ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses meanings of history in US higher education. US institutions of higher education have traditions that clearly stretch back to the Middle Ages in both academic and social lives, whether it is the liberal arts or students’ common preference for beer. Historians of higher education have long questioned, even resisted, the history of presidents, that singular approach of understanding the institutions by understanding a sole figure. Higher education in the United States has long been diverse, but the institutional stratification of diversity in the context of meritocracy highlights the means for keeping some on and many off the pathways for the most success. A more comprehensive view engaging meritocracy has more substance than the lives of presidents. Histories of higher education based on presidential decisions and actions have their limits, despite the lure of finding the records of presidents far more extensive than other individuals in archives.
