Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society: A Quarterly Journal in American Philosophy

In the tradition of classical pragmatism, one could contend there are two kinds of thinkers. The first kind, represented most notably by William James and John Dewey, could be labeled as enthusiastic and prolific writers to whom it posed no difficulty to articulate their ideas at remarkable length and with enviable wit. The pragmatists of the second kind like Charles S. Peirce and George H. Mead, for various reasons, never managed to put their (often outright revolutionary) ideas on paper in the form of a longer, systematic treatise. Whereas for Peirce such an endeavor might have arguably been a drag given his rushing mind, exploding with new ideas, Mead seems to never have been quite aware of the pioneering nature of his own philosophy. Moreover, as his life-long friend and colleague John Dewey (1931) affirmed in Mead’s obituary: “he was always dissatisfied with what he had done; always outgrowing his former expressions and … reluctant to fix his ideas in the printed word” (p. 311). Mead died at the age of 68, just at the point where he was preparing his Carus Lectures (the very first of which was presented by Dewey under the title Experience and Nature) for a publication in a book form as Philosophy of the Present.

Mead passed away leaving behind a good number of journal articles and reviews, an unfinished book and an infinite number of other texts, the traces of which we are just now finishing to map. Despite all of this, especially thanks to the manuscript Mind, Self, and Society: From the Standpoint of a Social Behaviorist Mead is considered one of the founding fathers of modern sociology. As Dan Huebner, the author of the Becoming Mead: The Social Process of Academic Knowledge pertinently points out “Mead is known in a discipline in which he did not teach for a book which he did not write” (p. 3). The tangled process of the origination, development and reception of Mead’s ideas in his own social relationships gave rise to an unprecedented archival and analytical work performed by Dan Huebner in the abovementioned book.

Becoming Mead is at heart a study in the social production of knowledge which aims to develop the analytical tools to investigate [End Page 125] the production of knowledge of and about G. H. Mead. Huebner’s monograph aims to be more than an intellectual biography. In the milieu of the American pragmatism, Huebner’s book is to be compared to Neil Gross’ Richard Rorty: The Making of an American Philosopher and will serve the needs of Mead-scholars just as well as the Gross’ superb study serves those interested in Rorty. As for its structure—the book is divided into three parts comprising eleven chapters (including introduction and overall conclusion). One can also find two appendixes listing Mead’s published works, and extant notes from Mead’s courses. All Huebner’s data and arguments are well-documented. Each chapter of the book includes a conclusion section which nicely summarizes the main points which might get overlooked in the abundance of the historical material which Huebner utilizes. In collecting his historical data, Huebner inspected materials from ninety archival collections at ten institutions, documented the existence of seventy-nine sets of classroom notes and inspected approximately one thousand dissertations and theses, all this in order to trace the influence and representation of Mead’s ideas.

Part one called “Rethinking Mead” aims at introducing Mead in a social context, as a public speaker and intellectual who was deeply engaged in dealing with numerous social problems (education of immigrants, their working conditions, women rights, etc.) in the sprawling city of Chicago at the beginning of the last century. Here, especially chapters one and three portray Mead indeed in a different light from that in which he is being normally presented. Of course, Huebner cannot be said to discover a completely new land here (see Cook 1993, Silva 2008...