---
title: "William Deresiewicz & Jonathan Zimmerman: The Ivy-League Miseducation of the American Elite?"
description: "William Deresiewicz & Jonathan Zimmerman: The Ivy-League Miseducation of the American Elite?"
---

[Vienna Live](https://simeonmorrow.com/vienna-live)

# [William Deresiewicz & Jonathan Zimmerman: The Ivy-League Miseducation of the American Elite?](https://simeonmorrow.com/vienna-live/2021/08/30/william-deresiewicz-jonathan-zimmerman-the-ivy-league-miseducation-of-the-american-elite)

 Written by [Vienna Live with Simeon Morrow](https://simeonmorrow.com/vienna-live/author/simeonmorrow) | Aug 30, 2021 2:25:15 PM

<https://www.facebook.com/events/867485787082872/>

*For those who give credence to Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of social Distinction, William Deresiewicz’ * Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite & the Way to a Meaningful Life* – a rebuke of elite American families’ academic objectives – may not come as a big surprise: the premium elites place on accumulating “institutionalized cultural capital,” the likes of a diploma awarded by an Ivy-League university, naturally promotes their collective identity and distinguishes their “habits” from those of other social classes.  But theory aside, what happens in practice when elite American families earn Ivy-League diplomas but don’t take seriously the age-old liberal arts education that informed the civic-minded decisions of their forefathers and, instead of taking *noblesse oblige *to heart, are fixated on using their capital collections to improve their own private socioeconomic standing?  Novel pandemonium seems to be the result.  Come welcome William Deresiewicz and Jonathan Zimmerman, author of *The Amateur Hour: A History of College Teaching*, the pioneering study of the evolution of undergraduate education in the United States, to our show for an in-depth discussion about the relevance of real learning. *

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