(1)
No
reason. The humanities
have got no reason to whine. As far as education goes, we live in a science
age. What is happening on that front is quite stunning, not least the speed
with which it has happened and is happening and the kinds of knowledge it has
provided. Leaves everything else in the dust. ‘Genome’ wasn’t invented when I
was a student. No wonder society’s priorities gravitate towards it.
(2)
Nothing
comparable. The
cultural front, the humanities, has nothing comparable to offer. Even
the fattest doctoral dissertation is mere contingent opinion when it comes down
to it. Coated in the circumstantial vocabulary of other academic opinions at a
given time sanctioned by its clergy. The effect being that it essentially
becomes an exercise geared towards establishing a foothold in the bourgeois
knitting-club that is the university world, i.e. clergy. Unless, of course,
Plato can convincingly be understood as a contemporary. That would change the
ball game. Which also is why we carry on.
(3)
What
is not meant. What do
we not mean by the humanities? Certainly not archeology, anthropology, history,
sociology, although these are indeed very human. But to their advantage they
all have something very tangible in their hands they can look at from different
sides and measure (which doesn’t keep them from being considered a kind of
humanities). Pride and Prejudice may be a hard cover book but that’s
beside the point. What it really is, is something that tangibly does not exist;
that’s where its strength lies. I am not sure I would rank ‘political science’
anywhere. (And ‘business,’ ‘communications,’ ‘engineering,’ ‘architecture’ and
‘nursing,’ of course, constitute their own, irrelevant cases, although some of
them, unfortunately behave like bad humanities). Psychology is its own disturbing
amalgamation of much of the above, but mainly bad sociology, that is, sociology
infused by narrative methodologies better suited for literary fiction.
(4)
What
is meant. What do we
mean by the humanities? The closest the humanities gets to being useful is
actually foreign language learning. But instead of being useful those
professors can’t escape the language classroom fast enough. And for some reason
the corporation rewards them, handsomely, to do so to invent obscurities and
typically vocabulate them in even more obscure terminology. Most of it stuff
that never reaches the domain of the customers, not now, never later. The
fundamental problem being that if obscure vocabulary isn’t invented and
employed, only the artificial format itself separates it from entertainment. As
does the deliberately serious posture of clergy.
(5)
Higher-order
thinking skills.
Intangible formation of higher-order thinking skills generated by the study of
symbolic expression: that’s the humanities. We do it because it is the promise
of mankind. When we sit with all our machines, reading our genome printout with
its accompanying annotations, we would be empty if we couldn’t interpret it
within the framework of something intangible. (‘we would be’ – not ‘we would
feel’ – the large majority is perfectly satisfied with the machines and the
printout). Lower-order thinking skills: bingo, soduko, sports, voting,
departmental meetings. Plus what it has always been very useful for: identity
cementation (which largely, probably, is the real reason it is still around).
(6)
Amazing
it is. Considering all
of the above it is amazing how the humanities is being attended to in thousands
of institutions across the land, even with a small presence here at Washington
State Agricultural College.
(7)
Just
be happy. Just be happy
that anyone takes an interest in your field and that it is, sort of, a
circumstantial requirement that you can negotiate. With a paycheck. And then
try to make it relevant to actual experience.
Gosh.
Kim
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