ABSTRACT
The industry remains perilously poised between the requirements and restraints of commerce and the responsibilities and obligations that it must bear as a prime guardian of the symbolic culture of the nation. Coser, Charles Kadushin, and Walter Powell recognize the influence of profit, the power of what they call commerce, in text production. While the text dominates curricula at the elementary, secondary, and even college levels, very little critical attention has been paid to the ideological, political, and economic sources of its production, distribution, and reception. Book production, hence, has historically rested on a foundation where from the outset it was necessary to "find enough capital to start work and then to print only those titles which would satisfy a clientele, and that at a price which would withstand competition." An excellent case in point is the production of texts for tertiary level courses.
