This book contributes to the contemporary revival of pragmatism as a practical and ultimately, as Mayer argues, necessary philosophical stance within democratic schools. Given that pragmatism addresses the question of how people can move forward in the absence of transcendent Truth, the author shows how pragmatism also—and not incidentally—provides grounds for pluralistic democratic societies to move forward in the absence of shared belief systems.Weaving together philosophical analysis and classroom discourse research, Mayer explores the relationships among pragmatism, progressive educational theory, and democratic knowledge construction processes and their implications for enacting progressive educational practices in schools.Several original, research-based heuristics that can serve in reliably identifying, studying, and orchestrating distinctively democratic knowledge construction processes are presented. The importance of granting all students a share of interpretive authority is