The Core Blog

The term "liberal arts" comes up a lot when discussing the various approaches to education found at American colleges and universities, but what exactly is a liberal arts education? Michael S. Roth's new book, "Beyond the University: Why Liberal Education Matters" tries to define it.

Roth argues that two distinct liberal arts traditions can be observed in the history of American tertiary education:

The first is a philosophical tradition emphasizing preparation for inquiry; its aim is freeing the mind to investigate the truth about things physical, intellectual and spiritual. The second is a rhetorical tradition emphasizing initiation into a common culture through the study of canonical works; its aim is learning to participate in the culture, to appreciate its monuments and to create new monuments inspired by the old. Roth characterizes the philosophical thread as “skeptical” and the rhetorical thread as “reverential.”

In most cases, universities or colleges define a liberal arts education as some combination of these two strands, emphasizing one or the other, in an effort at "serving the needs of the 'whole person'".

Roth's discussion of a liberal arts education does not end here though. He goes on to critique the two-fold American liberal arts education and the idea that it must "higher education must generate useful knowledge that can benefit society, or can increase the student’s financial and social status, or can advance business and economic interests", showing how influential Americans have helped to form the country's educational system. Individuals discussed include Thomas Jefferson, who "admired knowledge for its own sake but insisted that it also be useful to human progress"; Ralph Waldo Emerson, who believed that "education demanded cultivation of the self, resistance to the crowd and striving to transform society"; Booker T. Washington, who saw education as a means of "economic inclusion that might eventually lead to higher pursuits" for minorities such as the African-American community; W.E.B. Du Bois, who went further and asserted that education provided one with the ability to "help others attain their own freedom"; Jane Addams, who pursued education as a means to "cultivate empathy and cooperation"; and William James, who saw education in literature as a way to develop the imagination and "help overcome blindness to others’ points of view".

Ultimately, Roth believes that education should go beyond the confines of university corridors towards the growth of the whole individual for the entirety of life. "Now more than ever, we need both reflective and pragmatic liberal education if we are to shape accelerating change rather than be shaped by it."

The original article discussing Roth's book can be found on The Washington Post. Another take on the same article can be found on The Daily Beast.

Congratulations to Professor David Swartz for winning the History of Sociology Section Distinguished Scholarly Publication Award from the American Sociological Association for his book Symbolic Power, Politics, and Intellectuals: The Political Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu. Professor Swartz teaches in the Department of Sociology and the Core Curriculum Social Sciences. His book, which can be purchased from the University of Chicago Press, argues that power and politics are central to understanding Bourdieu's sociology and that sociology is not only a science but a "crucial form of political engagement".

According to a recent article published in the NYTimes, student governments at several major American universities are calling for trigger warnings for rape, violence and other sensitive material to be placed on syllabi, forewarning students who may be upset by such depictions in the literature and media read and discussed in class. And they aren't talking about The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Works proposed for trigger warnings include popular tenants of the western literary canon such as The Great Gatsby, Shakespeare and ancient Greek myths. The concept of trigger warnings, rooted in feminist thought, has gained traction on social media sites. Students in favor of adapting the idea for the classroom argue that it would provide "explicit alerts that the material they are about to read or see in a classroom might upset them or, as some students assert, cause symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder in victims of rape or in war veterans".

However, many professors find the movement ludicrous, arguing that trigger warnings "suggest a certain fragility of mind that higher learning is meant to challenge, not embrace". Lisa Hajjar, a sociology professor at University of California, Santa Barbara, even suggests that the idea is detrimental to academic freedom. Hajjar, who believes that the graphic depictions of torture she uses in her courses about war are essential, says, "Any student can request some sort of individual accommodation, but to say we need some kind of one-size-fits-all approach is totally wrong. The presumption there is that students should not be forced to deal with something that makes them uncomfortable is absurd or even dangerous.”

Let us know how you feel about the debate!