Overview

This unique book offers quotations that reflect both historic and current thinking in the field of higher education. These quotations are enjoyable to read, useful to those who speak and write on the subject of higher education, and illustrative of the enduring purposes of the academic enterprise. This book will be of particular value to academic, political, and journalistic practitioners who prepare speeches, position papers, or news backgrounders for both professional and lay audiences, as well as for scholars seeking citations to materials that are otherwise difficult to locate. More than 1,600 quotations from over 650 authors are arranged both chronologically and by subject. This arrangement offers readers the opportunity to trace how thinking has changed, or how it has remained the same, during the 2000-year period covered in this book. The collection includes both statements that support higher education as well as those that criticize it. Many of the quotations in this book were developed from original sources, which are cited in detail for verification and further reading. The represented authors range from academic leaders to social critics, U.S. presidents to Russian revolutionaries, Roman poets to student radicals, John Donne to Fats Domino. All of the authors are identified by professional positions, years of birth, and, where applicable, year of death.

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9780275980719

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Reviews

[T]his kind of work has its place; it will provide readers with time on their hands a few chuckles and dinner (or commencement address) speakers with many snide and self-deprecating asides for their remarks. How many times have you attended a campus banquet where the moderator ritualistically proclaims, 'And, of course, it goes without saying...?' Now you can break the stalemate of cliches and silence by standing up and reading any one of several appropriate quotations from Birnbaum's wonderful book. Then, be prepared for applause-after which you should be certain to give credit to Birnbaum. We are in his debt. * Journal of Higher Education *

[H]ow many times have you attended a campus banquet where the moderator ritualistically proclaims, And, of course, it goes without saying...? Now you can break the stalemate of cliches and silence by standing up and reading any one of several appropriate quotations from Birnbaum's wonderful book. Then, be prepared for applause--after which you should be certain to give credit to Birnbaum. We are in his debt. -The Review of Higher Education

[T]his kind of work has its place; it will provide readers with time on their hands a few chuckles and dinner (or commencement address) speakers with many snide and self-deprecating asides for their remarks. How many times have you attended a campus banquet where the moderator ritualistically proclaims, 'And, of course, it goes without saying...?' Now you can break the stalemate of cliches and silence by standing up and reading any one of several appropriate quotations from Birnbaum's wonderful book. Then, be prepared for applause-after which you should be certain to give credit to Birnbaum. We are in his debt. Journal of Higher Education

Author Information

ROBERT BIRNBAUM is Professor Emeritus of Higher Education at the University of Maryland, College Park, and was formerly Professor and Chair of the Department of Higher and Adult Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. He has held administrative appointments as Vice-chancellor of the City University of New York, Vice-chancellor of the New Jersey Department of Higher Education, and Chancellor of the University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh. Birnbaum is author, co-author, or editor of nine books and numerous articles in scholarly and professional journals related to higher education leadership and organization, and the role of higher education in society.

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