The Humanities Are Worth Fighting For

Something right wingers cannot comprehend:

Who teaches English in high schools? Where did they get the credentials to teach English? Stumped?!

The teachers who were too fucking stupid to get degrees in hard sciences, or not talented enough to WRITE for a living.

"Those who can DO , those who CANNOT, TEACH."
 
There are less than 3000 degrees in gender and ethnic studies awarded each year our of a total of 1,650,000 total degrees awarded each year.

That's 0.18 percent of all degrees. A tiny, tiny fraction of way less than one percent.

Rightwing radio and Fox made a gigantic mountain out of a tiny little molehill .

https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d11/tables/dt11_290.asp

That is just two examples of wasted time and money on humanities degrees. We are not graduating enough doctors and health care professionals, scientists, engineers and teachers to fulfill our needs. Yet student debt is over 1.5 TRILLON DOLLARS. That is my concern. That and the fact that these hallowed halls of higher learning can't seem to graduate someone who knows what gender they are simply by taking a peek in their pants.
 
That is just two examples of wasted time and money on humanities degrees. We are not graduating enough doctors and health care professionals, scientists, engineers and teachers to fulfill our needs. Yet student debt is over 1.5 TRILLON DOLLARS. That is my concern. That and the fact that these hallowed halls of higher learning can't seem to graduate someone who knows what gender they are simply by taking a peek in their pants.

The MAGAs have been screaming for 20 years about gender and ethnic studies majors for years, as it is some existential threat to America and high education.

I don't see a few thousand degrees awarded out of 1.6 million degrees to be anything more than an insignificant blip, statistically meaningless, a tiny little molehill.
 
The MAGAs have been screaming for 20 years about gender and ethnic studies majors for years, as it is some existential threat to America and high education.

I don't see a few thousand degrees awarded out of 1.6 million degrees to be anything more than an insignificant blip, statistically meaningless, a tiny little molehill.

Interesting these STEM fanatics can't understand simple statistics.
 
Interesting these STEM fanatics can't understand simple statistics.

I think MAGAs just really want to believe the propaganda they have been spoon fed for two decades.

One interesting thing to me is MAGAs never squealed like stuck pigs when ethnic studies degrees focused on Europeans.

My aunt got a Slavic Studies degree 50 years ago, and no Rightwinger ever took the time to harangue her for it.
 
There is something very satisfying about understanding the world around me, especially when so few do.

It makes me feel special.
 
Those who blame presentism or “wokeness” for the increased absence of traditional humanities in classrooms misdiagnose the problem. The idea that students are turned off by cultural studies and would return to a classical education is laughable and easily disproven by existing course enrollment trends.

In my elite university, some students tell me that they never read a book before college, or took an art history class, and certainly never learned any history outside the US context. Even cinema studies, whose teaching was at some point denounced as too great an accommodation to the popular, is a deeply esoteric subject to them.

https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-humanities-are-worth-fighting-for/

This is not a knock against you but the author of the article you linked to did a poor job of nailing down the primary point.
 
Well, as everyone knows, I’m a righty. The bolded above nails how I think of college. If you’re not learning something to help you make a living, why go? Go to trade school instead.

I see nothing wrong with learning art and music. I see nothing wrong with learning philosophy and psychology. I absolutely think one should learn history. Many of these courses are required with most degree plans that I’ve reviewed.

Shoot, I even took a human sexuality class in the process of getting my mathematics teaching degree. I disagreed with most of it but got my “A” and moved on.

But the idea of going to college just to learn stuff to make one a more rounded person without a view to how what I’m learning is going to help me survive in this world is just dumb. The process of survival for people is to develop a skill or know stuff that one can use to make a living.

I guess that’s how someone could get a degree (or degrees) and be saddled with college debt well into their 50’s. That’s not being very smart, IMO.

I agree. In fact I recommended to two of my kids that they not attend college because all college was going to do was knock them off their path. One went to trade school, he's a mechanic now and the other worked with a contractor until he could test for his own licensure.
 
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