová slova: pragmatizmus|vzdelávanie|perspektivizmus|kreativita|analýza textu|pragmatická metóda|Ralph Waldo Emerson|Friedrich Nietzsche|John Dewey
• Klíčová slova anglicky: pragmatism|education|perspectivism|creativity|textual analysis|pragmatic method|Ralph Waldo Emerson|Friedrich Nietzsche|John Dewey
• Akademický rok vypsání: 2020/2021
• Typ práce: diplomová práce
• Jazyk práce: angličtina
• Ústav: Ústav anglofonních literatur a kultur (21-UALK)
• Vedoucí / školitel: David Lee Robbins, Ph.D.
• Řešitel: skrytý - zadáno a potvrzeno stud. odd.
• Datum přihlášení: 30.11.2020
• Datum zadání: 30.11.2020
• Schválení administrátorem: zatím neschvalováno
• Datum potvrzení stud. oddělením: 30.06.2021
• Datum a čas obhajoby: 09.09.2021 00:00
• Datum odevzdání elektronické podoby: 28.07.2021
• Datum proběhlé obhajoby: 09.09.2021
• Odevzdaná/finalizovaná: odevzdaná studentem a finalizovaná
• Oponenti: doc. Erik Sherman Roraback, D.Phil.

Zásady pro vypracování

This MA thesis aims to illuminate the relationships between the major writers of the
pragmatic philosophical tradition and to explore the idea of a Creative Reader. This
investigation will focus mainly on Ralph Waldo Emerson, Friedrich Nietzsche and John
Dewey as prominent representatives of idealism and the pragmatic method of thinking. The
second emphasis of this thesis will be pedagogical, and it will consist of the examination of
the notion of Creative Reader, as it appears in Ralph Waldo Emerson, Friedrich Nietzsche,
Hans Vaihinger and William James. In the case of John Dewey, the pedagogical emphasis
will be more focused on project method and collectivist idea of social efficiency.
The thesis will begin the investigation of pragmatic thought by examining the early
sources of subjective idealism, and therefore will study the ideas of Immanuel Kant in
conjunction with Johann Gottlieb Fichte and his Wissenschaftslehre. The second chapter will
be dedicated to Ralph Waldo Emerson with his notions of creative poet- maker- creator and
his examination of the importance of imagination in human experience. The third chapter will
examine the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, and his ideas about representation in
literature, perspectivism, creativity, creative process and individualism. The fourth chapter
will analyze the ideas of Hans Vaihinger, especially his notions of fictionalism, regulative
fictions and generative, productive nature of human perspective. Chapter five will then
continue in a very similar vein with William James and will attempt to inspect his own flavor
of pragmatic perspectivism, ideational pluralism and individualism. The penultimate
analytical chapter will then examine John Dewey and his educational philosophy, as a direct
development of the previous pragmatic thinkers, and will offer a summary of pedagogical
methods and approaches for innovative instruction in a classroom that emphasizes
constructivism, individual creativity, reverential team work, respectful discussion, and social
efficiency. The final chapter of the main body of the thesis will then evaluate the overarching
question: Who is this creative, pragmatic reader? How does such a reader read? How does
he/she interpret the work of literature? How does he/she analyze a text? How does he/she
discuss his/her ideas? How does he/she think?
In other words, how does the creative reader approach literature?
The thesis, along with fostering better understanding of the philosophers, should then
be a journey of discovery and exploration in search after these signs of creative reading. This
thesis, then, will attempt to create, introduce, and explore new and innovative ways of
thinking about literature, for teachers and students alike.

Seznam odborné literatury

Preliminary Bibliography
Ameriks, Karl: Kant. Robert Audi, general ed., The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
Atkinson, Brooks, ed. The Selected Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson. New York: Modern
Library, 1992.
The Collected Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 10 volumes. Cambridge: The Belknap Press
of Harvard University Press, 1971-2013.
Berlin, Isaiah: The Essence of European Romanticism. Isaiah Berlin, The Power of Ideas,
Henry Hardy, ed. Princeton, NJ; Princeton University Press, 2000, 200-204.
Brobjer, Thomas H.: Nietzsche’s Philosophical Context. An Intellectual Biography, Urbana,
IL, and Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2008.
Deleuze, Gilles: Kant’s Critical Philosophy. The Doctrine of the Faculties, Hugh Tomlinson
and Barbara Habberjam, trans., 1963/1983 [Paris: Presses Universitaires de
France]/1984 [London: The Athlone Press, translation and preface]; Minneapolis,
MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1999.
Deleuze, Gilles: Nietzsche and Philosophy, Hugh Tomlinson, trans., 1962 [Paris: Presses
Universitaires de France]/1983 [London: The Athlone Press, preface and translation];
New York: Columbia University Press, 1983.
Dewey, John: Art as Experience. Based on John Dewey's lectures on esthetics, delivered as
the first William James Lecturer at Harvard in 1932. 1934/1980; New York: Penguin,
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Dewey, John: A Common Faith. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1934
Dewey, John. Democracy and Education. Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois
University Press, 1985.
Dewey, John: "Does Reality Possess Practical Character?," first published in Essays,
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University, by his Colleagues at Columbia University (New York: Longmans, Green,
and Co., 1908), pp. 53-80; reprinted in Philosophy and Civilization (New York:
Minton, Balch and Co., 1931), pp. 36-55, with the title "The Practical Character of
Reality"; in John Dewey, The Later Works of John Dewey, Volume 3, 1925-1953:
1927-1928, Essays, Reviews, Miscellany, and Impressions of Soviet Russia, edited by
Jo Ann Boydston; textual editor, Patricia Baysinger; with an introduction by David
Sidorsky (1984; Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2008), “The
Pragmatic Acquiescence” (first published in New Republic 49 [1927]: 186-189)
Emerson, Edward W. ed. The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Boston and New
York: Hughton Mifflin Company, 1904. Volume X: Lectures and Biographical
Sketches,
Fichte, Johann Gottlieb. Fichte: Early Philosophical Writings, Daniel Breazeale, trans. and
ed. (1988; Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993), Editor’s Introduction
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of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 16 volumes. Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard
University Press, 1960-1982.
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Routledge, 1995
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Gunn, Giles. Thinking Across the American Grain. Chicago: The University of Chicago
Press, 1992.
Hook, Sidney. The Metaphysics of Pragmatism. New York: Cosimo, 2008.
James, William. Pragmatism and Four Essays from The Meaning of Truth. New York:
Meridian Books, 1955.
James, William. The Meaning of Truth: A Sequel to "Pragmatism," 1909, in William James,
Writings 1902-1910, Bruce Kuklick, ed. (New York: Library of America, 1987)
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(Jan., 1884), pp. 1-26.
James, William: "A Pluralistic Mystic." Hibbert Journal, 8:739-759 [July 1910]). William
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Kaufmann, Walter: Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, Fourth Edition,
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