The Politics of Higher Education: The Imperial University in Northern Song China

Abstract

education’ should not limit itself to a series of actual historical accounts unless they can be shown to be exemplars of ways of investigating. In this regard both the Oxford and the Springer handbooks are only partially successful, since there are many (though very good) historical accounts that are not obviously exemplary in terms of ways of doing history. Both handbooks bring together an impressive group of scholars: their individual contributions will for the most part be of lasting value to readers wanting an authoritative overview of a particular topic. Only one contribution is written in impenetrable style. One writer thinks Magritte’s first name was ‘Renee’. As is the case with many compendia, it would have been helpful to contrive cross-referencing throughout, to enable greater coherence within and between sections. The indexes too could have been more useful as tools to navigate the complexity of coverage in both publications. They are far too selective: search in vain, for example, for Brian Simon or Lawrence Stone or Lawrence E. Cremin in the index of the Springer Handbook or Friedrich Paulsen in both. The on-line versions will of course be more searchable, but readers using the print versions will have to do a lot of textual excavation to uncover mention of people and places mentioned in the endnotes. Taken together, the two handbooks will be of lasting value to historians of education who will turn to their rich coverage of the field for insights into a huge range of issues of importance to anyone engaged in serious historical inquiry.