Are the Humanities Doomed?

[mleok]

I'm looking at that list of transferrable and soft skills in the report, and I'm thinking to myself that a STEM focused education is equally capable of delivering on most, if not all, of those skills. Sure, there are STEM students who lack those skills, but I am sure the same is true of humanities students.

it is common in engineering to have capstone design courses that are intended to force students to draw upon the entirety of their engineering education to address an interesting problem, and that is a critical way of addressing some of the siloing that is prevalent in our extremely modular system of higher education.

See, this is the objection so often.  No one says that you only get transferrable and soft skills ONLY from the humanities, simply that the humanities are very good for these.  Posters have acknowledged this on this very thread.  I've acknowledged that on this very thread. Last time I pointed this out you got snippy, but here we have it again.  It is a strawman argument.   

Why?

I disagree that high school offers enough quality "exposure" to a variety of subjects, and I am dubious that this is really accomplishable----but that's been gone over.

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

My point is that without a capstone course, that draws upon multiple courses, individual courses in and of themselves are not going to achieve any of these higher level thinking skills that transcend the siloed view of the world that comes from our very modular system of higher education. In engineering, this takes the form of senior design classes, and I would be interested to hear what plays a similar role in the humanities? In any case, there are two distinct issues, whether humanities majors acquire these soft skills in the course of their education, which again is assuming facts not in evidence, and the question of whether humanities requirements as part of general education address that need for STEM majors, which I think the evidence is even weaker for.

Also, our current high school systems in the US are inadequate, and that general education of the kind we currently have in college is better achieved in a rigorous high school system (which we do not uniformly have). The American system of higher education is exceptional both in terms of how far a well prepared student can get bacause of its flexibilty, as well as how little a college education can mean for a student who enters with an inadequate level of high school preparation and is doing the bare minimum to satisfy general education and major requirements.

[mleok]

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

Do you truly believe that our current system of general education, where students often take the first course in a discipline that is also designed for majors is anything but siloed, and is anything but intended to make up attendance in fields with a small number of majors? We've had extensive discussions of how general education might be retooled to free them of their silos, the first mark of this is that they involve faculty from multiple disciplines team teaching the same class, and classes that are designed from the ground up for non-majors.

[Wahoo Redux]

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

Do you truly believe that our current system of general education, where students often take the first course in a discipline that is also designed for majors is anything but siloed, and is anything but intended to make up attendance in fields with a small number of majors? We've had extensive discussions of how general education might be retooled to free them of their silos, the first mark of this is that they involve faculty from multiple disciplines team teaching the same class, and classes that are designed from the ground up for non-majors.

Fine.  Sounds expensive, but I think that sounds interesting.

My understanding of "Intro" courses is that it can be taken by majors and by non-majors.  I took intro science courses and found them very accessible and very interesting.  Whenever I plan an intro course I consider that I will be teaching a number of non-majors and I tailor the course accordingly figuring that the intro course will introduce a number of majors to the concepts as well.

I suppose colleges could craft intros-for-majors vs intros-for-non-majors?  Okay. 

[mleok]

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

Do you truly believe that our current system of general education, where students often take the first course in a discipline that is also designed for majors is anything but siloed, and is anything but intended to make up attendance in fields with a small number of majors? We've had extensive discussions of how general education might be retooled to free them of their silos, the first mark of this is that they involve faculty from multiple disciplines team teaching the same class, and classes that are designed from the ground up for non-majors.

Fine.  Sounds expensive, but I think that sounds interesting.

My understanding of "Intro" courses is that it can be taken by majors and by non-majors.  I took intro science courses and found them very accessible and very interesting.  Whenever I plan an intro course I consider that I will be teaching a number of non-majors and I tailor the course accordingly figuring that the intro course will introduce a number of majors to the concepts as well.

I suppose colleges could craft intros-for-majors vs intros-for-non-majors?  Okay.

Sure, one can try to accommodate the fact that non-majors are taking the class as well, but it affects the range of topics that are covered, and tend to be a narrower and less holistic view of the field, since the expectation is that the majors will be taking more advanced classes that will fill in some of the gaps. I have similar issues with Associates degrees at community college, as they tend to take the requirements for a four year college degree and offer the first two years, which would be quite different in structure from the topics I might choose to cover knowing that many students will only be taking two years of college classes.

[spork]

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

Do you truly believe that our current system of general education, where students often take the first course in a discipline that is also designed for majors is anything but siloed, and is anything but intended to make up attendance in fields with a small number of majors? We've had extensive discussions of how general education might be retooled to free them of their silos, the first mark of this is that they involve faculty from multiple disciplines team teaching the same class, and classes that are designed from the ground up for non-majors.

If faculty at mediocre institutions had any long term vision for student learning or their employer's financial viability, they would abandon the standard structure of separate discipline-based departments offering majors that few students care about and focus instead on a curriculum that trains students to tackle complex, interdisciplinary problems, like, as mentioned above, environmental degradation and climate change. Instead they stick to the approach that they were exposed to in their graduate programs.

[mleok]

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

Do you truly believe that our current system of general education, where students often take the first course in a discipline that is also designed for majors is anything but siloed, and is anything but intended to make up attendance in fields with a small number of majors? We've had extensive discussions of how general education might be retooled to free them of their silos, the first mark of this is that they involve faculty from multiple disciplines team teaching the same class, and classes that are designed from the ground up for non-majors.

If faculty at mediocre institutions had any long term vision for student learning or their employer's financial viability, they would abandon the standard structure of separate discipline-based departments offering majors that few students care about and focus instead on a curriculum that trains students to tackle complex, interdisciplinary problems, like, as mentioned above, environmental degradation and climate change. Instead they stick to the approach that they were exposed to in their graduate programs.

There is a new university in Singapore, the Singapore University of Technology and Design, which is a technology and engineering focused university that is structured along broad themes as opposed to traditional engineering disciplines, which I think is a rather novel take on engineering education,

https://www.sutd.edu.sg/Admissions/Undergraduate/Unique-Curriculum/undergraduate-curriculum

Since they don't have humanities majors, their course offerings in humanities, arts, and social sciences are entirely geared towards non-majors, and seem to my untrained eye to have a more multidisciplinary feel than many introductory humanities courses offered at my institution,

https://hass.sutd.edu.sg/education/undergraduate-subjects/subjects-schedule/

[spork]

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

Do you truly believe that our current system of general education, where students often take the first course in a discipline that is also designed for majors is anything but siloed, and is anything but intended to make up attendance in fields with a small number of majors? We've had extensive discussions of how general education might be retooled to free them of their silos, the first mark of this is that they involve faculty from multiple disciplines team teaching the same class, and classes that are designed from the ground up for non-majors.

If faculty at mediocre institutions had any long term vision for student learning or their employer's financial viability, they would abandon the standard structure of separate discipline-based departments offering majors that few students care about and focus instead on a curriculum that trains students to tackle complex, interdisciplinary problems, like, as mentioned above, environmental degradation and climate change. Instead they stick to the approach that they were exposed to in their graduate programs.

There is a new university in Singapore, the Singapore University of Technology and Design, which is a technology and engineering focused university that is structured along broad themes as opposed to traditional engineering disciplines, which I think is a rather novel take on engineering education,

https://www.sutd.edu.sg/Admissions/Undergraduate/Unique-Curriculum/undergraduate-curriculum

Since they don't have humanities majors, their course offerings in humanities, arts, and social sciences are entirely geared towards non-majors, and seem to my untrained eye to have a more multidisciplinary feel than many introductory humanities courses offered at my institution,

https://hass.sutd.edu.sg/education/undergraduate-subjects/subjects-schedule/

A friend who left a tenured humanities position at a U.S. R1 for a job in Asia wrote about this phenomenon last year:

https://contentasianstudies.wordpress.com/2020/09/09/connectivities-employability-rankings-and-the-end-of-asian-studies-history/.

The above is a follow-up to something else that he wrote on the end of humanities programs in the U.S.:

https://contentasianstudies.wordpress.com/2020/09/05/post-2008-knowledge-the-future-of-the-humanities-and-area-studies/.

(I've previously posted the link to the above, but the implications of what he's talking about were ignored.)

[Wahoo Redux]

I read your link the first time, Spork.  Your author is pretty conjectural and not very convincing.

[Hibush]

A friend who left a tenured humanities position at a U.S. R1 for a job in Asia wrote about this phenomenon last year:

https://contentasianstudies.wordpress.com/2020/09/09/connectivities-employability-rankings-and-the-end-of-asian-studies-history/.

The above is a follow-up to something else that he wrote on the end of humanities programs in the U.S.:

https://contentasianstudies.wordpress.com/2020/09/05/post-2008-knowledge-the-future-of-the-humanities-and-area-studies/.

(I've previously posted the link to the above, but the implications of what he's talking about were ignored.)

The author seems to be good are looking for the hot next new thing. Singapore is surely a place to find that! The two examples from there are universities that don't have some of the old traditions of European and North American universities, so there is less inertia when a new core curriculum is developed.

One thing this author emphasizes is something I see mentioned elsewhere even by humanities faculty. That US history faculty are so cocooned in their own world that they fail to respond when the world around them changes. There must be something to that. But it also seems impossible that a thoughtful historian would be unaware that historic changes happen continuously and that those who fail to adapt to new conditions become marginalized. Isn't that a consistent theme in any historic era?

[marshwiggle]

My understanding of "Intro" courses is that it can be taken by majors and by non-majors.  I took intro science courses and found them very accessible and very interesting.  Whenever I plan an intro course I consider that I will be teaching a number of non-majors and I tailor the course accordingly figuring that the intro course will introduce a number of majors to the concepts as well.

I suppose colleges could craft intros-for-majors vs intros-for-non-majors?  Okay.

First year physics is typically offered in two versions; calculus-based (for majors) and algebra-based (for non-majors). Non-majors often don't have a strong math background. (Ones that do, and want to take the calculus-based course, are usually fine in it.) The calculus version usually covers fewer topics than the algebra version, since majors will have individual courses in specific topics. The algebra version often has basic introductions to several topics.

Even most of the people taking the algebra version tend to be from things like life sciences, so they have to take it. The number of people taking it as a complete elective is tiny. (I can't say I've ever heard someone say taking the algebra version prompted them to switch to majoring in physics.)

As I've indicated earlier, I wouldn't recommend either version as a compulsory science course for non-majors; if I wanted non-science people to take a science course, it would cover more about science and less about any specific discipline within the sciences.

What majors, (who will take many courses in the discipline), and non-majors, (who may never even take another science course), need is entirely different. A single course can't do a good job of serving both.

[mleok]

My understanding of "Intro" courses is that it can be taken by majors and by non-majors.  I took intro science courses and found them very accessible and very interesting.  Whenever I plan an intro course I consider that I will be teaching a number of non-majors and I tailor the course accordingly figuring that the intro course will introduce a number of majors to the concepts as well.

I suppose colleges could craft intros-for-majors vs intros-for-non-majors?  Okay.

First year physics is typically offered in two versions; calculus-based (for majors) and algebra-based (for non-majors). Non-majors often don't have a strong math background. (Ones that do, and want to take the calculus-based course, are usually fine in it.) The calculus version usually covers fewer topics than the algebra version, since majors will have individual courses in specific topics. The algebra version often has basic introductions to several topics.

Even most of the people taking the algebra version tend to be from things like life sciences, so they have to take it. The number of people taking it as a complete elective is tiny. (I can't say I've ever heard someone say taking the algebra version prompted them to switch to majoring in physics.)

As I've indicated earlier, I wouldn't recommend either version as a compulsory science course for non-majors; if I wanted non-science people to take a science course, it would cover more about science and less about any specific discipline within the sciences.

What majors, (who will take many courses in the discipline), and non-majors, (who may never even take another science course), need is entirely different. A single course can't do a good job of serving both.

Most universities also have two (or more) tracks for calculus, one aimed at math/physical science/engineering majors, and another aimed at majors in less/non technical fields. But, I think you raise an important point that courses aimed at non-majors should focus less on specific technical content, and more on higher level issues, like the scientific method, etc. I feel similarly, that humanities courses aimed at non-majors should focus less on specific content, and more on general skills, like writing, deep reading, dealing with multiple sources, etc.

[Parasaurolophus]

Don't they?

[mleok]

Don't they?

Well, we do have a sequence of intensive writing courses that are designed like that, but students do not have the flexibility to chose an alternative to that sequence. The elective humanities courses do not however do that.

[Hibush]

I am reading people's observations of what a non-siloed, focused gen ed and I am not sure how what people suggest are particularly different from what we now have.

Do we have a good example of a school which has retooled gen eds so they fly free of their silos?

Do you truly believe that our current system of general education, where students often take the first course in a discipline that is also designed for majors is anything but siloed, and is anything but intended to make up attendance in fields with a small number of majors? We've had extensive discussions of how general education might be retooled to free them of their silos, the first mark of this is that they involve faculty from multiple disciplines team teaching the same class, and classes that are designed from the ground up for non-majors.

Fine.  Sounds expensive, but I think that sounds interesting.

My understanding of "Intro" courses is that it can be taken by majors and by non-majors.  I took intro science courses and found them very accessible and very interesting.  Whenever I plan an intro course I consider that I will be teaching a number of non-majors and I tailor the course accordingly figuring that the intro course will introduce a number of majors to the concepts as well.

I suppose colleges could craft intros-for-majors vs intros-for-non-majors?  Okay.

Sure, one can try to accommodate the fact that non-majors are taking the class as well, but it affects the range of topics that are covered, and tend to be a narrower and less holistic view of the field, since the expectation is that the majors will be taking more advanced classes that will fill in some of the gaps. I have similar issues with Associates degrees at community college, as they tend to take the requirements for a four year college degree and offer the first two years, which would be quite different in structure from the topics I might choose to cover knowing that many students will only be taking two years of college classes.

If faculty at mediocre institutions had any long term vision for student learning or their employer's financial viability, they would abandon the standard structure of separate discipline-based departments offering majors that few students care about and focus instead on a curriculum that trains students to tackle complex, interdisciplinary problems, like, as mentioned above, environmental degradation and climate change. Instead they stick to the approach that they were exposed to in their graduate programs.

This discussion has some valuable ideas for making humanities disciplines more impactful in the undergrad curriculum, and looks to me like something a smaller school could do particularly well. There is a chance of getting faculty from across campus to work together toward a more exciting teaching experience. They'd be less inclined than big-school faculty to replicate their graduate program in how they approach research and curriculum.

It also is a different solution than the Singapore examples.

[Caracal]

One thing this author emphasizes is something I see mentioned elsewhere even by humanities faculty. That US history faculty are so cocooned in their own world that they fail to respond when the world around them changes. There must be something to that. But it also seems impossible that a thoughtful historian would be unaware that historic changes happen continuously and that those who fail to adapt to new conditions become marginalized. Isn't that a consistent theme in any historic era?

As a historian, I don't often see clear lessons from the past. My students often think in those terms. "Prohibition shows that banning a substance is ineffective." "The progressive movement shows that concerted effort can lead to solutions to fix aspects of society." I'm never so sure. Maybe they're right, but I tend to see contradictions and complications that muddy the picture. I always get annoyed when historians sign some statement about how the past tells us how to do deal with something in the present. I can tell you about what the arguments at the Constitutional Convention as a historian. That might or might not be useful historical context for deciding whether Trump should have been impeached, but I don't think knowing that context gives me any more authority than anyone else to tell you whether or not impeachment should have happened.

In this case, I'd be inclined to say that people often invoke historical progress or technological change to argue for something that they want. People's ideas about the direction of the world often aren't borne out by subsequent events.

To be clear, that isn't an argument for keeping things the way they are.