ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the common complaint lodged against Aristotelian character education that it flouts or scorns the very method of general moral education that has turned out to be the most useful through the centuries: moral dialogue, as conducted for instance by Aristotle's predecessor Socrates. It provides precisely the missing ammunition needed to defang once and for all the received wisdom about Aristotle and the dialogical method. The chapter expresses that by parity of reasoning from Sherman's reconstruction of the habituation process that dialogue would have to be incorporated in all suitable forms of Aristotelian character education, including role modelling and the educative use of the arts. It presents Aristotle's saying on the relationship between character education and character friendships and, more specifically, the essential role of dialogue in both. On Ronna Burger's account, which undergirds and reinforces the received wisdom in question, the Socratic-Aristotelian dichotomy between Socrates and Aristotle concerning dialogue sits atop many other, more deeply entrenched dichotomies.
