The Idea of a University

The Eucatastrophe

Dave and Joel mull over what the university is for. The Australian Government has insisted funding for universities should be aligned with ‘job ready graduates’. In the nineteenth century, John Henry Newman railed against such ‘utility’. For him, the university exists to cultivate knowledge. Dave and Joel discuss the problems with subordinating the university to the demands of state and market, but also whether knowledge as Newman discussed it is too narrow or even solipsistic. It’s the usual defence of cultural Marxism that has become Dave’s gift to the world.