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 systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

and

philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...

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

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 Indo-European tradition, they were also traditionally worn by women of Lapland, the Japanese, the Mi'kmaq ...

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

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

—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 author 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 ...

compared it to other forms of school discipline she saw as degrading and outdated. It became unpopular in the early 20th century. Some American schools still permitted caps as late as the 1950s, however, and it was more recently banned in several areas in England and Wales in 2010. 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 first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a c ...

'' (3rd edition) cites mid-16th century examples of the term ''dunce'' used to describe a follower of Duns Scotus, a person engaged in ridiculous pedantry, or a person regarded as a "fool" or "dimwit"."dunce, n.". OED Online. March 2022. Oxford University Press. A visual depiction of the hat was first shown in the 1727 edition of ''

The New England Primer ''The New England Primer'' was the first reading primer designed for the American colonies. It became the most successful educational textbook published in 17th-century colonial United States and it became the foundation of most schooling befor ...

'', 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 one of two novels (the other being ''Barnaby Rudge'') which Charles Dickens published along with short stories in his weekly serial ''Master Humphrey's Clock'', from 1840 to 1841. It was so popular that New York r ...

''. 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 Catholic pointed hat of conical form that is used in Spain and Hispanic countries by members of a confraternity of penitents. It is part of the uniform of such brotherhoods including the '' Nazarenos'' and ''Fariseos'' duri ...

was prescribed for sinners and penitents during the

Spanish Inquisition The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition ( es, Tribunal del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición), commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition ( es, Inquisición española), was established in 1478 by the Catholic Monarchs, King Ferdinand ...

References

External links

{{commons category, Dunce caps
Etymology of "dunce"
History of education Slurs related to low intelligence Pointed hats

Dunce cap

See also

References

Further reading

External links