This study explored the relationship between the dramatic and the educational theories developed by Bertolt Brecht and selected twentieth-century theories of pedagogy. A survey of Brecht's life and works revealed that although the stimulus-response theories of the associationist psychologists were inappropriate to Brecht's concepts, the three principal aspects of Gestaltism—perception, insight, and life space, as formulated by Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, Wolfgang Kohler, and Kurt Lewin—seemed profoundly related to Brecht's concern with man's ability to perceive and to learn about his environment. Brecht strove to create perceptual images of historical environments. The characters, who represented various ideologies and philosophies in situations which stimulated insightful learning, struggled with life spaces that accurately resembled life outside the theatre. Thus, Brecht utilized elements of the theories of perception, insight, and life space in his dramas as he strove to force his audiences to perceive the characters' environments, to grasp the significance and relationships between the characters' environments and their own social milieu, and to recognize those influences in one's life space which attract or repel the individual. The study also suggested that Brecht's works might be amenable to empirical study.

This study deals with the issue of social control and evangelical preaching from 1850 to 1900. It responds to scholarship which has argued that nineteenth-century English Christianity used religion to avoid making social changes. This investigation builds upon the corrective work of E. R. Norman and Peter d'A. Jones through an intensive examination of the theological and social views of leading preachers from three different channels of evangelical religion. The principal sources of data are the pastoral messages, sermons, special addresses, and essays of the three men who are the focal point of this study. Other sources include memoirs, biographies, and church records.