humanities essay

humanities essay

The Importance of Studying Humanities

1. The Role of Humanities in Society

Another example would be the present NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) and NEH (National Endowment for the Humanities) program started in the 1960s during President John F. Kennedy’s administration. Though debatable about the budget appropriations, the program has immensely contributed to the production of radio shows, TV documentaries, and other known audiovisual mediums. A great deal of humanities knowledge can now be assimilated using this medium compared to several decades ago where the only knowledge was reading from books.

Humanities structures have continuously evolved, however, the reasons for its existence have not changed much. One of the modern-day examples was during the Great Depression in the 1930s. U.S. President F.D. Roosevelt’s “New Deal” policy was formulated to stimulate economic recovery and initiate long-term social reform. In order to analyze and understand the severity of unemployment, poverty, and general despair of the citizens at that time, an art project was included as part of the program to map the American people. Several interviews and photography of average Americans were made, and immense data was collected which helps today’s generation understand and feel the pain of the citizens at that time. Materials collected still exist today and are of great value.

In society, the importance of studying humanities can never be overemphasized. It’s not only a study of human behavior, but also an understanding of various complex issues dogging the society. Man and his environment, history and development, lead to an understanding of where we are at today. Furthermore, humanities subjects are stories of struggles in search of solutions. These are indispensable texts for society as they allow reflection on past mistakes and provide analysis for the search of improved solutions. The most important reason to study humanities is not only to get enlightened, but also to enrich knowledge that makes a difference in the society – knowledge that helps in the formulation of social policies and understanding of the various different issues in today’s fast, competitive, and global world. Knowledge changes the status quo; it is humanities that motivates to bring change in the betterment of the future.

2. The Benefits of Humanities Education

Not only are artists and musicians in demand to entertain and enrich society, but also to add beauty and style to the work of architects, engineers, and manufacturers. Industry, technology, and increasing social complexity over the past centuries have created a never-ending need for the communication abilities, critical thinking, and creativity provided only by the study of the humanities. This can be supported by the fact that, in general, people working in the arts have thrived in the past century and their need has only increased with the approach of the 21st century. A study of the humanities provides insight into any imaginable human endeavor.

A common argument is that art and music history, appreciation, and all involvement in the arts is a waste of time and money and must take away from study in more important areas. This argument is hard to support because the arts are more important today than they have ever been. This is an audiovisual age that has spawned such diverse media as TV, video, and the Internet, all of which require the knowledge and skills of artists and musicians.

Support the assertion that education in the humanities is important, beneficial, and worthy of continued support. Such an education helps one learn about oneself and one’s world. This insightful self-knowledge comes from the students’ own thinking and questioning; the teacher’s personal influence; the study of history’s great individuals and events; understanding people in other times and places; and the study and analysis of human behavior, social groups, and society as it has evolved. Knowledge and understanding developed through the study of the humanities give us an ability to comprehend and appreciate diverse forms of artwork. Through the ages, the arts have labored to express for each generation its understanding of the world and the feelings of the moment. Understanding these expressions gives students a glimpse of the human side of historical events and an understanding of viewpoints, ideas, and traditions different from their own.

3. The Relevance of Humanities in the Digital Age

Today’s humanist will face the dilemma of whether to use his new devices to pursue traditional goals more effectively, or to redefine his old goals in terms of the new capabilities. An example of the former is seen in the utilization of computerized statistical methods to process and correlate data. In many social sciences and humanities, the testing of a hypothesis is of secondary importance, and the data are often processed long after the inquiry in a way that reveals new research problems.

The digital age affords an unprecedented opportunity for humanistic research and, at the same time, creates a number of dilemmas and challenges. One of the greatest opportunities lies in the ability to assign new functions, an infinite range of functions, to traditional humanities resources. By the same token, the most fundamental drawback of the digital age may lie in the same area, as a temptation to redefine traditional humanistic values in terms of their technological power and efficacy. The danger is that far too many humanists will be seduced by functionalist rationalization to concentrate their creative energies on the design and implementation of tools, simply because they will have at their disposal better tools than ever before.

4. The Impact of Humanities on Critical Thinking

It should be evident that the more alternatives, that is the more complex and intricate the partial structure to be disambiguated, then the more the incoming information must be processed and transformed in order to achieve the reduction in uncertainty. Thus the creative aspect of art and literature share the attributes of discovery and invention involved in the experimental sciences. The treatment of ambiguities in form and content by novel methods of tabulation and structural analysis is a recognized aspect of literary criticism. The application of such critical techniques with a view to isolating and resolving some specific set of problems in a given specialty could well be described as scientific research in the humanities.

Inflammatory writings that falsely and maliciously indicate that information or ideas are “facts” issued as a string of epiphanies by an autonomous author through “coverage” of “civil events”, incidents or personages in a chemical-process-like “style.” This proliferation of neurological metaphors in the theories of language and communication is symptomatic of a common, but by no means universal, failure to codify and assimilate the conceptual revolution of the past thirty years. According to the precepts of information theory, the most that a communication or statement can achieve is some reduction of uncertainty. This is not effected by a signal or message, but by a set of instructions or specifications which will select one, and only one, message from a given ensemble of possible alternatives. The information content of the message is the measure of the reduction in the number of alternatives.

5. The Future of Humanities Education

This has led to the argument that humanities need to be made a distinct and separate part of education, and that the core curriculum required for graduation should focus more on essential language, math, and computer skills that are required to succeed in the workforce. The argument is that instead of losing humanities to a lack of appreciation, we can save them by allowing students to take these classes because humanities will have a more collective understanding of their value.

Kaplan and Lee claim that the study of humanities is a dying field, although it is a fundamental source of cultural and historical enrichment. They state that in order for this field to have a future, the educators need to re-instill a belief in the value of humanities studying. So long as humanities educators continue to doubt the importance of their studies, it will continue to have a negative impact on the students who are faced with the decision of whether or not to take these classes.

The future of humanities is amongst the most debated themes in the world. The amount of students enrolling in humanities classes every year is diminishing. The economic benefits of choosing humanities as a field of study have been argued. There are those who believe that the educational financial burden is too great for the prospective earnings in the workforce and that learning technical skills such as computer programming, management, and medical skills would be more beneficial in the long run. With the rising cost of tuition and the delay of full-time employment due to an increasing required skill set and an ever-increasing competition for jobs, this argument may be valid for those not attending top-tier universities.