Download or read book Book Review : the Phenomenology of Learning and Becoming written by Rodger E. Broome and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Phenomenology of Learning and Becoming: Enthusiasm, Creativity and Self-Development. New York: Palgrave McMillian, 2017, 230 pp. ISBN 978-1-349-95203-8 (Hardcover). $109.00. The non-reductive and holistic nature of phenomenology serves as an important approach to studying the unique subject matter of human learning and self-development. DeRobertis (2017) writes, "[h]umans are learning beings par excellence, capable of sustaining a world-spanning, open realm of perception, concernful dwelling, and meaningful questioning" [italics original] (p. 8). It is the unique affinity of human beings to learn and develop through using language , sociality and meaningful engagement with the world, that makes this taking of a humanistic approach to learning so important. There is more to becoming a human person than simply acting in one way or another. Early humanistic psychologists critiqued the earlier learning theories because the behaviorist-based research upon which the mainstream perspective was founded utilized animal subjects (e.g. pigeons and rodents) or college students (Bugental, 1963). Giorgi (2001) was a critic who pointed out that psychology's subject matter had deviated away from the psyche and become over focused about behavior or cognitive processing (neo-functionalism) that the soul of humanity had been lost or ignored along the way. DeRobertis (2017) presents a deeper view of learning theory as it is actually situated in both its sociality and practicality. Moreover, the role of learning in human development (becoming) provides a view of knowledge beyond that which is what we know but in the context of becoming who we are as an ongoing developmental project. Plants and animals live in environments, but humans world their worlds through active social engagement and thriving with motivation to transcend their natural conditions. Meaning making is a unique human project that becomes quite elaborate in terms of our sense-making. Sense making is always personal and has relevant practicality to navigating one's world.