Eugenics and Education:

Institutionalized Ideology

Ann Gibson Winfield

Intellectual history:

• Plato and Aristotle

• Great Chain of Being - Every existing thing has its place – divinely inspired – in a hierarchical order.

• Social Darwinism – application of ‘survival of the fittest’ to human society.

• ‘Eugenics’ – coined by Sir Francis Galton in 1889.

Eugenics is …

“The science of improvement of the human germ plasm through better breeding” (Galton 1889).

“The application of human intelligence to human evolution” (Wiggam 1924).

Historical Contextearly twentieth century

• Immigration• Poverty• Jim Crow South• Industrial Revolution• Labor Unrest• FEAR

Eugenic Goals

• Positive Eugenics• Negative Eugenics• Sterilization• Immigration Restriction• Marriage Restriction

Eugenically undesirable persons included ‘blind, insane, feebleminded, epileptics, paupers, alcoholics, tramps, prostitutes, beggars, unmarried mothers, morons, imbecile, idiots, sexual deviants, children who masturbate, and criminals” Popenoe 1918 p. 42)

Use of:

• Scientific caché

• Progressive idealism – “making the world a better place” (through racial cleansing)

• Utopian narrative

Dissemination and Popular Culture

• Lecture Circuits• Plays• Pamphlets• Displays• Books• Curriculum• State Fairs• Contests

• Churches• Social Services• Health Groups• Philanthropy• Boy/Girl Scouts• Medicine• YMCA/YWCA• Carnegie/Rockefeller

Eugenic Beliefs

• Heredity and Ability

• Race and Degeneracy

• Immigration, Crime and Poverty

• Sterilization and Marriage Restriction

Defining and Classifying

• Idiots – unable to develop full speech and have a mental age below age three

• Imbeciles – unable to master written language and range from three to seven in mental age

• Morons – the most dangerous to unsuspecting ‘normal’ people – a.k.a. “high grade defective”

• Feebleminded – anyone who didn’t fit into the long list of other classifications.

Education

• Focus shifts

• Compulsory education

• Education as a moral solution

Early Curriculum

• Efficiency and Waste

• Child Study and Emotion

• Direct Dominant Ideals

• Control Indigents and Defectives

• Eugenic Worth

• Usefulness

School Practices• Tracking• Ability Grouping• Vocational Education• Gifted and Talented Education• Health and Hygiene• Sex Ed• SAT/GRE

IQ Test Recruits