{"product_id":"9780801899720","title":"Reading ?ayy Ibn-Yaq?an: A Cross-Cultural History of Autodidacticism","description":"\u003cp\u003eCommonly translated as \"The Self-Taught Philosopher\" or \"The Improvement of Human Reason,\" Ibn-Tufayl's story ?ayy Ibn-Yaq?an inspired debates about autodidacticism in a range of historical fields from classical Islamic philosophy through Renaissance humanism and the European Enlightenment. Avner Ben-Zaken's account of how the text traveled demonstrates the intricate ways in which autodidacticism was contested in and adapted to diverse cultural settings.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn tracing the circulation of the ?ayy Ibn-Yaq?an, Ben-Zaken highlights its key place in four far-removed historical moments. He explains how autodidacticism intertwined with struggles over mysticism in twelfth-century Marrakesh, controversies about pedagogy in fourteenth-century Barcelona, quarrels concerning astrology in Renaissance Florence, and debates pertaining to experimentalism in seventeenth-century Oxford. In each site and period, Ben-Zaken recaptures the cultural context that stirred scholars to relate to ?ayy Ibn-Yaq?an and demonstrates how the text moved among cultures, leaving in its wake translations, interpretations, and controversies as various as the societies themselves. Pleas for autodidacticism, Ben-Zaken shows, not only echoed within close philosophical discussions; they surfaced in struggles for control between individuals and establishments. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePresented as self-contained histories, these four moments together form a historical collage of autodidacticism across cultures from the late Medieval era to early modern times. The first book-length intellectual history of autodidacticism, this novel, thought-provoking work will interest a wide range of historians, including scholars of the history of science, philosophy, literature, Europe, and the Middle East.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Johns Hopkins University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47128620663024,"sku":"9780801899720","price":63.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9780801899720_p0.jpg?v=1769906475","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9780801899720","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}