by Tim Lacy
Presented November 4, 2011 at the History of Education Society Conference
What mattered most about the famous “Stanford Debate” from the late 1980s—which was technically about a singular... more
What mattered most about the famous “Stanford Debate” from the late 1980s—which was technically about a singular change in course offerings from “Western Civilization” to “Culture, Ideas, Values” (CIV)—was that it became a larger phenomenon in the ongoing Culture Wars. Newspapers ran stories referring to the death of the study of Western civilization on college campuses. Secretary of Education William Bennett, a prominent political and cultural conservative, condemned the proposed changes. Education liberals feared something different: a reactionary return to overly rigid views of what constitutes excellence, as well as the de-legitimization of intellectual advances made since the 1960s. In that context, this paper is concerned with a particular consequence of the Stanford Debate: how it affected the history of the great books idea, both symbolically and in reality, from roughly 1988 going forward. Western civilization courses were related to ‘the great books’ because the latter were often used as primary texts for the former. Cultural conservatives equated the loss of Western civilization courses with the loss of ‘the great books’, which meant, in turn, a retreat from excellence, rigor, and tried-and-true tradition in American higher education. This paper analyzes the post-Stanford rhetoric—ranging from the reactionary to the thoughtful, from the left, center, and right—to understand views of the great books idea going forward. This paper is particularly concerned with the post-Stanford discourse in relation to Mortimer J. Adler, a lifelong great books supporter, and his community of discourse. Also of concern are perceptions of the 1990 re-release of Britannica’s Great Books set. This study will demonstrate that the Stanford Debates, by increasing popular awareness of the weaknesses of the great books idea, directly defeated plans for the Britannica set to renew interest in great books reading groups and recreate the cottage industry of publications that had surrounded the 1952 Britannica set. In sum, Stanford helped kill—or at least signaled the final death of—the great books as a capitalist business venture. This paper adds to the historical scholarship on both the Stanford Debate and the history of the great books idea. No known works on the great books contextualize the topic by exploring the legacy of the Stanford Debate on future, saleable iterations of the great books idea. The primary sources behind this paper include books (education and autobiography) and articles from the era, as well as selections from the Mortimer J. Adler Papers at the University of Chicago. Secondary sources include dissertations and histories that focus on canon-curriculum debates.
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