Liberal arts education

[Dracon II]

The arts and humanities faculties in Universities get a lot of bad press from all sectors of society. They are charged with irrelevance, idleness, uselessness, or even downright perniciousness. To what extent is this because a) society's perceptions of the field have changed, and b) the content and structure of the liberal arts field has changed?
What are the beneficial aspects of such an education... or, where has it gone wrong?

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Benefits: critical thinking and flexibility -- two traits prized at the higher levels of any institution except maybe the Bush White House -- are best taught through a liberal education.

Where it went wrong: it didn't, per say. There are two larger problems.

(1) You can't evaluate an education by the standards of a capitalist economy, which is what critics do when they deem it useless, and

(2) Regarding "perniciousness": If (a) you expect people to go school until they're 30, and go deeply into debt to do it, in order to become liberal arts professors, and (b) you then pay them less that your average bus driver (if you even bother giving them full-time jobs), you should not be surprised that the people you find for such jobs are non-mainstream thinkers. Mainstream thinkers would look at the whole set up and say "screw this."

[Admiral]

Basic answer: by not specializing in particular disciplines, it teaches people to be generally good citizens. People have a tendency to not see the larger issue, and focus on the small area of their expertise, and the liberal arts education tends to counter that.

However, your characterization of the bad press as being "from all sectors of society" is just not accurate. There is a very specific attack on liberal arts institutions by Conservatives because they seek to discredit institutions that tend to be incredibly liberal. This isn't really about the liberal arts education. Its about characterizing Democrats as effete intellectuals out of touch with mainstream America.

[Sava]

Why do they have to call it "liberal" arts?

that is so unfair... liberals are ruining America... we need to stop letting the liberals run our education system... first, we should balance it...

how about we start calling it the "balanced arts"

and we should have conservative commentators giving their opinions to offset the liberal biases that are obviously tainting the education process here

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Freedom Arts.

[Barnabas]

whats the meaning of liberal arts?

[Barnabas]

history, literature are liberal arts?

[:) Smiley]

Yes. In general, anything that doesn't have any math in it. For example, while economics is not usually considered Liberal Arts, history is.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Brachy-Pride
history, literature are liberal arts?

Liberal arts = humanities (literature, philosophy, theology, languages, Classics, etc.) + fine arts

History used to be considered a liberal art, but has shifted (post-WWII) to being considered more of a social science. This is partially due to the rise of social history (which tends to be very quantitative), but was a masterstroke of re-branding more than anything else.

[Barnabas]

liberal arts is a really really crappy name.


I think the problem is many dont see them as useful, for most of the people who get degrees on that, the only option is too teach.

You dont open a newspaper and see, We need philosophers, 3000 $ a month



For example, linguistics, and all careers related to teaching and studying languages are seen as very useful in this global world nowadays, and I feel are more respected than other "arts"

whoa, thats some broken english, hope you understood my point

need sleep

bye

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Brachy-Pride
liberal arts is a really really crappy name.

Derived from a much older (18th-19th century) meaning of liberal, one that has little to do with its current usage.

From the Online Etymology Dictionary

liberal (adj.)
c.1375, from O.Fr. liberal "befitting free men, noble, generous," from L. liberalis "noble, generous," lit. "pertaining to a free man," from liber "free," from PIE base *leudheros (cf. Gk. eleutheros "free"), probably originally "belonging to the people" (though the precise semantic development is obscure), from *leudho- "people" (cf. O.C.S. ljudu, Lith. liaudis, O.E. leod, Ger. Leute "nation, people"). Earliest reference in Eng. is to the liberal arts (L. artes liberales; see art (n.)), the seven attainments directed to intellectual enlargement, not immediate practical purpose, and thus deemed worthy of a free man (the word in this sense was opposed to servile or mechanical). Sense of "free in bestowing" is from 1387. With a meaning "free from restraint in speech or action" (1490) liberal was used 16c.-17c. as a term of reproach. It revived in a positive sense in the Enlightenment, with a meaning "free from prejudice, tolerant," which emerged 1776-88. Purely in ref. to political opinion, "tending in favor of freedom and democracy" it dates from c.1801, from Fr. libéral, originally applied in Eng. by its opponents (often in Fr. form and with suggestions of foreign lawlessness) to the party favorable to individual political freedoms. But also (especially in U.S. politics) tending to mean "favorable to government action to effect social change," which seems at times to draw more from the religious sense of "free from prejudice in favor of traditional opinions and established institutions" (and thus open to new ideas and plans of reform), which dates from 1823.

(Aside, re the second boldface: when I was in high school, you'd still come across the occasoinal reference to "Mechanical Arts" as a synonym for what now gets called "Vocational Tech." I hadn't thought about that in years.)

[Odin]

Originally posted by Brachy-Pride
whats the meaning of liberal arts?

IIRC, it is an old term stemming from the classes a person in the late middle ages took for his bachlor's degree, there were no majors for undergrads back then, only a general "Bachlor of Arts" degree. People who went further got a Masters or Doctorate degree in Philosophy, Law, Theology, and Medicine. The liberal part is derived from Latin, refering to the fact that the education was "suitable for free men," that is, people who wern't serfs.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
Freedom Arts.

[Dracon II]

It's funny really... I've just completed a bachelor of arts in politics and government, but because I'm doing honours in the politics and public policy faculty, I'm going to graduate with a Bachelor of Commerce (with Honours), simply because PPP made a strategic decision to join the Business faculty instead of Arts (because they get more funding per student in business). So even though I've studied what is substantively a bachelor of arts I'm going to graduate with a Bachelor of Commerce. It'll probably boost my employment prospects so I'm not complaining.

[Agathon]

Re: Liberal arts education

Originally posted by Dracon II
The arts and humanities faculties in Universities get a lot of bad press from all sectors of society. They are charged with irrelevance, idleness, uselessness, or even downright perniciousness. To what extent is this because a) society's perceptions of the field have changed, and b) the content and structure of the liberal arts field has changed?
What are the beneficial aspects of such an education... or, where has it gone wrong?

(a) Most people have a very limited understanding of what goes on and why it is done. Many think that university is to train people for widget making. If you want people who can communicate well in prose, then a liberal arts education is how you get it. Ask me about that the next time I have to mark essays written by students from the sciences (whose sole ventures into prose seem to be lab reports). Other than that the job of people at university is to pursue knowledge for its own sake and to act as the critic and conscience of society.

(b) More people now go to university and they pay more to do it. This has led to a general slippage in standards because there are many people at university who simply shouldn't be there. Universities are not supposed to be job training centres. Many university students would do more for themselves and society if they attended polytechnic and got a trade (there is nothing wrong or ignoble about doing that). More students also have to work to put themselves through college, which means less time to do their coursework (and hardly any time to read the materials).

IMHO it would be a lot better if humanities departments dropped the anti-elitist guff and returned to being the hardass places they used to be. In some areas standards have not slipped at all (our Classics Department is a good example) and you will have to work your ass off to achieve anything decent. At my old university I would personally have liked to have failed about half the students. At U of T the students are in general much better, but too many of them are hampered by having to work outside of college.

But the current political and economic situation makes that unlikely.