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Trevor J Phillips

Dr. Trevor J Phillips, Born January 26, 1927 – Died March 17, 2016

Trevor J. Phillips arrived in Canada from England in 1947 and studied at Sir George Williams and MacDonald College. He taught public high school for eight years at Lake of Two Mountains and Sorel, Quebec. The author then moved with his young family to the United States to embark on a doctoral program at the University of Connecticut. From 1963 until 1996, he taught Educational Philosophy at Bowling Green State University, Ohio, winning teacher awards more than once. He submitted his doctoral dissertation (Transactionalism) May 1966. He served initially as a teaching professor and later as department chair.

He was from the beginning of his career inspired by the writings of John Dewey, the pragmatic approach and the application of his theories to the democratic way of life. Transactionalism was the culmination of Dewey’s and many of his contemporaries’ life’s work.

Upon retirement he and his wife returned to Canada in 1997 to settle in Surrey, British Columbia. Although living a relatively quiet life, he had for the last decade been associated with a Third Age Learning Program (TALK) sponsored by Kwantlan Polytechnic University a participatory learning experience for adults over 50 of which he was one of the original founders. He was also an early supporter of the program’s Philosophers’ Cafe.

His doctoral dissertation (Transactionalism) was acquired, published, and edited by Influence Ecology in 2013, with a foreword by co-founder Kirkland Tibbels, edited by John Patterson and Kirkland Tibbels.

Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study.

Trevor J. Phillips submitted this doctoral dissertation May 1966 in Bowling Green, Ohio. Acquired, published, and edited by Influence Ecology in 2013, with a foreword by co-founder Kirkland Tibbels, edited by John Patterson and Kirkland Tibbels.

This book is the result of what started out to be a simple search to find an answer to what we assumed was a simple question: “What is transactionalism?” Until this writing, Transactionalism simply had no codified or single source of reference and yet, with very little exception, how the term has been described and explained remained fairly consistent across numerous landscapes of study. Trevor J. Phillips offers a fundamental and supporting work entitled Transactionalism – An Historical and Interpretative Study.

Importance of the Study

In a society whose professed structure is founded upon personal integrity and individual choice, but in which one may observe the ever-increasing growth of bureaucratic rule and the intendant rise of a complacent citizenry, there is obvious need for a re-assessment of that society’s philosophical-psychological complex, its Weltanschauung.[1] Perhaps the contemporary interest being shown by young people in Existentialism has been generated in part by a feeling of alienation from the world and its problems. Certainly the magnitude of [Existentialism’s] following testifies to its success as it calls upon its devotees to believe that, through a matrix of anxiety and despair, feelings of alienation may be understood, and a semblance of personal worth, freedom, and responsibility, achieved.

Transactionalism, too, emphasizes the intrinsic importance and dignity of each person. Far from submitting to the alienation syndrome, however, it lays stress upon the interdependence of all aspects of experience, and upon the integration of man and his surroundings. Leading transactional psychologists go so far as to define the act of living itself as a process in which one participates in the creation of an environment, and thereby in the structuring of existence itself. It is this very participation in creation which, say the transactionalists, gives to each person his unique status and dignity. Because the transactional approach to life emphasizes human dignity and uniqueness – and this view seems to run contrary to the advancing conformity and coercive competition so characteristic of our times – it seems most proper to trace the origin and development of the transactional approach, to examine its orientation, and to indicate the implications it may have for education, the area in which the relationship between the individual and his environment is of paramount concern.”[2]

 About the Author 

Trevor Phillips died on March 17, 2016, in his 89th year.

He leaves a loving family: his wife, Lois Carrie; son, David (SoMei, Christopher); daughter, Janis Bajor (Jordan, Aaron, Griffin, Nora); and Nancy Phillips.

[1] Weltanschauung – A world-view can include natural philosophy; fundamental, existential, and normative postulates; or themes, values, emotions, and ethics. Palmer, Gary B. (1996). Toward A Theory of Cultural Linguistics. University of Texas Press. p. 114.

[2] Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips. p. 26-27