Joshua Schwartz : How Much Does the Meaning of Life Cost?
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How Much Does the Meaning of Life Cost? By Professor Joshua Schwartz
Israel Teachers' Union Journal Iss. 34, December, 2005 [translated from Hebrew]
Professor Joshua Schwartz is the Director of the Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies, Department of Land of Israel and Archaeology Studies, Bar-Ilan University and the Schulman Center for Basic Jewish Studies at Bar-Ilan. He is the former Dean of the Faculty of Jewish Studies at Bar-Ilan University.
The humanities in Israel are in imminent danger of collapse. The universities could perhaps survive without them - but these would be shells of universities for a shell of a human society. It is therefore imperative that those working in the humanities agree to some degree of reorganization, and beyond this, engage in a public campaign to explain the importance of what they do.
Recently I completed a 4-year term as dean of the Faculty of Jewish Studies at Bar-Ilan University. Those four years were extremely difficult ones for higher education in general and for Bar-Ilan University in particular. They were years of deep budget cuts that affected all academic pursuits, the humanities above all. The field of Jewish studies at Bar-Ilan, though essentially an integral part of the humanities, is administratively divorced from them. Nevertheless, in what I wish to say, I will be drawing on personal experience which may be applied to the humanities in general. In this article, I want to share with you my impressions from that period when the humanities (and Jewish studies) in Israel's institutions of higher learning teetered on the brink. It goes without saying that my remarks reflect only my own opinion.
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Maayan Engel's article in the local newspaper "Tel Aviv" (9.9.05) informed readers that the most sought after study tracks at Tel Aviv University for that academic year were economics, law, psychology, biology, medicine, sociology and communications. The same was and remains largely true of Bar-Ilan, the second institution to be mentioned in the article. There, economics, law and psychology headed the list, followed by social work, life sciences and computer sciences. It is reasonable to assume that the situation is broadly similar across Israel. What all these fields of study have in common is that they are "practical" and provide a profession with good earning potential, sometimes without any need for graduate study. Not one of the most popular fields of study was in the humanities.
These and similar facts will come as no surprise to scholars and faculty of the humanities. Even the writer of these lines was not exactly surprised. As we in the humanities tend to see it, it is a matter of regret that students flock to these "professional" fields, which bestow a degree and the potential for wealth and status, turning their backs on important pursuits in the humanities, like literature, languages, history, art, and philosophy. The humanities, we argue, impart wisdom and knowledge, enriching the individual human intellect even though they may bestow less potential for wealth and status. There was a time when students, along with the university administration and its benefactors, appeared to value knowledge, wisdom and understanding. Their indifference today harms the spirit of the humanities and is leading to their collapse. We in the humanities bewail the materialism that now pervades the universities. In the humanities, we are noted for adhering to the law of "knowledge for its own sake." We know less about suggesting practical solutions.
Without detracting from the severity of the current depressing situation, in fact the picture we’ve just drawn of the past is not entirely accurate. Training for the professions has always been an important part of the university. Although the humanities were a central part of traditional university studies, the universities were also founded, among other things, in order to translate this knowledge into professions, status and a livelihood for their graduates. This has always been clear to almost everyone except the teachers of the humanities. As early as the 12th century (!), John of Salisbury, one of the leading intellectuals of the age, complained that his students preferred to specialize in the "practical" fields of the humanities and not in the more esoteric ones. From the very beginnings of the university, there has been tension, and sometimes dissension between the forces of the marketplace (the agora) and the lofty ideals of an education in values (the acropolis) - education for its own sake. The traditional balance deteriorated with the development of many new practical fields of study.[1] Despite this, the humanities have survived, at least until now, in all institutions of higher learning in Israel. The present situation represents something different, however. Today there is a real threat to the mere continuance of the humanities in the universities. Many are facing collapse and disintegration. What happened?
The first problem is the interminable and deep budget cuts suffered by higher education in Israel. It seems that the cuts will continue for several more years. As usual, there is talk of a light at the end of the tunnel and new developments in the near future; in reality we are witnessing cuts and no development. It is important to note that these cuts were imposed on the university administration and not on specific fields of study. It was for the universities to decide precisely where and how the cuts were to be implemented. There is unanimity among scholars in the humanities, justifiable in my opinion, that it is university policy with regard to cuts and future development, that has brought us to this pass. This regrettable situation is not confined to Israel; in other countries, too, there is a tendency to single out the humanities when times are hard.[2] How did the universities come to penalize so harshly the very courses that were at their core?
We have already seen that courses in the humanities are not among the most popular, and we'll have more to say about this later. For the moment, suffice it to say that a drop in registrations, especially a persistent drop, almost always leads to budget cuts. Fewer students, a smaller budget, and so goes the cycle: less money, poorer quality, and fewer students. These are the basic rules of academic administration and budgeting. It is ironic that cuts to the humanities are not particularly money-saving, since what may be cut is only staff, not heavy ancillary expenses such as materials, equipment, and laboratories.
But as far as the university administration is concerned, the flaw in the humanities is the poor potential they have for generating income. Thus, for example, the exact sciences and life sciences, by offering their scholars tangible and sometimes even immediate benefits, bring money, grants and status to the universities. The universities' research and development companies, commercial ventures in all respects, provide money for the universities and are built on the research of these scholars. Researchers in the social sciences, especially the popular fields of study mentioned above, are engaged in research that ostensibly benefits society. For every investment in these fields there is a chance of a real return. Thus, when David Leonhardt writes in the New York Times about this year’s Nobel laureates in economics, mathematician Professor Israel (Robert) Auman and his colleague, Professor Thomas C. Schelling, he notes that they are the only ones among the Nobel laureates (!) who can claim to “have helped preserve all humanity” thanks to their scientific contribution to game theory.[3] Where do the humanities, history, literature and philosophy stand in relation to these tangible contributions, people ask. This is what underlies the attitude towards the humanities of the university administration and the government’s Planning and Budgetary Committee. Just what is the contribution of the humanities, the university administrators want to know? Almost 2,500 years ago, the Greek philosopher Socrates was teaching us that the beginning of wisdom and knowledge is the recognition that "we do not know." Certainty and proof are beyond the reach of the student of the humanities. The whole endeavor appears to be a stuttering game compared with its counterparts in the practical fields of study. "We do not know" is not compatible with the budgetary models that attempt to quantify knowledge and education; models that universities use as the basis for allocating budgets.
The architects of the budgetary models and their interpreters "know"; they are certain that knowledge and education can be quantified and they know that the humanities do not deliver the goods; if it cannot be represented on a graph, it doesn't exist. The English poet, John Keats, wrote that "truth is beauty." Academic truth, when it comes to budgeting, is represented in graphs and statistical models. It makes no difference, obviously, that the architects of these models practically never come from the humanities. Alongside the profitable fields, the humanities appear irrelevant and self-indulgent. And if there is (still) some "fat" on them left over from better times, it must be eliminated. Is there really any need to teach all these languages, some of which ceased to be living languages thousands of years ago? Is it not advisable to increase the numbers of students per class in the humanities to the level of introductory courses in the exact sciences? May we not expect a university student to be thoroughly versed in the Hebrew language without offering courses in Hebrew expression, composition and writing? Why should poorly attended, esoteric courses be financed and subsidized when they do not contribute to the university's coffers? Perhaps it should be left to market forces to decide?
These questions and others like them, which are entirely legitimate, reflect the failure of those in the humanities to promote themselves. They rarely explain precisely what it is they do, and if they do, it's of little help. The universities do not understand them, the media do not understand them, and sometimes they don't even understand each other. To gain the support of the public and the universities, those in the humanities must explain, clearly and precisely, what it is they do and why it is important.
* The dissemination of information is not an easy task. Before scholars explain what they do in the humanities, they must clarify if there is anything to be gained from the explanations and if, clear as they may be, the public will be capable of understanding them. There is no element of snobbery or superiority towards the public in this question, though there is a danger that it will be regarded as such. Rather the question arises from an awareness of changes that have occurred in public mores concerning the consumption of culture.
A large number of the humanities are dependent on reading: reading history, philosophy, belles lettres, etc. The dissertations of scholars in the humanities are still published in paper form, in Articles or in books. But there has been a significant trend over the last few years away from reading books in general and particularly literary books. The trend is accompanied by a drop in the frequency of visits to art exhibitions and museums and the number of viewers of cultural programs on television. The phenomenon has recently been the subject of intense study in the United States, with the findings showing repercussions affecting people of all levels of education. A debate ensued between the acolytes of electronic reading and the advocates of book reading, but in the end, it was clear to all concerned that there has been a dramatic downturn in the reading of texts that may be considered cultural or humanistic. The findings relate to the situation in the United States, but there does not appear to be any great difference between the situation there and the situation in Israel. We will make a brief mention of the conclusions of the report and the repercussions relevant to us.[4]
It would appear that the move away from reading is common to all age groups. Although it is more marked among young people, it is prevalent at all levels of education, and among both men and women, even if there is still a tendency for women to read more. It is also common to all ethnic groups in the United States. Not surprisingly, some of the reduction in reading has been replaced by the electronic media, which diminishes the overall cultural level and leads to a culture of mediocrity. One could argue this point indefinitely. However, those engaged in education and instruction are not likely to disparage findings that also apply to that part of the reading vacuum that has been filled by the computer. These days, anyone incapable of operating a computer is considered illiterate, though it is doubtful what contribution, in any, a preoccupation with gadgets, computer games and cellular Internet instruments makes to anyone's cultural base.[5]
According to the report's compilers, there appears to be a link between a nation's political resilience and the intellectual life of its citizens. Any move away from the culture of reading affects spiritual, cultural, social and political life in general. The intellectual life of the individual impinges on society as a whole. Those engaged in the humanities in universities, according to the report's compilers, must work with teachers and educators in formal and informal education to spur the public to return to reading literature, and especially to return to a book culture.
We have raised these matters as an introduction to the problems those in the humanities have in explaining themselves. There is a danger that no matter what language they use in speaking to the public, it will be considered foreign and unintelligible. Nevertheless, as we have said, it is necessary that they become "instructors" - even on levels with which they may prefer to remain unfamiliar – in order to prepare the ground for further activities and explanations related to the humanistic disciplines.
The dilution of the reading culture, especially the reading of literature, has already spread to the universities and settled within the humanities. This has contributed to their continuing loss of popularity, as they become less and less relevant for students. Some of the academic staff in the humanities preferred to ignore these problems and to teach their students, in ever-diminishing numbers, as if nothing had happened. Others, especially those on the periphery of the humanities, settle their scores with the preachers of the canon of the humanities by proffering "cultural studies", with the word "culture" often reflecting the very lowest level of culture or stark anti-intellectualism. Cultural studies, especially the study of popular culture - grandly attired in the totally incomprehensible pseudo-scientific jargon of post-modernism - faithfully reflected the cultural and intellectual mediocrity of society and did nothing to raise its standard.
This led to a crisis in the humanities as they considered which way to turn. Should they raise their own standards to attract the few remaining outstanding students of the humanities while driving the others away? Or should they rather stoop to the level of culture studies and compete with them - a policy that often led to the addition of banal and boring courses that ultimately also drove students away. A third approach – to ignore everything and continue business as usual - has equally been shown to drive students away.
In view of all this, one is tempted to conclude that the process of whittling away the humanities should continue and they should be allowed to expire quietly, while budgets and university posts are diverted to pursuits ostensibly more profitable and important to the university and society.
The first and perhaps most important contribution of the humanities is the teaching of modesty. We have already mentioned Socrates who stressed the wisdom of "I do not know" as the first stage of acquiring knowledge, or at least of the attempt to acquire knowledge. The humanities teach us to ask questions. Many other disciplines also raise questions at the outset of the journey towards wisdom, but in the humanities there is no guarantee that the answer will be forthcoming. The scholar of the humanities is not perturbed by this, he believes that one must continue to inquire and to seek.
Thus, we all ponder the meaning of life and sometimes we have to contend with pain and loss. In the modern (and post-modern) world, man frequently finds himself tackling these questions in isolation. Mental support comes from the computer screen, which sometimes crashes precisely the same way his life does. But exposure to literature, for example, or to philosophical treatises, reveals to the reader that he is not alone in his pondering and that he does not contend alone. The ruminations of Tolstoy or Sartre or Camus on the meaning of life, though none of them have a convincing answer in my opinion, can change the way the reader looks at everyday life and his life as a whole. A physicist can perhaps help us to deal with theoretical questions concerning the universe, but the writer, the poet and the philosopher will help us to deal with questions about life that should trouble every one of us. Their writings can be constant friends and companions.
And if the reader asks why he needs an intermediary, after all he could just as easily go directly to literature and philosophy without the aid of teachers, the answer is that he can certainly do so, but where will he acquire the knowledge of where to go and what to read?[6] It is the duty of those in the humanities to acts as guides to the student - to the student and the man in the street - to teach them how to read and to provide them with the tools necessary for basic interpretation. In this way we will come to a far better understanding of the complexity and richness of life than we could through a computer screen or a budget graph. The humanities seek to give meaning to life, sometimes by candlelight and sometimes without success. But the quest is never-ending.
The humanities teach us who we are, who we were, and who we will be, and they teach us to test ourselves against the "other." The humanities give us the tools to try to understand human nature through the ages: our creative culture and the creative culture of others. The humanities teach critical and exhaustive analysis and give us the mental strength to cope intellectually, ethically and emotionally with difficult and complex challenges. We mentioned Thomas Schelling, Nobel Prize laureate in economics. Schelling may be concerned with the present and the future, but he also mentions, for example, the writings of Xenophon (5th and 4th centuries B.C.E.), a student of Socrates, military commander, mercenary in the Persian army, and historian. In his writings, Schelling recalls the considerations taken by this ancient military commander in choosing the best terrain in which to fight a war. Xenophon analyzed the problem in a way characteristic of the way game theory is taught. One might think that game theory is far removed from the history of the ancient world and the humanities, but no doubt today's scholar and his problems will find something relevant in these pursuits, if he but knows how to look and what to look for. A dialogue such scholars and scholars of the humanities can benefit us all. Events of thousands of years ago remain relevant and it is possible to provide many more examples from diverse fields in the humanities.
Twenty-first century society is becoming more and more global. Our history, language, literature, religion and culture and those of others, in Israel and worldwide, are the bread and butter of the humanities scholar, and he must be at the disposal of university students and the general public to make it easier for them to comprehend this "great globe itself." In the United States, for example, there are elementary schools (!) that have begun to teach Chinese as a second language; we barely teach English and Hebrew.
Some are now discovering that the humanities have "relevance" for the world of business and related matters. It is ironic that the ones who discover this relevance are very often the very ones who object to the inclusion of the humanities in the study of economics or business management. Still, one may hope that such small successes will also bring an awareness of the importance of studies beyond the pursuit of a profession.
In the long term, blinkered and provincial thinking leads to ignorance, mediocrity and intolerance in every field. Open and global thinking, the thinking of the humanities scholar, opens the gates of the world to the citizen and provides him with a treasure trove that is not measured in income recorded in a graph. It sometimes even leads to wealth, and above all, to happiness.
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All this is clear to the humanities scholar; but as we have mentioned, is not generally understood or appreciated by those who finance the universities, or to most students and the general public, or at the more primary levels of the educational system. At best, continued support of the humanities is considered a privilege and not a right, and humanities scholars are viewed by the institutions and the public as mendicants whose hands are held out for academic "charity." And to a large extent, those to blame for the breakdown in communications and the failure to explain the humanities, are those very humanities scholars. Some of them, those who ignore the situation, and they are usually the most senior scholars, have no intention of descending from their ivory towers and engaging in explanations to the public or to students. Informing the public is considered a waste of time, and working with students is viewed as a recipe for demeaning their professional status. Others, recognizing the importance of these activities and the adoption of a more affable attitude towards students, are all too often concerned with trivialities and communicate in a technical language replete with jargon. An air of snobbery and boredom frequently exudes even from those who are prepared to talk to the public. All this must be changed.
We in the humanities must speak clearly and forthrightly about our work and about the value this work has for the public and society. We must be prepared to participate in public and even popular debate, in a clear and courteous manner. The public has not shunned the humanities; we have estranged ourselves from the public. We have a duty to begin a process of rapprochement and to begin it now. If we take this route, we will perhaps be able to influence the public in general.[7]
It is not enough to explain what we do in the humanities. As we mentioned above, there are real problems with the present structure of the humanities in most universities in Israel. Certain changes, accompanied by a public relations exercise, will improve their status. The changes proposed here are obviously only expressions of my personal opinion. They are proposed both with regard to the humanities in the universities and in relation to the public. Some of them require an increase in the budget, or at least a redistribution of certain resources. But with a little goodwill and open and productive thinking, these problems can be overcome.
Steps to be taken by the humanities departments. Interesting and high-level courses must be maintained. One would think that nothing is more obvious than this, yet there are any number of boring courses. This article is based, among other things, on an op-ed piece in "Ha'aretz." Among the responses to that article published on the Internet, in Hebrew and English, students and graduates of other fields claimed that the elective courses they took in the humanities were boring or of a poor standard in comparison with their courses in the sciences. The Israeli Council for Higher Education and the universities do have a system of checks and balances, but they are ill-suited for the humanities. Humanities scholars are inclined to disregard the findings, even when they call for a justified revision. An appropriate testing system for the humanities must be instituted.
It is uncertain if the humanities can truly succeed in competing for the young student who comes to university in order to learn a profession. But the humanities are particularly popular among more mature students who come to university late, or among those in part-time education. There are also school teachers who come to complete a degree, for the most part in preparation for an advanced degree. Many countries have been wise enough to create a framework suitable for these students, a large proportion of whom are middle-aged with families and concerned with earning a living. The Planning and Budgetary Committee regulations concerning budgets, which stress the coefficient of efficiency, i.e. the speedy exit from university with a diploma, discriminate against those not in full-time studies. The rules have to be changed to allow many more students like them to study at university, under reasonable conditions. A large number of them will gravitate towards the humanities.
In spite of the difficulties, a reassessment must be made of the possibility of making a "core program" of studies compulsory, as is currently the case in the United States. Harvard University, for example, requires every student to take a two-year compulsory course in English composition. We must establish a Liberal Arts course that would expose students of the exact sciences and the social sciences to several courses in the humanities. According to such an arrangement, the student of the humanities would also be required to take elective courses in other disciplines.
The humanities faculty (and perhaps other faculties as well) must be reorganized in an inter-disciplinary format. The current disciplinary-course model, which creates divisions between fields of study - often most of all between the fields most similar to each other in nature and content - has proved to be extremely damaging to the humanities. The divisions should be eliminated; broader, inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary formats should be introduced, not outside the faculty in independent units as is the practice in several universities, but within the faculty. Course formats should be changed so as to allow for courses to be taught by a team of teachers and not by one lecturer. All these changes require a radical change of approach in the budgetary framework of universities (“on whose authority?” they ask, and enter into the interminable controversy that always accompanies that question).
Those in the humanities should adopt the research methods of other sciences and set up work and research teams. This will also affect teaching. They must persuade university heads of the importance of these changes, and not wait for the university heads to make changes of their own volition that might be damaging to the humanities. Persuasion can be attained through ongoing promotional activities by those in the humanities to the university heads.
Steps to be taken in relation to the public: Some universities have instituted programs of "adult education" or "education for pensioners", or "open Friday." This is not enough, since these activities only reach limited strata of society. Particularly in the case of the humanities, the universities should be opened up to the public, and, in effect, the public should be brought to the university. Unlike the exact sciences or the life sciences, the humanities make minimal demands on resources. If the public feels comfortable on the campus and in the humanities faculty, it will understand what is being done there and the importance of the disciplines being taught.
The humanities faculty must get its product to the market. There must be programs, even between universities, to go from town to town, from community center to community center, from high school to high school, and present the public with a book, a story, a song, an interesting take on history, or a piece of music. Thus, we will enrich the public and enable it to understand the importance of our enterprise.
The humanities in Israel are on the verge of collapse. A university could perhaps survive without them, but for all the "riches" and the income, it would be a shell of a university that would create an impoverished shell of a society. Humanities scholars must explain the importance of what they do, in clear and intelligible language and also agree to some level of reorganization. The public and the universities must lend an attentive ear, support us and learn. Thus, we will all benefit from truly rich universities and a healthy and sound society.
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[1] For a more detailed historical survey of the above statements, see Stanley Chodrow, "Taking Humanities Off Life Support", American Council of Learned Societies, Occasional Paper No. 40, 1997 (www.acls.org/op40ch.htm). See also Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the Twelfth Century (1927, New York, Meridian Books, 1957) Robert L. Benson and Giles Constable (eds.), Renaissance and Renewal in the Twelfth Century (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982) indicated by him in Note 1. [2] Pauline Yu, "The Course of the Particulars: Humanities in the University of the Twenty-first Century", American Council of Learned Societies, Occasional Paper No. 40, 1997 (www.acls.org/op40yu.htm). [3] David Leonhardt, "All Consuming: To Prove You're Serious, Burn Some Bridges," The New York Times, Business Day, October 17, 2005, C4. The writer made a special reference to the link between game theory and deterrence, which prevented the superpowers from attacking each other. [4] National Endowment for the Humanities, Reading at Risk: A Survey of Literary Reading in America – Research Division Report, No. 46, 2004. [5] See David Goldman's article "Merciless City", "Yediot Aharanot", holiday supplement, Succoth eve, October 17, 2005, pp. 16-17. [6] Based on Rafaela Bielski, The Charm of Happiness: An Examination of Happiness – Meanings, Findings and Conclusions, Carmel, Jerusalem 2004, p. 99 and p. 179. [7] Compare Ben-Dror Yamini, "Intellectuals with no Influence", "Ma'ariv", October 19, 2005.
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