ABSTRACT
The preface to the 1963 edition of The Uses of the University states that "universities in America are at a hinge of history: while connected with their past, they are swinging in another direction". Noting that the university is one of the oldest extant institutions, Clark Kerr discusses the novel position in which the university finds itself in society where, as a knowledge producer in a knowledge-based economy, it has a centrality it never enjoyed before. In the 1994 edition of The Uses of the University, Clark Kerr reflects that "the hinge of history" can been seen "even more dramatically in 1994 than in 1963". In the prologue to the last edition of The Uses of the University, Kerr said that universities in America were again at a hinge of history. This time, however, he saw "the hinge flapping in the winds blowing from many directions—no zephyrs, alas".
