''Dunce'' is a mild insult in English meaning "a person who is slow at learning or stupid". The etymology given by Richard Stanyhurst is that the word is derived from the name of the Scottish scholastic

theologian Theology is the study of religious belief from a religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of divinity. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of ...

and

philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

John Duns Scotus John Duns Scotus ( ; , "Duns the Scot"; – 8 November 1308) was a Scottish Catholic priest and Franciscan friar, university professor, philosopher and theologian. He is considered one of the four most important Christian philosopher-t ...

Dunce cap

A dunce cap, also variously known as a dunce hat, dunce's cap or dunce's hat, is a

pointed hat Pointed hats have been a distinctive item of headgear of a wide range of cultures throughout history. Although often suggesting an ancient Proto-Indo-Europeans, Indo-European tradition, they were also traditionally worn by women of Sápmi, Lapland ...

, formerly used as an article of discipline in schools in Europe and the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

—especially in the 19th and early 20th centuries—for children who were disruptive or were considered slow in learning. In the 19th century, it was seen by some as degrading: in 1831, children's book author Sidney Babcock wrote of the dunce cap as debasing and harsh, and in 1899, historian

Alice Morse Earle Alice Morse Earle (April 27, 1851February 16, 1911) was an American historian and writer from Worcester, Massachusetts. She was christened Mary Alice by her parents Edwin Morse and Abby Mason Clary. On April 15, 1874, she married Henry Earle o ...

compared it to other forms of school discipline she saw as degrading and outdated. It became unpopular in the early 20th century. However, some North American schools still permitted caps as late as the 1950s. In modern

pedagogy Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political, and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken ...

, punishments like dunce caps have fallen out of favor: By 1927 an editorial in the ''Educational Research Bulletin'' stated: "The rod and the cap were not eminently successful ... we have our doubts about exclusion being the solution to the problem. ... High scholarship is not produced by students who have their curiosity stifled by their teachers. Curiosity must be stimulated if scholarship is desired, and sympathy is essential to this stimulation." The ''

Oxford English Dictionary The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the principal historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP), a University of Oxford publishing house. The dictionary, which published its first editio ...

'' (3rd edition) cites mid-16th century examples of the term ''dunce'' used to describe a follower of

Duns Scotus John Duns Scotus ( ; , "Duns the Scot"; – 8 November 1308) was a Scottish Catholic priest and Franciscan friar, university professor, philosopher and theologian. He is considered one of the four most important Christian philosopher-t ...

, a person engaged in ridiculous pedantry, or a person regarded as a "fool" or "dimwit". A visual depiction of the hat was first shown in the 1727 edition of '' The New England Primer'', and the term ''dunce's cap'' is recorded as early as 1791. The first use of the term in literature was in 1840, in Charles Dickens' ''

The Old Curiosity Shop ''The Old Curiosity Shop'' is the fourth novel by English author Charles Dickens; being one of his two novels (the other being ''Barnaby Rudge'') published along with short stories in his weekly serial ''Master Humphrey's Clock'', from 1840 t ...

''. Scotus apparently believed that the hat would funnel knowledge into the brain, and in the centuries before his followers became unpopular, was a social signal of an intelligent person. The dunce cap has also been connected with donkeys to portray the student as asinine. An engraving featured in an early 1900s textbook depicts a child sitting on a wooden donkey in an "eighteenth-century" classroom, wearing a dunce cap with donkey ears. A similar cap made of paper and called a

capirote A capirote is a Christianity, Christian pointed hat of conical form that is used in Italy, Spain and Hispanic countries by members of a confraternity of penitents, particularly those of the Catholic Church. It is part of the uniform of such br ...

was prescribed for sinners and penitents during the

Spanish Inquisition The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition () was established in 1478 by the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, Catholic Monarchs, King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile and lasted until 1834. It began toward the end of ...

References

External links

{{commons category, Dunce caps
Etymology of "dunce"
History of education Slurs related to low intelligence Pointed hats Child abuse Human rights abuses

Dunce cap

See also

References

Further reading

External links