Social Securities Talk: Teaching the People: Enlightenment and the American Republic

In this talk, David Marshall will illuminate contemporary debates about the value of the liberal arts and sciences and public investment in higher education by examining Enlightenment arguments for both liberal education and public education in the early American Republic, and the 19th-century Land Grant movement, which resulted in the establishment of the University of California as a “public trust” in the California State Constitution. These two Enlightenment moments resonate today as we try to make the case for accessibility, the liberal arts, and the public research university in the face of privatization and pressure to focus on vocational and pre-professional training, and applied research.

David Marshall is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at UC Santa Barbara, where he serves as Executive Vice Chancellor.  His research focuses on eighteenth-century fiction, aesthetics, and moral philosophy. Past President of the National Humanities Alliance, which advances national humanities policy in the areas of research, education, preservation, and public programs, David Marshall has lectured widely on issues in higher education and public education.

Sponsored by the IHC’s Social Securities series and the Harry Girvetz Memorial Endowment