American National Identity, Policy Paradigms, and Higher Education

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xv

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2. Introduction

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 1-48

3. Industrialization and Competition: The Development of the American Research University

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 49-91

4. From Progressive Reform to Research and Competition: Higher Education from the Turn of the Twentieth Century Through the Great War

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 93-110

5. A Failing Nation, a Struggling Institution: Higher Education in the Inter-War Period

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 111-134

6. University Technology and Arms to Win the War: The US in World War II

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 135-158

7. Higher Education for American Democracy

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 159-176

8. Cold War Challenges, Unrest and Rebellion, and a Shift in the Federal Role in Higher Education

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 177-205

9. The Impending Twenty-First Century: Education to Save America or for Market Domination?

   • Allison L. Palmadessa

   Pages 207-229

10. Twenty-First-Century Trials and Tribulations: Market Competition and National Dependence on Higher Education

    • Allison L. Palmadessa

    Pages 231-245

11. Market Commodities and Human Capital: What Happened to Democracy and Sharing of Knowledge?

    • Allison L. Palmadessa

    Pages 247-268

12. Back Matter

    Pages 269-271

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This volume examines the role of higher education in producing and reproducing American cultural identity from 1862 to 2015 and considers whether changes in federal policy regarding higher education result in paradigm shifts that directly impact the purpose of higher education. American institutions of higher education have served as a beacon of American idealism and identity since the foundation of the earliest universities.  As the nation developed, higher education matured and maintained a position of importance in the future of the nation.  While the university has perpetuated American national cultural identity, the nation-state has resourced and legitimated the university, inextricably linking national identity and higher education. In this historical analysis, the relationship between national identity, federal legislation, and higher education is established, and an identity of superiority, defined in economic terms, reinforced by higher education, is revealed.

• education
• higher education
• identity
• national identity
• state

“This book takes the study of higher education in bold new directions. This theoretically rigorous and empirically grounded study offers a pioneering account of higher education and American national identity. It situates higher education within complex historical, cultural, and policy contexts, problematizes contemporary policy assumptions, and raises critical questions about the future of higher education.” (David F. Ayers, Associate Professor of Community College Leadership, Old Dominion University, USA)

• History, Greensboro College , Greensboro, USA

  Allison L. Palmadessa

Allison L. Palmadessa is Assistant Professor of History and Coordinator of Social Studies Licensure, Greensboro College, USA. 

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