When it was published in 1968, a year noted for historic student protests on campuses across the country, The American University spoke in Jacques Barzun's characteristically wise and lucid voice about what colleges and universities were really meant to do--and how they actually worked. Drawing on a lifetime of extraordinary accomplishment as a teacher, administrator, and scholar, Barzun here describes the immense demands placed on the university by its competing constituencies--students, faculty, administrators, alumni, trustees, and the political world around it all. "American higher education is fortunate to have had a scholar and intellectual of Jacques Barzun's stature give so many years of service to the daily bread-and-butter details of running a great university and then share his reflections with us in a literate, humane, and engaging book."--Charles Donovan, America

雅剋•巴爾贊（Jacques Barzun,1907—2012），法裔美籍文化史學者，其研究建立瞭現代文化史研究的現代規範。齣版著作40餘本，內容涉及哲學、音樂、思想史，當代藝術乃至偵探小說。他曾兩度榮獲美國藝術和文學學會批評傢金奬，並兩次任該學會主席。已譯成中文的著作有《從黎明到衰落：西方文化生活五百年》《藝術的用途和濫用》《我們應有的文化》。