I Hate Poetry! (Or why do I need to study this stuff?): The Importance of Humanities

Question: Why should we read poetry or study literature, history or religion?

The short answer: To help us understand the world & the people who live in it.

Studying the humanities helps us to understand people and their experience. We encounter people we might never meet in other circumstances when we read literature, study history or examine religion.  We witness things we have not or might never live ourselves. Reading literature and studying humanities  helps expose students to the human experience and prepares them for the many different people and situations they will encounter when they head out into the world outside of their comfortable bubble.

 "When you read all of a sudden the world is bigger
 and nothing makes sense." ~Nathan Flood
(Something my son said and this is my first meme.)

Students  tend to live life with people they already understand or who have similar or identical world views as they do. While this can be a comfort and a source of strength it can also be a disadvantage.  When we live life in our comfortable bubble we assume everyone thinks like we do or makes decisions based on the same beliefs we have. This can lead to conflict and misunderstanding.



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How many conflicts both locally and globally have had tragic results because people didn't try to understand what other people believed, why they acted in a certain way or lacked the ability to cross communication boundaries? Whether it's a personal conflict with a friend or boss or a broader conflict  within communities or between nations the understanding, or lack there of, regarding values and beliefs can result in life altering consequences.

By examining the people we encounter in humanities and trying to understand their perspective (why they do what they do) we are preparing ourselves for the people we will encounter and the decisions we will need to make on an individual, business, community and global level. By exposing students to literature, history and religion in a way that causes them to examine these subjects with the goal of understanding people we are helping them to see beyond themselves, engage in empathy and hopefully help them become more compassionate and thoughtful of the people and circumstances around them.

Kid President reads poetry.

I can thank my humanities teachers in all of my literature, history and religious studies who helped equip me for the strange new world that awaited me outside the doors of my home and school and prepared me for the many people I would encounter.

When I was in high school I had not yet met as self centered a person as Oscar Wilde's Dorian Gray but I gained insight into how selfishness can lead to destruction of self and others. In college I encountered men who viewed women as Hemingway's heroes did but I wasn't completely surprised by their actions and knew to look for a different type of hero in my life. Observing the dysfunction of  the families in Tennessee William's plays prompted me to examine my own family's story. 

As I witnessed religious and moral hypocrisy I was reminded of Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Scarlet Letter" and then examined my own heart as I related to others. As I faced my own crossroads and needed courage I was reminded of Frost's diverging roads and Christ's reference to the narrow gate.

When community or world leaders made decisions about limiting free speech,  free press or the exercise of religion I remembered how leaders from the past used that to their advantage to control the populace.  I took my lessons from ordinary citizens I had read about in history who stood up to injustice in the past which impacted my decisions in the voting booth as a young adult and to take action as a citizen.

When I encountered broken or angry people I was more compassionate and able to interact with them in a positive way because I had 'met' people like them in my studies of literature, history and religion and could empathize with their situation instead of turning my back on them.

The world is getting smaller in this technological age. Our students will be working with and living alongside people from diverse walks of life, cultures and world views. They will need to be able to understand, empathize and communicate with people from all over the world. A strong foundation in the humanities can help equip them for just that task.

Authentic advancement and achievement mean understanding what it is to be a true citizen and not a repeater of unexamined platitudes, a compassionate and self-reliant human being, a good parent, a caring member of the community, and somebody who can be trusted to teach the next generation something other than greed, territoriality, anger, outrage, bitterness and a blinkered vision of the unmapped parts of the world — and the mind.~ Gina Barreca

Further perspectives on the importance of humanities:
Op-Ed: "Humanities at the Heart of Real Education" by Gina Barreca
YouTube Video: "How & Why We Read: Crash Course English Literature #1"

Heather Flood is the developer of the history curriculum at Jill Dixon's Eclectic Academy of Learning. For the last 10 years she has been teaching humanities courses to homeschoolers whom she hopes have gone on to become empathetic, compassionate future world changers who have learned how to learn, yearn to understand, and continue to ask the question "Why?" wherever they find themselves.