Walt Whitman is very radical in his views of the self, of the notion of religion and God, and of education. Whitman’s view of education is radical because he sees no benefit of learning from books and lectures of professors in classrooms. He believes that we can learn more from experience, and we are influenced greater by experience. Walt Whitman expresses his radical view of education in Song 6 of “Song of Myself,” “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer,” Song 46, Song 47, and Song 48 of “Song of Myself.” In Song 6 of “Song of Myself,” Walt Whitman’s radical view of education is expressed by his answer to the child who asks him what grass is. In the beginning of Song 6, Whitman is asked by a child, “What is the grass?” This question is simple, …show more content…
In Song 46, Whitman describes himself in nature, learning form nature, not the education of society. He writes in Song 46, “Not I, not anyone else can travel that road for you, you must travel it for yourself.” This is him describing that no one can explain or teach about something enough to the point that we actually learn it. We have to be a part of or do something to know what it is, we have to experience it. This is supported by Quay in his preface when he says, “…a coherent theory of experience elucidates the interrelationships between education and life, re-examining the foundations of education by examining the philosophical connections between being, doing, and knowing” (Quay xiii). In Song 47, Whitman’s point is that he who has done more or done better than what the teacher has taught him has no need for the teacher. “…to embrace the dimension of experience understood as our perception of existence as both an interaction between things and a simple whole” (Quay xii). This quote supports the way Whitman explains experience in Song 48. He explains how one does not need to go to church every Sunday or pray everyday to know God because we can find God in most everything we see everyday. We don’t need to be preached at to learn about or learn from God because we learn from God through what we experience each day. Whitman’s radical view of experience over education is expressed through his writing of Song 46, Song 47, and Song 48 in “Song of