Richard Stanley Peters was born on 31 October 1919 in Mussoorie, India, the second son of Charles Robert Peters (1886-1965), of the India police, and his wife, Mabel Georgina.
He attended Clifton College, Bristol, as a boarder from 1933 until 1938. In that year he went to Queen's College, Oxford, where he took classical moderations in 1940; his degree course in literae humaniores was cut short by the war, but he was awarded a 'war degree' BA in 1942, as was the custom at the time. The letters he wrote to his family during this period can be found in RSP/1/1, RSP/1/2 and RSP/1/3.
At the outbreak of World War Two, he registered as a conscientious objector, and joined the Friends' Ambulance Unit in 1940. He worked in the East End of London during the blitz, and later became a Youth Club leader for the Friends' War Relief Service (see RSP/4 for material from this period). On 31 July 1943, he married Margaret Lee Duncan (1917-1998). They had a son and two daughters.
From 1944 until 1946, Peters taught classics at Sidcot School, a Quaker boarding school in Somerset, while studying philosophy part-time at Birkbeck College, University of London. He was encouraged by his tutors and his wife to pursue his studies full-time. After 1946, Peters taught philosophy and psychology on a part-time basis at Birkbeck while completing a PhD, awarded in 1949. He worked full-time in both these subjects after that date, first as lecturer in philosophy, and after 1958 as reader. His research notes, probably made during this period, can be found in RSP/6/1. Throughout the 1950s, he was active in the adult education group, Thaxted Workers' Educational Association, and organised events and discussions for members. Papers relating his involvement with this group can be found in RSP/5.
He published a revised edition of Brett's History of Psychology in 1953, and The Concept of Motivation in 1958. Soon afterwards he set up a new joint BA degree at Birkbeck in philosophy and psychology. Other books written at this time included Hobbes (1956); Social Principles and the Democratic State (with Stanley Benn, 1959); and Authority, Responsibility and Education (1960). It was in this period, too, that marital difficulties led to his maintaining two households. For the most part, he lived in Highgate, London, with his partner Mary Killick and her six children.
Peters spent part of 1961 as visiting professor of education at Harvard University at the invitation of Israel Scheffler. Correspondence between the two philosophers survives in RSP/1. In 1962 Peters became professor of the philosophy of education in the Institute of Education, University of London. His inaugural lecture was entitled 'Education as Initiation', and a copy can be found in RSP/6/4.
In 1964, Peters and Paul Hirst founded the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain, of which Peters became the first chair, and later president. The Proceedings of its annual conference in 1967 became the Journal of Philosophy of Education, with Peters as its first editor.
In 1966, he wrote his seminal work, Ethics and Education, which used the methods of conceptual analysis to clarify a range of educational concepts.
On a tour of New Zealand in 1975, Peters began to succumb to bipolar disorder. This illness blighted the remainder of his career, and he retired from the University of London in 1982. The speech he gave on the occasion of his retirement can be found in RSP/9, and photographs of the event in RSP/10.
Although he continued to publish, and to edit collections of essays on education, he could not sustain his previous levels of industry.
He died on 30 December 2011, and was survived by his son and two daughters.
Bibliography:
Collits, Mavourn. "R.S. Peters: A Man and his Work." PhD thesis, University of New England, Armidale, 1992
"Richard Stanley Peters." In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2015. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/104600
Wikipedia. 2021. "Richard Stanley Peters." Last modified February 14, 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stanley_Peters
