This volume of specially commissioned original essays presents the
thoughts of some of the most distinguished commentators within the
American academy on the fundamental changes that have taken place
in the humanities in the latter part of the twentieth century. In
the transformation of American higher education from the university
to the "demoversity," the humanities have become a less and less
important part of education, a matter established by a statistical
appendix and elaborated on in several of the essays. The individual
essays offer close observations into how the humanities have been
affected by declining academic status, by demographic shifts, by
reductions in financial support, and by changing communication
technology. They also explore the effect of these forces on books,
libraries, and the phenomenology of reading in the age of images.
When basic conditions change, theory follows, and several essays
trace the appearance and effect of new relativistic epistemologies
in the humanities. Social institutions change as well in such
circumstances, and the volume concludes with studies of the new
social arrangements that have developed in the humanities in recent
years: the attack on professionalism and the effort to transform
the humanities into the social conscience of academia and even of
the nation as a whole. Cause and effect? Who can say? What the
essays make clear, however, is that as the humanities have become
less significant in American higher education, they have also been
the scene of unusually energetic pedagogical, social, and
intellectual changes. The contributors to the volume are David
Bromwich, John D'Arms, Denis Donoghue, Carla Hesse, Gertrude
Himmelfarb, Lynn Hunt, Frank Kermode, Louis Menand, Francis Oakley,
Christopher Ricks, and Margery Sabin. Included is a substantial
introduction by Alvin Kernan and an appendix of tables and figures
showing baccalaureate and doctoral degrees over the years in
various types of schools. Originally published in 1997. The
Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology
to again make available previously out-of-print books from the
distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These
editions preserve the original texts of these important books while
presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The
goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access
to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books
published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
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