The Big Test: The Secret History of the American Meritocracy
by Lemann, Nicholas
- Used
- Fine
- Hardcover
- first
- Condition
- Fine/Fine
- ISBN 10
- 0374299846
- ISBN 13
- 9780374299842
- Seller
-
Santa Barbara, California, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999. viii, 406 pages; 24 cm. Tight, clean copy. Stated First edition. Dust jacket protected in a mylar cover. A fine copy of the first printing. "A major work of social history that asks profound moral and political questions about what is right for American society. This brilliant book shows us for the first time the ideas, the people, and the politics behind a fifty-year-old utopian social experiment that changed modern America. The experiment--launched by James Bryant Conant, president of Harvard University, and Henry Chauncey, head of the brand-new Educational Testing Service (ETS)--was to use the then-young science of intelligence testing to assess and sort American students in order to create a new democratic elite that would lead postwar America to progress, strength, and prosperity. No writer before Nicholas Lemann has gained access to the archives of the all-powerful ETS, and none has understood the significance of this extraordinary drama. But now, in a remarkable synthesis of vibrant storytelling, vivid portraiture, and thematic analysis, he reveals this secret history. Predictably, the utopian experiment did not turn out as planned. It created a new elite, but it generated conflict and tension, and American society's best-educated, most privileged people are now leaders with no followers. Lemann shows that this American meritocracy is neither natural nor inevitable, and it does not apportion opportunity equally or fairly. He concludes with his own keen assessment of what the future may hold. / Born in New Orleans in 1954, Nicholoas Lemann has been a journalist for more than twenty years. His last book was the prizewinning The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration and How It Changed America. He lives in Pelham, New York." - Publisher.. 1st. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. 8vo. Collectible.
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Details
- Bookseller
- LEFT COAST BOOKS (US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 123236
- Title
- The Big Test: The Secret History of the American Meritocracy
- Author
- Lemann, Nicholas
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- Used - Fine
- Jacket Condition
- Fine
- Edition
- 1st
- ISBN 10
- 0374299846
- ISBN 13
- 9780374299842
- Publisher
- Farrar, Straus and Giroux
- Place of Publication
- New York
- Date Published
- 1999
- Size
- 8vo
- Keywords
- Collectible
- Bookseller catalogs
- XXX / COLLECTIBLES;
Terms of Sale
LEFT COAST BOOKS
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About the Seller
LEFT COAST BOOKS
Biblio member since 2016
Santa Barbara, California
About LEFT COAST BOOKS
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Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Tight
- Used to mean that the binding of a book has not been overly loosened by frequent use.
- Jacket
- Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
- Fine
- A book in fine condition exhibits no flaws. A fine condition book closely approaches As New condition, but may lack the...
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...