Report: public perception of the humanities

[Parasaurolophus]

The American Academy of Arts and Sciences' Humanities Indicators project has released its findings from their 2019 survey of Americans (detailed report; at a glance).

Some takeaways:

• There is substantial engagement with the humanities in American life. However, very few people engage regularly in the full range of activities, or even in all the activities associated with a given discipline (e.g., someone who watches history shows is not very likely to also research history topics online).
• The survey revealed that a substantial majority of Americans believes the humanities confer personal, societal, and economic benefits. The study also found considerable engagement in a range of humanities activities at home and in the workplace, as well as strong support for teaching humanities subjects in the schools. The survey detected relatively little agreement with a variety of negative statements about the field, such as "cost too much" or is "a waste of time."
• With the exception of reading, a majority of Americans do not remember seeing their parents often engaging in humanities activities.
• Almost half of American adults wish they took more language courses while in school
• Almost 95% of Americans agree that the humanities should be an important part of every American's education.

You can see results summarized by field here. A couple of interesting tidbits from my perspective:

• 23% of adults often think about or researched the ethical aspects of a choice in their life. (Another 31% do so sometimes.)
• 29% of Americans recall their parents often discussing ethical issues, though that is smaller than the share who remembered their parents rarely or never engaging in those conversations (36%).
• 87% of Americans feel that teaching ethics to K–12 students is important. An identical share feel it is important that children be taught logic.
• Self-identified political liberals are substantially more likely than conservatives to have a very favorable impression of philosophy. While 41% of liberals have such a favorable impression of the term, only 17% of conservatives are similarly disposed.
• Given a range of humanities and nonhumanities subjects to choose from (and allowed to select more than one), 25% of Americans wish they had taken more philosophy courses.

I find this one (above) especially surprising, however:

• With the exception of reading, a majority of Americans do not remember seeing their parents often engaging in humanities activities.

I find it surprising because Americans are hyper-religious, and religious studies is a humanities subject. This suggests to me that "the folk" don't have a very solid grasp of what the humanities are, or what 'humanities activities' look like outside school.


All that said, they drew their sample of 5015 American adults from "NORC at the University of Chicago's AmeriSpeak panel". I dunno what that is, but I have to wonder whether the sample is representative (and I kind of suspect not).

[polly_mer]

1) Attending religious ceremonies is not at all the same as engaging in religious studies as the humanities scholars do.

2) My parents dragged me to all kinds of humanities things when I was a kid.  If we were traveling, then we'd visit historical sites, museums, and other educational facilities.  We visited the humanities-focused places much more than the science places.  Those experiences are much more useful than the checkbox requirements in college.

3) Reading for pleasure is not at all the same as being a humanities scholar or even engaged discussant.

4) Philosophy as discussion among people who want to discuss is seldom the same experience as taking a formal philosophy course.  I have many, many fond memories of late-night bull sessions in college, but my 5 courses in philosophy, while interesting, seldom were as personally satisfying as the informal bull sessions that were unmoderated and unguided.  My courses were useful (particularly formal logic), but not at all the same as the freewheeling discussions.

5) Where I hang out, the perception is not that the humanities as ways of knowing about the world are worthless.  The perception is that majoring in the humanities in college as someone who needs college to move up in SES class has significant opportunity costs (at best) and puts one on a long detour to possibly never get back on track (at worst).  Better to major in something that can't be picked up other places and reserve the humanities for less formal interactions. 

The poster example are the armies of adjuncts/contingent faculty.  While making a trade-off for quality of life over lots of money makes sense, being short on money and having a low quality of life does not make sense, especially after more than a two decades of education (K through grad school).  It's not quite "If you're so smart, then why ain't you rich?", but there's definitely the pointed question of "Why should we believe you on the specifics of the value of your type of education when you're not at all successful in the ways that we want to be successful?"

[Hibush]

• 23% of adults often think about or researched the ethical aspects of a choice in their life. (Another 31% do so sometimes.)
  
  
• 87% of Americans feel that teaching ethics to K–12 students is important. 

A fair part of the population appears to appreciate being told (or having their children told) what constitutes ethical behavior rather than figure it out by themselves.

Historically religions have served to provide that guidance, but that is changing quickly in the West. Are humanities scholars missing an opportunity by trying to teach people how to analyze ethics, something that has limited demand? The high demand is for the conclusions, but there isn't yet a consistent trusted secular source.

[polly_mer]

Historically religions have served to provide that guidance, but that is changing quickly in the West. Are humanities scholars missing an opportunity by trying to teach people how to analyze ethics, something that has limited demand? The high demand is for the conclusions, but there isn't yet a consistent trusted secular source.

Agree that people want answers, not the tools to do the analysis.

People also want clear, concise, simple answers that always work and that already agree with the activities in which they regularly engage.  Telling lower-middle-class white folks to be more woke so that the playing field is leveled for strangers is a clear answer, but a non-starter.

[marshwiggle]

5) Where I hang out, the perception is not that the humanities as ways of knowing about the world are worthless.  The perception is that majoring in the humanities in college as someone who needs college to move up in SES class has significant opportunity costs (at best) and puts one on a long detour to possibly never get back on track (at worst).  Better to major in something that can't be picked up other places and reserve the humanities for less formal interactions. 

I can give a personal example of this. We spent thousands of dollars over the years for music lessons, music camps, and instruments for our kids. Music is a big deal for all of us, but we never encouraged any of them to study music in university. Why? Only a very small number of people who study it can make a really good living at it, but anyone who's interested can enjoy it and pursue it as a hobby for life without studying it at the post-secondary level. Putting several years of full-time study into something should have more practical value (such as employability) than simply personal interest, unless one is rich enough to not need to worry about earning income.

[Hibush]

Historically religions have served to provide that guidance, but that is changing quickly in the West. Are humanities scholars missing an opportunity by trying to teach people how to analyze ethics, something that has limited demand? The high demand is for the conclusions, but there isn't yet a consistent trusted secular source.

Agree that people want answers, not the tools to do the analysis.

People also want clear, concise, simple answers that always work and that already agree with the activities in which they regularly engage.  Telling lower-middle-class white folks to be more woke so that the playing field is leveled for strangers is a clear answer, but a non-starter.

Are humanists in a position to contextualize the message so that it is not a non-starter but a moral imperative? Or do we leave that to the applied media studies majors?

[polly_mer]

Historically religions have served to provide that guidance, but that is changing quickly in the West. Are humanities scholars missing an opportunity by trying to teach people how to analyze ethics, something that has limited demand? The high demand is for the conclusions, but there isn't yet a consistent trusted secular source.

Agree that people want answers, not the tools to do the analysis.

People also want clear, concise, simple answers that always work and that already agree with the activities in which they regularly engage.  Telling lower-middle-class white folks to be more woke so that the playing field is leveled for strangers is a clear answer, but a non-starter.

Are humanists in a position to contextualize the message so that it is not a non-starter but a moral imperative? Or do we leave that to the applied media studies majors?

Flat out propaganda to the youth for decades would work.

Getting adults to change their minds and behaviors when they don't immediately (well, within a week or so) get substantial goodies tends to not work all that well and that's true even for things like good nutrition, exercise, and sleep.

[marshwiggle]

Historically religions have served to provide that guidance, but that is changing quickly in the West. Are humanities scholars missing an opportunity by trying to teach people how to analyze ethics, something that has limited demand? The high demand is for the conclusions, but there isn't yet a consistent trusted secular source.

Agree that people want answers, not the tools to do the analysis.

People also want clear, concise, simple answers that always work and that already agree with the activities in which they regularly engage.  Telling lower-middle-class white folks to be more woke so that the playing field is leveled for strangers is a clear answer, but a non-starter.

Are humanists in a position to contextualize the message so that it is not a non-starter but a moral imperative? Or do we leave that to the applied media studies majors?

You might have some success if there were humanists across the political spectrum who were able to have civil, nuanced discussions of current events with a view to suggesting practical, effective reponses. However, if what people see is humanists predominantly from one fringe of the political spectrum who demonize anyone who disagrees with them and suggest unrealistic, draconian responses to current events, it's not very likely.

[Hibush]

Are humanists in a position to contextualize the message so that it is not a non-starter but a moral imperative? Or do we leave that to the applied media studies majors?

Flat out propaganda to the youth for decades would work.

Getting adults to change their minds and behaviors when they don't immediately (well, within a week or so) get substantial goodies tends to not work all that well and that's true even for things like good nutrition, exercise, and sleep.

IOW we leave this job to the media studies majors, and will continue to do so. Humanists will continue to think deep thoughts that have no societal effect. Is that good for society?

[Hibush]

Are humanists in a position to contextualize the message so that it is not a non-starter but a moral imperative? Or do we leave that to the applied media studies majors?

You might have some success if there were humanists across the political spectrum who were able to have civil, nuanced discussions of current events with a view to suggesting practical, effective responses. However, if what people see is humanists predominantly from one fringe of the political spectrum who demonize anyone who disagrees with them and suggest unrealistic, draconian responses to current events, it's not very likely.

Effecting behavioral change requires empathizing with those you hope to influence. Living in an academic bubble seems to make that really hard, even for those who study that very phenomenon. The result is exactly what you describe.

Is there a place in the academic world between the hostile idealists and the ideal-free media-studies types to develop thoughtful solutions to issues classically in the humanities domain, and to succeed in having more people in society think a little deeper about them?

[polly_mer]

Humanists will continue to think deep thoughts that have no societal effect. Is that good for society?

That depends on whether the deep thoughts would translate into useful action or would just be a distraction from what needs to be done and that what the people involved want to be done. 

Is there a place in the academic world between the hostile idealists and the ideal-free media-studies types to develop thoughtful solutions to issues classically in the humanities domain, and to succeed in having more people in society think a little deeper about them?

Thinking deep thoughts is no substitute for action.

Encouraging others to think deep thoughts is no substitute for action.

People who are close enough to the edge of survival that they worry about food and shelter for next week can't afford to think deep thoughts to the big problems.

Having a sufficient number of people well enough off that they can think the deep thoughts to big problems, come up with solutions, and then implement the solutions can work.  Ideally, that would be a university function, but can't really be done at scale as long as so much faculty time in many institutions is devoted to going through the motions of teaching with students who don't want to learn. 

Fixing that university problem of diversion of resources by only enrolling students who want to learn and can learn by virtue of being able to devote enough energy to learning, closing programs/institutions that no longer have a teaching purpose once many fewer students are enrolled, and having universities be places where serious people think deep thoughts as a standard operating procedure is not appealing to the folks who would lose their current jobs going through the motions of teaching with students who don't want to learn.  In my experience, very few people want to think deep thoughts, even when that's ostensibly their bailiwick, when going through the motions is enough to keep them fed and sheltered.

Even if we somehow reform universities to be focused on deep thoughts to solve hard problems, many drawbacks are inherent in this model.  The first is whether the problems can be solved by deep thoughts by some people that lead to action by other people.  As a concrete example consider why people are poor.  If they are poor because of making bad individual choices when good choices exist, then that's a different solution than if people are poor because redistributing all the resources equally means no one can be at the comfortable level, although many current people would be better off.  One might then ask what the goals are to address the problem of poverty and whether it benefits society at large or the deep thinkers in particular to actually solve the problem in the way that the poor people would like instead of the way that benefits the deep thinkers and modestly helps the poor.

A second drawback is, often, the deep thinkers need to know more than just the traditionally humanistic areas to be able to grasp the whole societal problem, let alone the solution.  As an example, on the energy thread, forumites are flat out refusing to grok the limitations imposed by physical reality including lack of the materials on earth and chemical/physical processes.  The choices those deep thinkers want to make cannot lead to the outcomes they desire by virtue of being physically impossible to scale up in the necessary way.  Spending more money or devoting more resources to research can fix problems that are mainly a lack of human knowledge about how the physical world works.  When the problem is physical reality doesn't work the desired way, more money on research is not going to fix the problem.

A third drawback is the degree to which the people who have to implement the solutions are willing to do so.  One unexpected-to-aspiring-engineers harsh lesson is that the best solution based on objective criteria that the humans involved refuse to use is a much worse solution than any solution that humans will use that still productively addresses the problem.  I point to the prevention of communicable disease by quarantining.  People who break quarantine will contribute to community spread while those who observe strict quarantine will not.  It doesn't matter why one doesn't want to quarantine; even the medical folks with the best PPE existing get sick, albeit at dramatically reduced rates.  The cries in many quarters about the out-of-touch elites often are related to those who thought really deeply didn't think even more deeply about how that solution would be implemented and what other problems would be caused by focusing on that one solution.

A fourth drawback is a variation on the first: are the intellectually satisfying or personally appealing problems the ones that society needs solved and are the most urgent problems the highest priority?  To return to the examples upthread, is poverty, a merely theoretical notion to those who are pretty comfortable,  the problem that will be addressed or will people focus on something like climate change, but only the solutions that overlap their expertise?  Even when someone states in a good, clear voice, This is a problem that will kill us all if we don't get it under control, will that person then work as though they were on the Manhattan Project with laser focus or will that person lead a middle-class life in which some portion of most weeks involves thinking the deep thoughts that might eventually someday lead to a partial solution?

[Stockmann]

5) Where I hang out, the perception is not that the humanities as ways of knowing about the world are worthless.  The perception is that majoring in the humanities in college as someone who needs college to move up in SES class has significant opportunity costs (at best) and puts one on a long detour to possibly never get back on track (at worst).  Better to major in something that can't be picked up other places and reserve the humanities for less formal interactions. 

I can give a personal example of this. We spent thousands of dollars over the years for music lessons, music camps, and instruments for our kids. Music is a big deal for all of us, but we never encouraged any of them to study music in university. Why? Only a very small number of people who study it can make a really good living at it, but anyone who's interested can enjoy it and pursue it as a hobby for life without studying it at the post-secondary level. Putting several years of full-time study into something should have more practical value (such as employability) than simply personal interest, unless one is rich enough to not need to worry about earning income.

As a parent, my position is very similar. I value the humanities, but would never encourage my child to, when the time comes, major in a humanities or field even in a "pure" science. Even for fields that have a clear practical value, a humanities major seems poor value for money, time or effort - take languages, for example. I never took language classes in HE, yet I speak a second and a third language, and I dare say I've mastered my second language (English) well enough. I've managed to communicate the basics in my third language in places where it's the main language. I can attest to the usefulness of learning languages. However, not only does majoring in a language seem to me to be devoting excessive resources to a task that doesn't really require a college degree, but by the time you're 18 it seems like it's already too late for most people (yes, there are exceptions, but if you're not already fluent in a given language by that age, you probably never will be). This is unlike engineering, medicine, law, etc, for which the relevant degree is a prerequisite to becoming a practitioner. Thus English and a major Far Eastern language (Mandarin, Japanese or Korean, basically) are among my top priorities for my child's education, but a language major is way, way down the list of majors I'd encourage, for example.

[apl68]

I'd allow, even encourage, a bright student who was truly interested in the field to do a humanities undergrad major.  Better to study something you're interested in as an undergrad and do a good job at it than study something that will only make you miserable for a lucrative field you'll probably be washed out of anyway.  But I could not in good conscience encourage that student to carry the major into grad school.

[fourhats]

There are a number of studies that show that a few years out, humanities majors earn close to what other majors do.

I would never, and did not, discourage my kids from majoring in something they love. And they ended up successful after majoring in the humanities.

[dismalist]

And the elephant in the room is ???

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-unfortunate-fallout-of-campus-postmodernism/