THE IDEA OF AN URBAN UNIVERSITY - A HISTORY AND RHETORIC OF AMBIVALENCE AND AMBIGUITY

American public and professional attitudes toward the idea of the urba n university have always been ambivalent and confused, if not hostile and resistant, in keeping with tendencies toward metrophobia, or fear of the city and its people. Furthermore, definitions of and criteria f or the urban university have suffered from ambiguity, thus exacerbatin g negative attitudes toward it. Uncovering the reasons for these views toward and definitions of the urban university requires analyses that are both rhetorical and historical. Sources of resistance to the urba n university are found in the rural and small town traditions of colon ial, state, and land grant institutions in the United States. Further indication of ambivalence and ambiguity is the current rhetorical move that poses what used to be called urban problems as metropolitan or h uman problems and the corresponding reconceptualizations of urban univ ersities as metropolitan or generic, thus deflecting attention from ur ban institutions and inner cities.