Synopses & Reviews
Review
andldquo;Examines how andlsquo;going to collegeandrsquo; became that quintessential middle-class experience and, moreover, how it reshaped the archetype of the American businessman for the emergent economic base of corporate capitalism.andrdquo;andmdash; John Pettegrew, author of Brutes in Suits: Male Sensibility in America, 1890-1920
Review
andldquo;A valuable contribution to the scholarship on the several areas it pulls together: the histories of popular magazines, the success ethic, business, higher education, and intercollegiate athletics.andrdquo;andmdash;Michael Oriard, author of Reading Football: How the Popular Press Created an American Spectacle
Review
andldquo;[A]n engaging contribution to the history of the mass media that provides evidence of the power of magazines to shape our mental lives.andrdquo;andmdash;Bookforum
Review
andldquo;Clarkandrsquo;s book is a valuable addition to the growing historical literature on the meaning and significance of higher education in America. . . .[I]t clearly and thoroughly illuminates crucial sources of popular images of college life.and#160; Such images remain familiar to this day and, whether we realize it or not, shape our own expectations and perceptions of what college is and should be about.andrdquo;andmdash;The Cutting Edge
Review
andldquo;Articulate and engaging. . . .the findings here are significant and timely, suggesting how college education acquired its democratic value and even utility, less from curricular changes than from larger norms and narratives attached to it by educators, editors, and advertisers.andrdquo;andmdash;Thomas Augst, Journal of American History
Review
andldquo;The book is rich in reflections about these magazineandrsquo;s representations of college curricula and extracurricular life, and the linkages between these and both the newly developing ideals of masculinity and the world of corporate capitalism.andrdquo;andmdash;
Historical Studies in EducationSynopsis
How did a college education become so vital to American notions of professional and personal advancement? Reared on the ideal of the self-made man, American men had long rejected the need for college. But in the early twentieth century this ideal began to change as white men born in the U.S. faced a barrage of new challenges, among them a stultifying bureaucracy and growing competition in the workplace from an influx of immigrants and women. At this point a college education appealed to young men as an attractive avenue to success in a dawning corporate age. Accessible at first almost exclusively to middle-class white males, college funneled these aspiring elites toward a more comfortable and certain future in a revamped construction of the American dream.
and#160;and#160;and#160; In Creating the College Man Daniel A. Clark argues that the dominant mass media of the eraandmdash;popular magazines such as Cosmopolitan and the Saturday Evening Postandmdash;played an integral role in shaping the immediate and long-term goals of this select group of men. In editorials, articles, fiction, and advertising, magazines depicted the college man as simultaneously cultured and scientific, genteel and athletic, polished and tough. Such depictions underscored the college experience in powerful and attractive ways that neatly united the incongruous strains of American manhood and linked a college education to corporate success.
About the Author
Daniel A. Clark is assistant professor of history at Indiana State University.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgmentsand#160;and#160;and#160;
Introduction. Piggy Goes to Harvard: Mass Magazines, Masculinity and College Education for the Corporate Middle Classand#160;and#160;and#160;
1 The Crisis of the Clerks: Magazines, Masculine Success, and the Ideal Businessman in Transitionand#160;and#160;and#160;
2 The College Curriculum and Business: Re-Conceptualizing the Pathways to Power in a Corporate Worldand#160;and#160;and#160;
3 Athletes and Frats, Romance and Rowdies: Re-Imagining the Collegiate Extracurricular Experienceand#160;and#160;and#160;
4 Horatio Alger Goes to College: College, Corporate America, and the Reconfiguration of the Self-Made Idealand#160;and#160;and#160;
5 From Campus Hero to Corporate Professional: Selling the Full Vision of the College Experienceand#160;and#160;and#160;
Conclusion: College and the Culture of Aspirationand#160;and#160;and#160;
Appendixand#160;and#160;and#160;
Notesand#160;and#160;and#160;
Indexand#160;and#160;and#160;