Susan Verducci

Nel Noddings is best known for her pioneering work in feminist ethics and philosophy of education. She came to national and international attention in 1984 with her book, Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Education. Noddings’ ethics of care replaces the traditional Western framing of ethics in terms of autonomous moral agents seeking to maximize utility or perform obligations for their own sake with situated social beings in face-to-face everyday relations with others. She argues that relationships, and not individuals, are ontologically basic. In the ethics of care, human encounter and affective response form the foundation of ethics, and moral relationships are organized in terms of connections, rather than traditional conceptions of freedom. Noddings’ distinctive ethical voice and commitment to improving education blend in her work on school reform. This work articulates educational aims grounded in an ethic of care and school practices that align with not only cultivating the interests and aspirations of individual students, but also that align with the moral and civic purposes of education. Noddings is an award-winning author and editor of over 20 books and 200 articles across fields as varied as philosophy of education, ethics, feminism, school reform, religious studies, peace studies, and social policy.

This dissertation responds to a current trend in moral education that advocates fostering empathy in students. Individual scholarly accounts falsely generate the impression of consensus on the nature of empathy, the process of empathy, and empathy's moral value. Viewed as a whole, these accounts narrate a far more complex story. Drawing heavily from moral philosophy and moral psychology, I explore the nature and processes of empathic phenomena and their connections to morality. I argue that empathy's connection to morality is far more complex than generally assumed and that in order to cultivate empathy in schools for the purposes of moral education, educators must pay close attention to these complexities. To neglect them is to endanger the very ties between empathy and morality. ;Tracing the history of the concept of empathy reveals that theorists have not been describing a single phenomenon. They have been examining a number of distinct but related "empathies." A question arises, "which conception are we calling for in moral education?" or, better yet, "which of these conceptions should we be calling for?" The remainder of the dissertation examines dimensions of empathic phenomena that can be seen as salient for morality and for educators. Extended analysis on these topics suggests that some dimensions are more securely tied to morality than others. First, empathic phenomena with strong connections to morality possess evaluative as well as emotional dimensions. Second, exploring the philosophical problem of other peoples' minds suggests that empathizing with actual others serves to connect empathy more securely with morality. Third, an empathizer's epistemic authority can be improved through acts of dialogic confirmation. Finally, empathy is part of a cultural and historical dynamic and is influenced by a person's past experiences. Educators must negotiate these issues in order to cultivate an empathy securely connected to morality. I conclude by suggesting some practical means to do this in schools

This essay focuses on the value of self-doubt in moral inquiry and in moral education. Using John Patrick Shanley’s play, Doubt: A parable, as illustration, it shows how self-doubt initiates and extends moral inquiry, highlights one’s epistemic fallibility and connects the inquirer to the virtue of humility. The essay draws on the work of Charles Sanders Peirce, Hullett, Nussbaum, Thayer-Bacon and Elbow to support the idea that the question ‘Am I wrong?’ is important for moral inquiry and for moral education.

In introducing the works included in this special issue, this essay identifies some general ways that these and other narratives can function in ethical explorations in the field of education. The essay not only articulates ways that narratives can be useful to education scholars, but it also provides pedagogical reasons to connect stories with ethics in classrooms. It concludes with a brief nod to the dangers that Plato, contemporary scholars and teachers have about combining narratives with ethical inquiry, and touches upon some ways to temper them.