Academic Platypus: The Humanities Safety Valve
I teach a course called "Humanities" at a classical school. Humanities is a rather amorphous course that's something like a combination of History, Ethics, and Literature (you might think of it as "History and Moral Philosophy" Oops!) It can be a little difficult to teach since you're always caught on the horns of a dilemma: do I focus on the Literature end or do I focus on the History end; there isn't enough time for both.
That said, I have found one thing that Humanities excels at: serving as a safety valve for other courses. Have an argument break out in Anatomy and Physiology about cannibalism in survival situations? Shift it to Humanities. Have a rash of questions about Satan in Bible class? Shift it to Humanities. Kids want to talk about the decline of pop-music as copyright laws gets ever tighter? You guessed it: bring it up in Humanities. What I'm saying is the very amorphous nature of the Humanities course becomes a huge asset when seen in context with the other classes. Knowledge produces questions, but not all questions fit in with a given class' agenda. Rather than allow students "pregnant with the Logos" to stifle in frustration, Humanities acts as a safety valve where questions that don't fit in anywhere else can be brought up and dealt with. It's a sort of catch-all class where the various disciplines can be brought together and addressed as a unified whole; a place where students can unwind and work out their intellectual problems apart from the tyranny of compartmentalized knowledge.
Humanities is a safety valve, but it can be even more than that. It can be a place where students are allowed to experience knowledge as a whole; a place where things come together and make sense. Under such circumstances, Humanities would cease being the ugly duckling of the upper school and become a beautiful swan. As our culture continues to fragment, students crave unity and stability. They want a chance to see "the big picture." My class is where they do that.
That said, I have found one thing that Humanities excels at: serving as a safety valve for other courses. Have an argument break out in Anatomy and Physiology about cannibalism in survival situations? Shift it to Humanities. Have a rash of questions about Satan in Bible class? Shift it to Humanities. Kids want to talk about the decline of pop-music as copyright laws gets ever tighter? You guessed it: bring it up in Humanities. What I'm saying is the very amorphous nature of the Humanities course becomes a huge asset when seen in context with the other classes. Knowledge produces questions, but not all questions fit in with a given class' agenda. Rather than allow students "pregnant with the Logos" to stifle in frustration, Humanities acts as a safety valve where questions that don't fit in anywhere else can be brought up and dealt with. It's a sort of catch-all class where the various disciplines can be brought together and addressed as a unified whole; a place where students can unwind and work out their intellectual problems apart from the tyranny of compartmentalized knowledge.
Humanities is a safety valve, but it can be even more than that. It can be a place where students are allowed to experience knowledge as a whole; a place where things come together and make sense. Under such circumstances, Humanities would cease being the ugly duckling of the upper school and become a beautiful swan. As our culture continues to fragment, students crave unity and stability. They want a chance to see "the big picture." My class is where they do that.
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