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Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

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Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#31

Post by woodruffw »

seibelj wrote: post #8

I was a double major in CS and Latin, and once I asked my Latin advisor about grad school for Latin. I didn’t intend on going, I was just curious about what she would say as a tenured Latin professor at a good university. The look on her face when I asked was complete shock and she went on a rant about how it was the dumbest idea ever. She told me how she was going on sabbatical to write a book that only 30 people wo…

I received the same rant/incredulity from several of my own professors (in Philosophy). It was incredibly disheartening to see academics essentially give up on any sort of robust future for their field.

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#32

Post by AnimalMuppet »

jessaustin wrote: post #24

Maybe this is more an indictment of universities than of the humanities? Is it possible that university study in general is on borrowed time, and the future is simply here earlier for the humanities? It's not as though the Classics will be forgotten, nor will writers, artists, connoisseurs, or critics disappear. Professors haven't ever been [EDIT:] a vital part of this.

University studies probably are on borrowed time. It seems to me that they are insanely inefficient for the stated purpose - educating people. They are more than ripe for disruption.

That said, it seems to me that the disruption probably will first be in the engineering areas rather than in the humanities. Do you know chemical engineering? I can test for that, whether or not you went to a university. (The GRE will do that in many fields.) But did you absorb the enrichment that should have come with your university education? The humanities cares about that; STEM doesn't.

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#33

Post by andromeduck »

yazan94 wrote: post #13

I think the 'crisis' can be distilled to a simple concept - with rising costs of living not many people want to invest in a degree which has relatively few options for comfortable living compared to other options. If the humanities are really so important for our culture, then the public needs to invest in making them practical options for someone to invest in. Otherwise, why bother lamenting about the lack of people…

I think what's changed is that the humanities have become so easy to access that degreess are no longer required for people with just a passing interest and since the degree itself isn't worth as much as the skills it develops; is more effective to get a higher value degrees and persue those interests in other ways.

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#34

Post by AnimalMuppet »

yazan94 wrote: post #13

I think the 'crisis' can be distilled to a simple concept - with rising costs of living not many people want to invest in a degree which has relatively few options for comfortable living compared to other options. If the humanities are really so important for our culture, then the public needs to invest in making them practical options for someone to invest in. Otherwise, why bother lamenting about the lack of people…

"Liberal education" originally meant the education appropriate for free people, as opposed to education in a trade, which was for slaves. Translating that into the modern day, if you have to work for a living, a liberal education probably isn't going to pay.

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#36

Post by darpa_escapee »

seibelj wrote: post #20
anoncoward111 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is a shame, because I would happily teach Latin for a guaranteed $18,000 a year. Latin is an amazing language that has a lot of tangential applications. At the very least, Latin shouldn't go extinct.

Hard to live and work around Boston on $18,000 salary

Hard to be human and get sick on $18k a year.

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#37

Post by ams6110 »

darpa_escapee wrote: post #36
seibelj wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hard to live and work around Boston on $18,000 salary

Hard to be human and get sick on $18k a year.

One good thing about university employment is that the health benefits are usually very good, even if the salary isn't.

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#38

Post by dominotw »

ams6110 wrote: post #37
darpa_escapee wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hard to be human and get sick on $18k a year.

One good thing about university employment is that the health benefits are usually very good, even if the salary isn't.

Till you get laid off and get sick with no savings :)

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#39

Post by Naga »

I majored in History in university. I graduated, was discouraged from grad school by my professors (one of my professors stressed that when he was doing his PhD probably ten years before our conversation, he was so poor he had to literally fish to feed himself), and went back to school for accounting. As someone who went through it and can honestly evaluate the return on investment for my history degree, I don't believe it has paid back yet five years out. I did not learn practical skills, which are important for getting a career after exiting school. That's why my accounting degree was necessary. I will say though that I believe I learned a lot of important soft skills in the humanities, which I believe make me 1) a better person in general and 2) a more attractive candidate for jobs, since the skills I have (critical thinking, writing, etc) are not learned in business. They try to teach it in some courses, but it takes the leisure of taking a full humanities degree to properly learn it. It put this into perspective, writing an essay is taking a firehose of data, analyzing it and presenting a critical opinion on it. Most people who I was in business school with struggled because there is no right answer, and there is no answer key. A well reasoned argument based on the data given makes a good essay and good grades.

I will also say that in the professional accounting designation program, they are emphasizing that these are necessary skills for accountants to have now. I watch people studying for exams worrying about the same things. The exams are graded based on giving a 'competent' (their buzzword) answer based on the information given, which many people struggle with. I, on the other hand, find it very easy and do not have to study nearly as hard as my peers to succeed on the exams.

I don't mean to toot my own horn, and I do not think I am better than everyone else. I think that my time spent in the humanities has really benefited me in my career, but only after learning practical, 'hard' skills. Would I do it this way again, if I had the chance to start over? Probably not. Would I recommend someone going back to school for a humanities degree, after taking business/STEM? Maybe not, but there is definitely value in them.

Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities

#40

Post by draw_down »

Not to put too fine a point on it, there is a certain type of personality that loves to roll their eyes when people are concerned about something and say they are "hyperventilating". Sometimes people can see what's happening before it shows up on a chart. Just because you can't see it doesn't make you wiser than them.
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