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- Title
Liberal versus Useful Education: Reconsidering the Contrast and Its Lineage.
- Authors
Kimball, Bruce A.
- Abstract
This article presents a comparison between liberal and useful education. The tension between what is liberal and what is useful is one of the oldest and the most persistent problems in education. The definition of liberal education as a broad exposure to various disciplines still perseveres among faculty members in professional fields, especially if the liberal disciplines have direct application to their professional field. Liberal education has the greatest utility for a profession, career, or vocation. Liberal arts are said to expand the scope of knowledge and maximize reasoning skills and generally provide skills needed for employment in the field of commerce, as well as in all occupational fields. Useful is more important than liberal from contemporary society. Liberal is better than useful from faculty of liberal disciplines. Useful is actually liberal from faculty of useful disciplines. Liberal is actually useful from faculty teaching liberal disciplines. Liberal education is broad and general while useful education is narrow and specific.
- Subjects
EDUCATION; PROFESSIONS; HUMANISTIC education; REASONING; EMPLOYMENT; COMMERCE
- Publication
Teachers College Record, 1986, Vol 87, Issue 4, p575
- ISSN
0161-4681
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1177/016146818608700406