HUMANITIES IN NEED OF BROADER, DEEPER BASE

By Constance Rooke

Editor's note: Constance Rooke is president of the University of Winnipeg and former associate vice-president (academic) of U of G. This is an excerpt from an address she gave at a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council conference at the University of Toronto and is reprinted from the U of T Bulletin.

We are, to some degree, guilty as charged of "structures" - departments, degree programs, etc. - that are largely geared to replicating the professoriate. We may have enacted in a too literal and prescriptive (and therefore counter-productive) manner William Wordsworth's poetic faith, and I quote: "What we have loved/Others will love, and we will teach them how."

When one takes into account the proportion of our students who pursue graduate study in humanities and social science disciplines - between 14 and 17 per cent take master's degrees and only three per cent do a PhD - the status quo seems questionable. It appears we are concentrating too large a share of our "design" energy and our resources on a minority of students. If this educational track (a high degree of specialization at the undergraduate level) is not, in fact, optimal for the majority of students, shouldn't we be asking ourselves what is optimal for them?

The problem is compounded by the fact that although specialization is prefaced - for the sake of "breadth" - by half a dozen introductory courses in an array of disciplines, those courses are too often focused on preparing students for advanced work in the discipline (learning the jargon and methodology it is believed they will need as specialists), even though five out of six students will go on to specialize in some other discipline.

The issue is not only one of numbers. The public and our funding bodies also regard the preparation of those other students (the majority who enter the workforce directly or pursue other professional/vocational training) as intrinsically more important than the preparation of those who are bound for the "ivory tower." It is clear that the public and our funding bodies are preoccupied with the relationship of education and the economy, with instrumentalist goals. I make this point only to recall the obvious temper of our times. We cannot ignore it. We do not have to accept it. Indeed, we must resist the reduction of education to its vocational and economic value. But we must respond on both fronts. It is both foolhardy and unfair to our students to do otherwise.

Fortunately, we do not have to choose between what David Bentley has called "humanities for the sake of the humanities" (the enrichment of consciousness) and the role of the humanities with respect to producing the communication skills, critical thinking, etc., that are of interest to business. We can make both claims - the pragmatic and the pure. And both ends can be better served by paying more attention - and attention of a somewhat different kind - to education in the humanities for students who will not go on to specialize in the humanities.

The world of work and the human spirit (overlapping categories, I would suggest) will both be strengthened if more people are led to care about the humanities. I am assuming here that the love of learning in the humanities and the acquisition of transferable skills develop best in tandem. The force of this claim is diminished when the humanities are too narrowly construed as a guild or profession.

I am obviously not suggesting that we abandon preparation for graduate study in our disciplines. But I think we should ask ourselves whether we are not asking these students as well to specialize too much, too soon. I believe we are. I think a broader, deeper base would be better for the professoriate of the future.

A shift of this kind would, of course, require that we adjust the expectations of our graduate programs - not as to standards, but as to the level of concentration required at point of entry. I would go further: I believe our graduate programs often foster an excessively narrow course of study within the discipline, thus compounding narrowness created at the undergraduate level and perpetuating it. I would modify both in the interest of producing professors in the humanities who will have a better chance of generating student interest in the humanities, and a better chance of establishing an essential public role for the humanities.

I do not believe that highly specialized research in the humanities would wither under these reforms; I think it would actually be strengthened. A broader base can provide the context in which powerful links are made, strengthening a very particularized edifice internally and providing the "surround" that helps establish its importance. It can also help create the ability and the will to communicate more clearly to a wider audience.

The argument for education in the humanities is most effectively - and, I think, most appropriately - positioned within the argument for liberal education. If we stake our claim within the more inclusive territory of liberal education, and can establish that as the best possible base for professional studies and vocational training and the changing world of work, we can become "central" again as an essential part of the centre. (I hope I have made clear that this instrumental claim is not the only one I would make.) We should also not mistake the centre of the university circle for the whole or be seen (in our efforts to defend that ground) to disparage the rest.

I do not believe that historical arguments for liberal arts as the centre of the academy can succeed. Science and social science and the humanities must occupy that centre together and be declared by us as occupying it together. Liberal education can, I think, be widely acknowledged as "central," but only if we demonstrate its value more clearly and only if we do not attempt to devalue the rest.

We can establish the centrality of liberal education - and the need to support it adequately - only if we demonstrate clearly that liberal education delivers on its promises. The development of transferable skills (not the only promise, but a critical one) should be pursued more intentionally; we should not assume it to be an inevitable byproduct of disciplinary study. We should be looking at things like "skills transcripts" and exit-testing to assess and certify levels of attainment. And we should look at curriculum in a more co-operative, integrated, "horizontal" way, across courses and across departments, to ensure as far as possible that all the necessary skills and capacities are being developed in all our students.

Another of the promises of liberal education is that it offers a broad intellectual base. But I must say that in defending liberal education, I often experience some dissonance between that breadth and the reality of what happens in our universities. Specialists may tend to associate "depth" with intellectual rigour and sophistication (higher-level thinking, greater understanding) and "breadth" with superficiality. If there is only so much butter and we try to cover the whole loaf, the bread will have to be very thinly spread. But in intellectual matters, the situation is somewhat different: a broader view (of the discipline and beyond the discipline) can also make it possible to penetrate more deeply. My own view is that liberal education as currently practised in our universities is not "liberal" enough. It is too specialized - because we think this degree of specialization is good for students and because we think it's good for us.

I think we underestimate both our own ability and our students' ability to bring intellectual rigour to courses that aren't designed for specialists. We move students quickly into specialization because we think that will stretch them intellectually as nothing else can. But we have also designed a highly specialized curriculum because universities are largely made up of professors with quite particularized intellectual passions. Most of us prefer to teach specialized courses in our own research areas at the upper level; that's where we feel most capable, most appreciated by students and most intellectually alive.

What I am suggesting is that we should both require more wide-ranging study and design more carefully more courses for non-specialists that are aimed at a higher level of understanding, many of which integrate perspectives from science, social science and the humanities. This would not be easy, but I think it would be a good thing for students and faculty - and for the reputation of liberal education.

I also have a concern about two forces that may drive and shape interdisciplinary (as well as disciplinary) courses and programs in ways that are not optimal for students: the research agendas and ideological agendas of faculty. Clearly, the convergence of interdisciplinary research and interdisciplinary education is an excellent thing, but only to the extent that educational priorities are not skewed by the priorities of a research agenda. I believe that ideological agendas affecting interdisciplinary study are a legitimate force in universities; I reject an ideal of value-free "objectivity" in the professoriate.

At the same time, I am concerned that common cause on political objectives plays too great a role in the creation and design of some interdisciplinary courses and programs. Again, my concern is that interdisciplinary courses and programs should be designed for students.