I have a PhD in the humanities and am now working on NLP. I can attest to the difficulty of finding a fulfilling career in humanities academia, but I don’t know if it’s worse than STEM academia since academia is insanely competitive in general. In my school (Ivy League) , PhDs in my department attain professorship as often as STEM ones, if not faster.
I think the humanities are more suited for general education than specialization, unless you want to be a professional scholar, which is a fine choice as long as you are aware of the competition. I do think humanities need to re-brand itself as an essential part of general higher education (STEM kids need to know some humanist thinking) rather than just specializations.
Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
111–120 of 246 posts
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
> law school Technically still part of the humanities :) I majored in math and history and my history adviser made it very clear to us how brutal the job market for history phd's was, although he did that in the context of how great the people they were hiring were (compared to the old guard). Basically there were so few tenure track positions open in the whole country that every open position would get world class a…
> > law school > Technically still part of the humanities :) Law is usually considered part of the social sciences rather than the humanities (outside of the law schools that offer BSL as well as JD degrees, undergraduate study of law is often within political science departments.)
Law School for a JD is a vocational/trade school.
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
> law school Technically still part of the humanities :) I majored in math and history and my history adviser made it very clear to us how brutal the job market for history phd's was, although he did that in the context of how great the people they were hiring were (compared to the old guard). Basically there were so few tenure track positions open in the whole country that every open position would get world class a…
> > law school > Technically still part of the humanities :) Law is usually considered part of the social sciences rather than the humanities (outside of the law schools that offer BSL as well as JD degrees, undergraduate study of law is often within political science departments.)
Law, political science and history all fall in the sizable overlap between the humanities and social sciences:
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#114In countries like India you would be laughed at if you aren't rich and take an arts degree. It is because in a country with limited earning opportunities, it doesn't make any sense to invest in a degree that has virtually non-existent employment opportunities. Seems like the majority of US population has now become poor enough that taking getting a humanities degree is risky.
Oh, that's an interesting point. Universities have increased their student body share from foreign countries. And from the same source, only 2% study humanities. https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/international-studen... There's a spike from 3% to 5% of the total college population, so that doesn't account for the whole story. But the makeup of their elite school demographics might also differ from average.
That's because rich foreign students pay full price, as public schools cut funding and raise spending on educationally-worthless perks to raise their USNews rankings.
USNews has done grievous injury to tertiary education in USA.
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#115In countries like India you would be laughed at if you aren't rich and take an arts degree. It is because in a country with limited earning opportunities, it doesn't make any sense to invest in a degree that has virtually non-existent employment opportunities. Seems like the majority of US population has now become poor enough that taking getting a humanities degree is risky.
Given that an arts degree in the US easily costs a quarter million (at least at a decent art school) these days, I think "poor" isn't the word I'd use for people who don't take it. Just "not willing to be in debt for the rest of their lives".
https://www.campusexplorer.com/college-advice-tips/E58F762A/...
says $160K including residential living expenses (which you'd pay even if you weren't at scool.). $80K for the education part.
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#116I think every engineer or applied scientists should be expected to take a reasonable "liberal" education subset - including history, literature and law. I know that this is very much not in vogue with the latest group-think in college, but I also believe that humanities should master at least basic calculus. Not because you may need to do a differential or integral, but rather because it teaches you to think differen…
I'd say the anti-intellectual authoritarianism has emanated from campuses. That being said when I first went to college I also held the view that mandating some level of humanities was important to be "well-rounded", and on some level still think this is true, but I've since soured on the people who say we need more B-school & Engineering schools students taking these classes to promote so called "critical thinking"…
No... “rounding” is mostly about being able to coherently think and write, which requires structured practice to achieve competence or mastery. The median engineer is awful at both.
I do agree that the dumbing down of universities comes from universities, and the prominence and political power of nonsensical areas of study drags everyone down.
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#117I 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…
My conversation with two of my professors pretty much sealed my future as far as getting away from a history PhD. I did a Master's, and I'm glad I tried it, but when I asked the two profs I was closest with whether it was worth continuing with all of the negative things I had read and experienced, they both gave a very clear "we aren't supposed to say this, but get the fuck out while you still can." It's really unfor…
>"Do you miss it?" He said, "I miss the idea of it, but that's not what it is."
I... Wow.
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#118I think every engineer or applied scientists should be expected to take a reasonable "liberal" education subset - including history, literature and law. I know that this is very much not in vogue with the latest group-think in college, but I also believe that humanities should master at least basic calculus. Not because you may need to do a differential or integral, but rather because it teaches you to think differen…
I agree very much. It has always stung a nerve with me, the fact that if you are a scientist with no interest or knowledge in humanities or arts you get (rightfully) labeled an ignorant and a reductionist obsessed solely with his science; yet the reverse, if you have a background in the humanities and know nothing about science or mathematics, is somehow okay or even celebrated in certain circles. You can proudly declare you "understand nothing of that horrible complicated maths and physics". Boggles the mind. Many lawyers, artists, literature scholars, historians, philosophers, etc, simply don't mind being stuck inside a bubble and inside a myopic way to see the world. A different perspective, such as that offered by mathematics, of rigour and analysis, would do them a world of good, so as not to be stuck inside a bubble/echo chamber.
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd say the anti-intellectual authoritarianism has emanated from campuses. That being said when I first went to college I also held the view that mandating some level of humanities was important to be "well-rounded", and on some level still think this is true, but I've since soured on the people who say we need more B-school & Engineering schools students taking these classes to promote so called "critical thinking"…
No... “rounding” is mostly about being able to coherently think and write, which requires structured practice to achieve competence or mastery. The median engineer is awful at both. I do agree that the dumbing down of universities comes from universities, and the prominence and political power of nonsensical areas of study drags everyone down.
The median engineer is not able to coherently think and write? Is the median humanities grad better able to do this?
I don't see much of a difference. The majority of engineers I've interacted with have actually been well adjusted people who can coherently think and write.
Re: Mea culpa: there is a crisis in the humanities
#120Honestly, the majority of humanities students I've interacted with have been uninspired and unmotivated. I took a good deal of humanities classes and more often than not comments were uninformed and presentations poor quality.
And what do you expect? These students come in at 18 years old, straight out of high school. You put them in college and they want to do the least work possible. And since it's all papers, there is not an objective minimum for the work. With grade inflation, a poor quality paper can still pass you. By contrast, with engineering there are objective minimums. The program has to compile and tests have to pass. You have the structure that a young person needs out of high school, and the work ethic develops during this time.
Maybe about 1% of the humanities students actually cared about what they studied, their output reflected that in the form of papers and internships...when it came time to graduate a couple of the motivated students were Rhodes scholars or otherwise working in their field of study. Everyone else was either not doing much or working in another area.
Most of the time a degree is just a necessity to go into the workforce for whatever field, and those in humanities couldn't give less of a shit about what they're studying as long as there's a degree at the end.