Learning Humanities that matters

Of late you must have noticed that there’s been a lot of importance given to Humanities in academia, appealing students from all streams of education. It’s the economic utility aspect of learning humanities that’s trying to gain wider acceptance. There’s even mention about humanities helping the student to succeed in whatever their endeavour might be, while also contributing to make students better citizens for democracy.

Humanities involve the study of how people process and document the human experience. That’s why we see that philosophy, language, literature, religion, art etc come under this field as they were used to understand and record our world. One can find Humanities courses in all the eight Ivy League universities, with the idea to help in bringing insights about everything, understanding our world and to bring clarity in our future.

Now one may ask- Why learn humanities? Because gaining knowledge is a piece of cake in today’s world. But, knowledge is not only the one to be concerned upon. A character is necessary too. How does a character represent a person? Character determines one’s success. How? What is a character? Precisely to say it’s moral strength or integrity. The subjects of Arts and Humanities are there to make people to think out of the box and to help one critically think and analyse, to reason and analyse all of which come under the utility aspect. In a broad sense, it might be difficult to understand from where is the helpfulness aspect of humanities is coming from. The reasons can be better understood by the focus on arts, which brings balance to the utility with quality aspect of life’s issues.

To know about the role of arts is to ask whether we become more perceptive and sensitive as humans due to experiencing the arts. We can say with some certainty that reading and viewing masterworks in the visual arts or in attending performances of great music, opera, or ballet widen our horizons about how people behave and what historical and cultural forces shape that behaviour. By awakening our imagination, art intensifies and complements our own experience. Art represents people, cultures, values, and perspectives on living, but it does much more. While bringing us pleasure, the art teaches us. While reading or contemplating a painting our minds go elsewhere. We are taken on a journey into the world where form and meaning are intertwined. That entry into other worlds and minds does give us a larger context for thinking about how to live and how to confront and understand present personal and historic issues.

The goal of the humanities is not only to intensify and complement the students’ life experiences but also to give them tools to understand and interpret the world in which they live. This will help them be economically and professionally successful. But it will also enhance their lives, enabling them to take pleasure in the arts and satisfaction in being part of an ongoing humanistic tradition of reading, writing, and thinking.

Resources:

Schwarz, Daniel R. How to Succeed in College and Beyond: The Art of Learning. Chichester, West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons, 2016. Web.