Thomas and Henderson collaborate on new book

Furman University Education Professors Paul Thomas, Ed.D. and Scott Henderson, Ph.D., have collaborated on a new book, Pedagogies of Kindness and Respect (Peter Lang USA).

Thomas co-edited the book with Paul Carr, Julie Gorlewski and Brad Porfilio. Henderson provided the cover artwork and authored a chapter in the book.

Pedagogies of Kindness and Respect presents a wide variety of concepts from scholars and practitioners who discuss pedagogies of kindness, an alternative to the “no excuses” ideology now dominating the way that children are raised and educated in the United States today.

Two interpretations of the upbringing of children are investigated and challenged, one suggesting that the poor do not know how to raise their children and thus need help, while the other looks at those who are privileged and therefore know how to nurture their young. The volume investigates the issue of why this circumstance has continued and even worsened today.

“This volume on care as a fundamental aspect of educational practice is most welcome,” Peter Smagorinsky, Distinguished Research Professor of English Education, Department of Language and Literacy Education at The University of Georgia, said in his review of the book. “I hope that this book gains a wide readership of concerned educators who believe that teaching and learning are, at their heart, built around relationships that lead to trust and support.”

Last year, Thomas and Henderson co-edited the book, James Baldwin: Challenging Authors (Sense Publishers), the fifth volume in the Critical Literacy Teaching Series: Challenging Authors and Genres, for which Thomas is series editor.

Henderson, the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Education, has been a member of Furman University’s Education Department since 1998. He is also Director of Program Development and Evaluation, as well as Furman’s Director of National/International Scholarships.

Before joining the Furman faculty in 2002, Thomas taught high school English in rural South Carolina. He earned undergraduate, master’s and doctoral degrees in education from the University of South Carolina.

Thomas was the 2013 recipient of the George Orwell Award presented by National Council of Teachers of English. A collection of essays that he co-edited, De-Testing and De-Grading Schools, was named an Outstanding Academic 2014 title by Choice magazine.

He is a column editor for the English Journal, a publication of the National Council of Teachers of English and has written commentaries for the Washington Post, The New York Times, The Guardian, Education Week, The State, and The Greenville News.

Read Thomas’ blog at https://radicalscholarship.wordpress.com and visit the publisher’s book site at www.peterlang.com.

For more information, contact Furman’s News and Media Relations office at (864) 294-3107.