American Heresies and Higher Education

Peter Lawler is one of our most intelligent observers of higher education in America, and these essays demonstrate why. They range from ancient thinkers to today's 'futurists,' from the Puritan colonies to the 21st-century liberal arts college. Along the way, Lawler offers bits of wisdom worth saving, such as this: "The preference for diversity over truth and the common good depends on the detached attitude of the tourist." His work is a sweet and potent antidote to the deterioration of humanitas in the classroom-I've read it for many years. It is also a welcome change from the flaccid and predictable commentary on the university that tumbles forth daily. Mark Bauerlein, Senior Editor of First Things. Professor of Literature at Emory University, and author of The Dumbest Generation. Peter Augustine Lawler is our best national commentator today on higher education, a wise and deft essayist of the abiding importance of liberal education for souls in society. American Heresies and Higher Education overflows with truth, clarity, provocation, and humor. My wild yet sincere hope is that every reader might buy a second copy and send it gift-wrapped to Bill Gates, with the persistent message that the Gates Foundation should be funding and founding, all across America, new Lawler-inspired small residential liberal arts colleges. John Seery, George Irving Thompson Memorial Professor of Government and Professor of Politics, Pomona College, and author of America Goes to College among many other books. Book jacket.