ABSTRACT
The article in the special issue of The New Republic is a clearly argued and learned defense of the “canon” by the Marxist-bred literary critic Irving Howe. He shows that the opponents of the canon—feminists, black activists, Marxist, deconstructionists, and various mixtures of these—all tend to share the egalitarian, anti-elitist, and anti-hierarchical values so dear to the hearts of the “the left.” A brief look at the ten articles in a special issue of The New Republic on “Race on Campus: Reports from Colleges around the Nation,” tends to bear out the above views on class and liberal education. Of course, this occurred largely at elite institutions where liberal learning is an issue. After all, most students at the some three thousand institutions of higher learning in America major in business administration or some utilitarian subject. While the eight New Republic articles on the problems of elite campuses leave the reader with deep sense of despair.
