The Importance of the Humanities
- Calvin Stevens
- Aug 10
- 7 min read
My experience in an increasingly STEM-focused world.
All my life I’ve been told — am being told — that I should not squander and waste my academic talents on the so-called dogma of the humanities. I’ve been an A-student for as long as I can remember (primary school, high school, university) and, for the most part, have maintained high scores across the multiverse of academic fields.
Sounds like I was all set, right?
Well, yes and no. It’s not to say that I don’t appreciate my talents — I’m sure some would love to have a similar, seemingly inherent affinity for the academics — but it does come with a few caveats.
For one: what the hell do I do with this knowledge?
I remember taking an aptitude test when I was 15 years old, hoping it would give me guidance in this regard.
I scored high in all the sections. The result? I could do anything.
Ah yes! That childhood dream — the sky’s the limit! Okay, but wait… how does that help my predicament?
Newsflash, it doesn’t; and a similar process was repeated through a Career Guidance Counselor, yielding the same results. But, with such talents, the world around me had a very clear opinion: “you should do science, medicine, engineering, perhaps”.
Amidst scores of peers who went on to study in those fields, and in the shadow of my parents who had obtained doctorates in botany and nuclear physics, respectively (gosh, how do I live up to that?), I was somewhat embarrassed to announce that I’d be putting my academic prowess to use in the humanities.
But as time has gone on, I am no longer embarrassed. Only proud.
The myth of “intelligence”
What do you picture when you think of an “intelligent” person?
Probably an academic, right?
Delve further into detail and I bet many of us, certainly children, would picture the likes of a scientist, a mathematician, or maybe even a doctor.
That’s just the way society has molded our thoughts into categorical sets of stereotypes.
But this basic idea of a general intelligence — if we can call it that — has largely been met with heavy scrutiny in modern discourse.
Prominent developmental psychologist, Howard Gardner, for instance, posits that there are actually 8 categories of intelligence with that which he calls linguistic and logical-mathematical modalities being the traditionally sought after forms of intelligence in schools and, thus, forming our basic stereotype of “the intelligent person”.
Now, there is still much debate around those exact categories and their number thereof, but I do tend to agree that our stereotypical understanding of intelligence is limited.
To say a good sportsman, musician, or artist isn’t intelligent, at least to me, seems rather narrow-minded and short-sighted.
They are intelligent; it’s just that their intelligence doesn’t necessarily align with our traditional views.
Because of my academic background and abilities, people around me — family, friends, peers, and colleagues alike — generally consider me “an intelligent person”; but sometimes their image of my intelligence gets skewed by those traditional stereotypes and, hence, some think I ought to use my intelligence to match that specific image.
A larger, more societal result of all this is that the humanities — along with sports, art, music, and the likes more broadly — are becoming more and more undervalued.
And this is especially true in a world that is becoming ever more focused on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.
Defining the humanities
Before I get to the titular point, I think it is worth briefly defining what we mean by “the humanities”.
It seems fitting of the humanities in any case, doesn’t it?
To begin, the term itself evolved from Latin phrase studia humanitatis which, itself, rose from the Renaissance humanist tradition, and literally means the study of humanity.
It was a large academic field to begin with, primarily concerning itself with the more critical, interpretive, human-related fields that could not be empirically defined, as is the approach of the sciences.
As a result, the humanities are not always intuitive and do not always fall part of Gardner’s logical-mathematical modalities.
According to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, this umbrella term, “the humanities”, encompasses the following:
“the academic study of philosophy, religion, history, language arts (literature, writing, oratory, rhetoric, poetry, etc.), the performing arts (theater, music, dance, etc.), and the visual arts (painting, sculpture, photography, filmmaking, etc.)”
But recent practices also allow for the inclusion of other social sciences into the humanities (such as sociology, anthropology, archaeology, linguistics, psychology, and politics) as well as education more broadly due to their employment of methods not necessarily (but not always) bound to empirical thinking.
Basically, if a field is primarily concerned with the social study of humans, it can certainly be classified as a humanities subject.
The importance of the humanities
I remember going to the open-day of the university I’m currently studying at — this was back when I was still in high school — and attending a talk by members of the humanities faculty.
“People are under the impression that STEM will fix all the problems of the world, but really it is the humanities.”
I rolled my eyes at those words. If anything, I thought it was another gimmick on the part of the humanities to “sell” their subjects and compete with the rapid advancement of the sciences.
After all, who doesn’t want to save the world?
But I never understood why the humanities had to compete with STEM.
And while those words may, indeed, have been a marketing ploy, I have come to realise in recent years that there is a bit of truth to them.
I admire the sciences for their ability to transform our world, our very history. As my father would say, if we can reduce everything down to mathematical and scientific models, then the study of science and mathematics is imperative to mastering the universe.
Give science time and we will find the cure for cancer; a bit longer and we will solve climate change; longer still and we may be able to find the answer to all our problems.
Yet that rhetoric ignores one very crucial thing: while we may live in the natural state of the universe, we also live in a world of our own construction that is, fundamentally, human.
While science can be a perfect tool, that’s all it is. A tool.
A tool in the hands of imperfect beings.
We can use science for good, but oftentimes we use it to make weapons of mass destruction. Why use it to save the world from climate change when we can use it to make profit?
Empathy. Critical thinking. Understanding the human. These are what the humanities offer that the sciences do not.
Humanity itself is the final limit.
And ideally STEM and the Humanities should not compete with one another but rather compliment each other. Our world cannot be fixed with either one of them missing.
So often do I now think of the likes of Leonardo da Vinci in this regard. As per his Vitruvian Man above, there is that romantic marriage between the sciences and the humanities, between the natural and human elements of our world in all his works.
Are the humanities dying?
Oh boy, the age old debate again — the humanities seem to be perpetually faced with this question.
Yet, with the rapid rise of STEM fields in universities, we seem to be closer to that breaking point than ever. Certainly, according to surveys such as this, less and less students are going into the humanities across American, Australian, and Canadian universities alike; similarly, governments and institutions are spending less and less on development thereof.
Naturally, many begin to question the need for humanities. Some, such as Justin Stover in his essay There Is No Case for the Humanities, argue in favour of his own title.
Interestingly however, Stover concludes by adding that the humanities need not make a case for themselves.
“Whatever administrators and legislators might think, the fact that there is no case for the humanities is irrelevant. The humanities do not need to make a case within the university because the humanities are the heart of the university.”
And this rings true when we consider just how some of the earliest universities formed. Humanities were quite literally the backbone of the worldwide institution that has become “The University”.
From my own experience, I would also argue that the so-called decline of the humanities is, partly, because we’re looking in the wrong place.
In fact, if anything, I believe the humanities are now — and have always been, really — more prominent outside the university.
To claim that the humanities are dying is simply to move the goalpost.
Social pressure has made it so that we view the humanities entirely within a scholarly framework; and yet, just as we engage with the laws of physics on a daily basis, so too do the humanities exist all around us.
Think of art, books, music, politics, your everyday interactions and thoughts — do they only exist within the vacuum of the university? Of course not!
The music industry is booming, art has become ubiquitous, more books are being published every year than history can count, and cross-cultural interactions are easier and more frequent than ever.
The problem, really, is the universities themselves.
People no longer value those column-encased halls of wisdom as places one goes to obtain knowledge for the sake of knowledge; rather, universities have become laboratories, factories, and printing presses for churning out certified pieces of paper that offer promises of wealth and job security.
And there the humanities die, for they are unable to compete with the more lucrative prospects of STEM in those cold vats of modernity.
“A liberal arts degree won’t get you anything!”
“You can’t make money with philosophy!”
“Music isn’t very useful!”
As I said, the goalpost has been moved; the objective of going to university is no longer the same as it once was.
But just because the fate of the humanities within the cloistered corridors of the university wavers, that does not mean the study of humanity — as it may be — is dying. Rather, it is blooming elsewhere, flourishing in the world around us; and for as long as humans exist, the humanities will live on.
So when people ask me why I still care, I simply hit them with one of my favourite quotes of all time:
“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for” — N.H. Kleinbaum, Dead Poets Society.
Thanks again to all my faithful readers!
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