E-Paper
Re-evaluating the relevance of a humanities degree in today’s time
The core value that a humanities degree instils is the ability to critically analyse diverse viewpoints.
As Helen Small writes in her introduction to The Value of the Humanities, published by Oxford University Press in 2013, “The humanities might ideally find justification simply in our doing them” and the fact that humanities education and research have been a critical foundation of societies around the globe has been testament to this approach.
Economic, political and institutional pressures, however, have engendered a different kind of discourse, one that is strongly focused on articulating the public value and benefits of a humanities education, as well as emphasizing students’ career and earning prospects.
The demands of the modern workforce, and the future of work in more general terms, are changing due to increasing globalization and rapid technological developments. It is well recognized that students enrolled in a humanities degree develop an extensive set of capabilities (such as critical thinking and problem solving) through their study of ideas, movements and theories in culture, society, history, language, reasoning and more. Their in-depth engagement with their respective discipline allows them to form a broad understanding of the world around them and the ways in which humans connect and interact.
Employers have identified gaps between the demand and supply of so-called ‘transferable skills’, in particular communication skills, and due to changes in the labour market these skills will be increasingly sought after, as the proportion of the work force with transferable-skill-i ntensive employment is forecast to steeply increase over the next decade.
According to recent employability reports such as the one released by the Foundation for Young Australians in 2017, employersare increasingly looking for graduates who are able to articulate which highly transferable skills they have developed during their studies, and who are able to communicate and demonstrate these. Reports such as the Australian ‘Social Sciences Shape the Nation’ report, also released in 2017, articulate the complexity of the issues graduates will need to solve in ever changing nationaland global landscapes and the capabilities they need to activate to meaningfully contribute as employees and engaged citizens. Students studying humanities and Social Sciences subjects are acquiring high levels of literacy, as well as digital, cultural and interpersonal skills, which equip them to face the challenges our increasingly complex societies pose.
Humanities degrees also involve many technical skills including quantitative analysis skills, policy development, software use and foreign language skills. A recent report commissioned by the Faculty of Arts at Macquarie University in Sydney and conducted by Deloitte Access Economics identifies some 30 technical skills that students may acquire in a humanities degree and that are highly valued by employers across different sectors. In addition to those technical skills, humanities graduates develop a strong set of transferable skills, in areas such as communication, teamwork, problem-solving, innovation, emotional judgement etc., which have at their core the ability to solve complex problems by taking a flexible and adaptable approach - a set of skills highly valued by employers across a range of sectors.
At Macquarie University we are always ready to talk to employers about how to improve our course offerings, and with such input we have developed a new distinctive Bachelor of Arts program that is well positioned to address the future of work. This includes a renewed focus on what are variously called ‘soft’, ‘transferable’ or ‘enterprise skills’. The new Bachelor of Arts program emphasises the development of transferable skills to prepare graduates for a world where transactional and manual work is increasingly automated. The renewal of the Bachelor of Arts develops a way to bring together the external drivers around employment outcomes, the internal drivers around delivering high-quality education and the articulated core values of the Faculty of Arts, which is committed to the notion that a broad humanities-based educational offering, combined with appropriate transformative learning experiences in an applied context, is a crucial element in providing outstanding employment outcomes for graduates.
One of the core values that a humanities degree instils is the ability to recognise, critically analyse and communicate different points of view – an essential skill in today’s increasingly complex global settings that forms the basis for mutual understanding. Humanities studies have a major contribution to make in understanding how our society and economy can adapt to conditions of rapid change due to globalisation, rapid technological development (e.g. Artificial Intelligence) and changes to economic structures. Humanities students will be well equipped to face these challenges with a critical mindset and a well-developed ethical compass that enable them to make a contribution in a broad range of national as well as global professional settings and they will be sought out to make a contribution across a wide variety of employment sectors.
(The author is executive dean, faculty of arts, Macquarie University, Sydney. Views expressed are personal)
