The Origins of Literary Studies in America by Gerald Graff

The Origins of Literary Studies in America by Gerald Graff

Originally published in 1989, The Origins of Literary Studies in America brings together for the first time hard-to-find speeches, reports, and other writings by the founders of literary studies in the United States: Bliss Perry, Woodrow Wilson, Irving Babbitt, M. Carey Thomas, and many other scholars between 1874 and 1937.

The selections—on teaching, the MLA, and the goals of the discipline—are readable, accessible, often charming and amusing; what is most striking about them, however, is their resemblance to the debates over the crisis of American higher education. Gerald Graff and Michael Warner argue against the “myth of consensus”—a naive belief that the academic humanities until quite recently enjoyed a coherent agreement on their goals—popularized by such critical voices as Secretary of Education William Bennett, E.D. Hirsch, and Allan Bloom.

This remarkable anthology is a valuable corrective to twentieth century popular views of educational history and a work that broadens our understanding of professionalism within the academy.

Review of the first publication:

“This will be immediately a touchstone anthology and will be essential reading for those concerned with American studies, questions of professionalism, institutions, the formation of values through education, etc, in short, everybody.”

— Stanley Fish, Duke University

Gerald Graff is Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Illinois Chicago, USA. He is one of his generation's most influential commentators on education, not only as a historian and theorist, but also through his impact on the classroom practice of teachers.

Michael Warner is Seymour H. Knox Professor of English and Professor of American Studies at Yale University, USA. His work ranges across several topics and styles, from scholarship in early American literature and print culture, to more theoretical writing about publics and social movements, to introductory editions and anthologies, to journalism and non-academic political writing.