Education for Whom and for What?

( September 10, 2012, London, Sri Lanka Guardian) Noam Chomsky, a world-renowned linguist, intellectual and political activist, spoke at the University of Arizona. His lecture, Education: For Whom and For What? featured a talk on the state of higher education, followed by a question-and-answer session.

Chomsky has been concerned with a range of education-related issues in recent years:

• How do we characterize the contemporary state of the American education system?
• What happens to the quality of education when public universities become more privatized?
• Are public universities in danger of being converted into facilities that produce graduates-as-commodities for the job market?
• What is the role of activism in education?

With unprecedented tuition increases and budget struggles occurring across American campuses, these are questions that are more relevant than ever.