#366: Teach Yourself Like George Washington

The Art of Manliness

Society & Culture, Education, Philosophy

4.7 • 14.5K Ratings

🗓️ 21 December 2017

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

George Washington has become an archetype of the great American leader. Subsequent generals and presidents all have been compared to Washington, and in the American mythos, they all fall short of this founder's military and political genius. What many people don’t know about Washington, however, is that his formal schooling abruptly ended at age 11 with the death of his father and that he was largely self-taught. My guest today wrote an intellectual biography of Washington and how this autodidact rose to American apotheosis despite lacking the classical education of his Revolutionary contemporaries. Her name is Dr. Adrienne Harrison and her book is "A Powerful Mind: The Self-Education of George Washington." Today on the show, Adrienne discusses how her time as a combat officer in Iraq led her to researching and writing her doctoral dissertation about Washington’s intellectual journey. We then discuss why Washington’s education was deficient compared to other Founding Fathers like Jefferson and Adams, how this lack made Washington extremely self-conscious, and what he did to mitigate ever revealing it. Dr. Harrison then takes us through how Washington charted his own education throughout the different stages of his life and career to help him become a wealthy landowner, successful general, and first executive of the United States. Adrienne also takes us on a tour of Washington’s personal study and library and what is says about his learning style. We end our discussion on lessons we can take from Washington on maintaining a passion for lifelong learning.

Transcript

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0:00.0	[♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪
0:13.9	[♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪
0:14.7	Brett McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast,
0:18.0	where George Washington has become an archetype of the great American leader.
0:21.5	Subsequent generals and presidents have all been compared to Washington
0:24.3	and in the American mythos they all fall short of this founder's military and political genius.
0:28.7	What many people don't know about Washington however is that his formal schooling
0:32.0	abruptly ended age 11 with the death of his father and he was largely self-taught.
0:36.0	My guest today wrote an intellectual biography of Washington and how this auto-diadactic rose
0:40.3	to American apotheosis despite lacking the classical education of his revolutionary contemporaries.
0:45.6	Her name is Dr. Adrienne Harrison and her book is a powerful mind the self-education of George
0:50.1	Washington. Today on the show Adrienne discusses how her time as a combat officer and Iraq
0:54.0	led her to researching and writing her doctoral dissertation about Washington's intellectual journey.
0:58.1	We then discuss why Washington's education was deficient compared to other founding fathers
1:02.0	like Thomas Jefferson or John Adams, how this lack made Washington extremely self-conscious
1:06.3	and what he did to mitigate ever revealing it. Dr. Harrison then takes us through how Washington
1:10.4	charted his own education throughout the different stage of his life and career to help him become a
1:14.3	wealthy landowner, successful general and the first executive of the United States. Adrienne
1:18.8	also takes us on a tour of Washington's personal study and library and what it says about his learning
1:23.1	style. We enter discussion on lessons we can take from Washington on maintaining a passion for life
1:27.6	long learning after the show is over check out our show notes at a.m. I.S. slash powerful mind
1:32.5	and Dr. Harrison joins me now via clearcast.io
	...

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