The humanities comprise those fields that study human creations of all sorts. The humanities thus include literary studies, philosophy, history, (including art history and history of science), foreign languages, cultura
l studies (including First Nations Studies), musicology, interdisciplinary studies, and parts of fields such as psychology, anthropology, and sociology.
There are two kinds of Bachelor's level degrees: a) those that train you for a specific career, and b) those that educate you to be able to be trained for a wide variety of careers.
Examples of degrees that train you for a specific career are nursing, accounting, and social work. These degrees train you well to practice a specific profession, but they do not prepare you well to be trained for many other professions.
Degrees that educate you, thus enabling you to be trained in a wide variety of fields, are found in the Humanities and other Liberal Arts. These degrees emphasize skills such as:
They also emphasize perspectives like a) understanding and appreciating other cultures, and b) valuing rational thought and effective analysis.
Employers have found that people with degrees in the Humanities are among the most flexible and best able to learn how to do a job. People with degrees in the Humanities tend to climb higher and faster in whatever career track they choose than do people trained in particular fields.
The Humanistic Studies internship program will place you in a good learning situation in a local business or agency allowing you to build your resume while getting credits.
With a Humanistic Studies major or minor you learn to understand and appreciate the greatest works that human beings have produced and set yourself on a road to a fulfilling and satisfying life.
Learning Outcomes:
1. Students will acquire an understanding of what it means to be human by studying and analyzing important works and ideas in literature, philosophy, language, and history.
2. Students will acquire essential life skills, including the ability to reflect critically on texts and artifacts, to recognize and appreciate nuance and complexity of meaning, and to express themselves in a clear, organized, and well-reasoned manner.
3. Students will be transformed and given greater self-awareness by understanding the historical and cultural context for human values through the study of literature, philosophy, language, and history.
4. Study of the Humanities imparts a fundamental understanding of: