«=> BILL READINGS The University in Ruins Harvard University Press Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, EnglandCopyright © 1996 bythe Estate of Bill Readings Allights reserved Printed in the United States of America Fourth printing, 1999 Library of Congres Caalaging-in-Pull Readings, Bl, 1960. The university in rains Bill Readings Includes bibliogrsphical ferences (p, and index ISBN 0-674-92952-7 oth) IN 0-674-82953-5 (pbk) 1. Education, Higher—Aims and objectives. 2. Education, Highet-—United States—Aims and objectives, 3. Education, Higher—Socal specs 4 Higher edcation and state 5 Nationalism and education, I Tie p23222.Ra2 1996 378001—de20—95-47290 cw x x ahkRwenn o S ll 2 <> Contents Foreword by Diane Blam vi Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 The Idea of Excellence 21 ‘The Decline of the Nation-State 44 ‘The University within the Limits of Reason 5) ‘The University and the Idea of Culture 62 Literary Culture 70 Culture Wars and Cultural Studies 89 The Posthistorical University 119 The Time of Study: 1968 135 The Scene of Teaching 150 Dwelling in the Ruins 165 The Community of Dissensus 180 Notes 195 Index 229<=> Foreword Bill Readings was in the process of making the final revisions to this book when he died in the crash of American Eagle flight 4184 on Oc tober 31, 1994. I completed the revisions on which Bill was working, taking his notes and our many conversations as my guide. Editing each other's work was once just something Bill and I did. At the tim: med extraord lary; it never seemed like something that would need to be talked about, something that would mark, as it does now, the line dividing life from death, Revision and conversa- tion—with me, with friends and colleagues, with students—were Bills way of trying to create possibilities for thinking together. Uf there is anything I could say about how this book evolved, how Bill imagined it would continue to evolve, it would have to be in terms of the many conversations that informed it and the many more that he hoped would follow from it, Dwelling in the ruins of the University ‘was not usually a silent occasion for Bill. Talk——whether i led to agree ment or disagreementt, whether it was serious or silly—had everything to do with how he worked, thought, and envisioned a future for the University To say that conversation with Bill ca acknowledge the painful fi a part of the very fabric of this book is perhaps a step toward acknowl- edging the singularity of a voice, a place, and a time which would not exist apart from the University never again take place is to ty of his death. And to insist on talk as, Diane Blam Montréal, 1999