Who Killed the Liberal Arts?

[Beliavsky]

<p>Who</a> Killed the Liberal Arts? | The Weekly Standard
by Joseph Epstein
When asked what he thought about the cultural wars, Irving Kristol is said to have replied, “They’re over,” adding, “We lost.” If Kristol was correct, one of the decisive battles in that war may have been over the liberal arts in education, which we also lost.</p>

<hr>

<p>I think history and literature are important, but I don't trust most American universities to teach them properly, which is one reason I will encourage my children to major in engineering or the natural sciences. A classic book on this topic is Bloom's "Closing of the American Mind" (1987).</p>

[emeraldkity4]

<p>You don’t trust American schools with the humanities but you do with engineering & the sciences? </p>

[stradmom]

<p>Reports of their death have been greatly exaggerated.</p>

[momofthreeboys]

<p>Maybe the OP is an engineer…as the only liberal arts grad in a sea of multiple generations of engineers in my family I’m kinda used to that line of thinking and it actually tickles my funny bone.</p>

[SlitheyTove]

<p>Who killed the liberal arts? </p>

<p>

I think history and literature are important, but I don’t trust most American universities to teach them properly, which is one reason I will encourage my children to major in engineering or the natural sciences.

</p>

<p>Looks like we have a confession. ;)</p>

[moonchild]

<p>The natural sciences are liberal arts.</p>

[ucbalumnus]

<p>Were liberal arts (including math and science) majors and subjects ever that popular at universities other than the most selective ones (state flagships in states with more than a few state universities, and private schools of that level of selectivity and higher)?</p>

[Lergnom]

<p>Colonel Mustard in the library with a pipe wrench.</p>

[katliamom]

<p>Beliavsky has some strange ideas, including this one. There are hundreds of thousands of students at LACs throughout the country and he says the liberal arts are dead?</p>

<p>Clearly, he hasn’t been reading all those ‘in defense of the liberal arts degrees’ threads on CC alone ;)</p>

[stradmom]

<p>+1 to Lergnom</p>

[SteveMA]

<p>Lee Harvey Oswald?</p>

[lefthandofdog]

<p>I’m waiting to review the Zapruder (sp?) film before I decide. </p>

<p>I’m assuming that grainy, black and white 8mm film has some artistic meaning but what was the videographer’s intent?</p>

[bclintonk]

<p>

@ucbalumnus

Were liberal arts (including math and science) majors and subjects ever that popular at universities other than the most selective ones (state flagships in states with more than a few state universities, and private schools of that level of selectivity and higher)?

</p>

<p>That’s an interesting question. I’m going to say yes, based on a quick tally of undergrad degrees conferred at Michigan State University, clearly Michigan’s #2 public university after the more selective University of Michigan. In 2010, in the depths of this nation’s worst recession since the Great Depression, a little over 40% of the undergrad degrees conferred by MSU were in liberal arts fields, and this at a school with thriving undergraduate vocational and pre-professional programs in such varied fields as business, engineering, education, public policy, criminal justice, urban planning, dietetics and nutrition, food science, food industry management, apparel and textile design, packaging, agriculture, natural resource management, architecture, interior design, communications, parks and recreation (I kid you not!), nursing, and allied health professions. Among the most popular liberal arts majors: social sciences (11.1% of all Bachelor’s degrees), biological sciences (10.1%), psychology (4.4%), visual and performing arts (3.2%), English (2.3%), physical sciences (1.9%), foreign languages (1.9%), mathematics/statistics (1.1%), and history (0.9%). </p>

<p>It’s a pretty similar percentage at Wayne State University in Detroit, and at Grand Valley State University in Grand Rapids, with a slightly different mix of majors at each school.</p>

<p>Then I think about all the little liberal arts colleges scattered around the state–Kalamazoo, Albion, Adrian, Hope, Calvin, Hillsdale and the like–and most of them offer nothing but liberal arts, and every one of them is less selective than the University of Michigan.</p>

<p>So yes, I think liberal arts majors have always been popular at many colleges and universities of widely varying degrees of selectivity.</p>

[ucbalumnus]

<p>What I saw looking at California publics is somewhat different. The most selective UCs like Berkeley graduate about 70% liberal arts majors, but the CSUs that I looked at were only around 25% liberal arts majors (and the CSUs enroll about twice as many students as the UCs).</p>

<p>There are also private schools, but their total enrollment is small compared to that of the public schools; the two largest ones in California for undergraduate enrollment are probably USC and University of Phoenix. Small LACs and other small private schools have a minimal effect on the overall distribution of majors, due to their small size.</p>

[emeraldkity4]

<p>I’m waiting for OP to finish reading the “cool colleges” book that he found interesting on the types of colleges thread.
The author’s undergrad degree is in philosophy/religion.

<a href=“http://www.reed.edu/reed_magazine/december2011/articles/features/asher.html[/url]”>http://www.reed.edu/reed_magazine/december2011/articles/features/asher.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

[toblin]

<p>Who Killed the Liberal Arts?</p>

<p>Globalization. (As in economics.)</p>

[megan12]

<p>Didn’t I see a reference to this in Harry Potter - the Defense against the Liberal Arts program? :)</p>

<p>Can’t say I agree about the death of the liberal arts, but I agree with the person who questioned the part about trusting America to teach science and math but not liberal arts. What??</p>

[glido]

<p>The liberal arts majors often go on to graduate schools. The professional ranks are filled with highly successful people with undergraduate degrees in the liberal arts. Not at all dead.</p>

[alh]

<p>

Education is a political act. For over half a century, the conservative movement has waged a political war on liberal arts education. They have waged this war because they know that without the skills we are provided by a liberal arts education citizens must abdicate our power. They know, like the Greeks and Romans did, that only those with the ars liberalis can do the job of citizens. That is why we must not allow the liberal arts to be further attacked, economically or ethically. A democracy without citizens will not long survive and citizens are only those who have mastered the ars liberalis.

</p>

<p>[Katie</a> Billotte - Salon.com](<a href=“http://www.salon.com/writer/katie_billotte/]Katie”>http://www.salon.com/writer/katie_billotte/)</p>

[Beliavsky]

<p>

You don’t trust American schools with the humanities but you do with engineering & the sciences?

Yes, and these articles from Minding the Campus explain why:</p>

<p>[Look</a> What they’ve Done to U.S. History](<a href=“http://www.mindingthecampus.com/forum/2012/10/look_what_theyve_done_to_us_hi.html]Look”>http://www.mindingthecampus.com/forum/2012/10/look_what_theyve_done_to_us_hi.html)</p>

<p>[In</a> History—the Obsession with Race, Class and Gender](<a href=“http://www.mindingthecampus.com/forum/2012/10/in_history--the_obsession_with.html]In”>http://www.mindingthecampus.com/forum/2012/10/in_history--the_obsession_with.html)</p>