The Western Tradition

Abstract

The Western Tradition is a major new college television course constructed around the western civilization lectures of Eugen Weber, Professor of History at UCIA, and the author of A Modem History of Europe (1971) and the highly praised Peasants into Frenchmen (1976). The tendency in recent successful telecourses, such as Kenneth Clark's Civilizalion, J. Bronowski's The Ascent of Man, or the recent Annenberg/CPB Project, Art of the Western World, has been to consciously take the host or scholar of the series out of the classroom, away from the lectern, and transport him to some dramatic historical backdrop such as the palace of Versailles or the Parthenon.