Full Description
This bookpresents the issues, controversies, and key players that formed and enabled the American college and university to endure as a critical institution of the nation and society. Nelson examines contested issues and concerns in the academy such as the role and position of religion; the place and value of the liberal arts; the threat of disunity and balkanization; the ideological contentions and fights for control; the effect of politics and ideologies on its future as an institution; its role as a critic and servant of society; and its promotion of academic freedom, free speech, and liberty. This overview, combined with Nelson's examination of the historical dramas, influential political forces, and stories of key personalities, provides a nuanced understanding of the evolution of the academy that scholars of Education, American History, and Philosophy will appreciate.
Contents
Chapter 1 Religion in the Nation and the Academy
Chapter 2 The University: What is It and How Does Its Center Hold?
Chapter 3 Contentious Compatibility and the Common Good: The University as Servant and Critic in a Democracy
Chapter 4 The Purpose of the College: Clashes over Liberal Education and Ideas that Prevail
Chapter 5 The Rise of the University: The Influence of Progressivism and the Social Gospel
Chapter 6 Battles over Liberty, Academic Freedom and Free Speech
Chapter 7 The Disuniting of America and the University: A Reprise of Academic Freedom and the Threat of Balkanization in the Quest for Pluralism and Diversity
Chapter 8 The Contemporary Ideological World of the McCarthy Era to Present: Political Rightness and Wrong-Headedness
Chapter 9 A Coda: The Concept of a University in America and the Culture We Deserve
