Academic Freedom in a Democratic South Africa

"Must universities starve themselves to death in order to stand up for their principles? Noted cultural critic John Higgins has written a book about much more than what Americans call ‘academic freedom.' Taking up a perspective that is defiantly located 'offshore,' Higgins shows in brilliant and intriguing detail how the humanities in post-apartheid South Africa have suffered both from American-style corporate instrumentalism and from what he calls 'applied nationalism' and how much democracy stands to lose thereby. This is a world-scale contribution to the university’s never more than partially realized challenge of figuring out what cultural literacy should be and how it can be defended." -- Bruce Robbins, Old Dominion Foundation Professor in the Humanities, Columbia University
"Higgins' account of  the predicaments of the humanities in the new South Africa reflects issues that are being encountered all over the world, and not least in the United States.  His retelling of episodes in the anti-apartheid student movement in the 1980's is uncannily resonant with questions raised  by the current BDS movement against Israel, and his reflections on the demise of a liberal arts tradition under pressure from global neoliberal technologism are an important resource for all of us who are faced with giving an account of ourselves in an outcomes-driven academic environment." -- David Simpson, G.B. Needham Chair in English at the University of California, Davis