HISTSCI 2911: The Past and Futures of the University

With Professor Peter Galison on Thursday 9:00-11:45 AM

This seminar is aimed at exploring the changing structure, aims, and impact of the university, from its medieval origins through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, into our contested present and possible futures. Each week we will explore a different facet of the university in its many forms, from the British, French and Italian monastic and seminary universities founded in the 11th through the 13th centuries (including Oxbridge, Bologna, Paris)  through colonial new world institutions, inter alia Harvard, Columbia, Princeton, Yale.  Most of the course will address developments of the 19th century through to the present: starting with the explosive growth of the research & teaching university created between Germany and the United States in the later 19th century—and the myriad ways it is has been transformed by wars (Civil, hot, cold), alongside debates over who can attend, meritocracy, commerce, politics, and the expanding world of AI with its impact on teaching and research.  The course, in short, is an exploration of institutional epistemology: the re-definitions of what counts and what is valued as knowledge.  Where will the university head—where should it head—over the 21st century?  This is a research seminar, open to graduate students and undergraduates, by permission of the instructor, limited to 25 students.