The Humanities

1. The Humanities Brendan Rapple LIS413 Summer 2009 Simmons College

2. What are the Humanities? • Those branches of knowledge that concern themselves with human beings and their culture. • Distinguished in content and method from the physical and biological sciences and, somewhat less so, from the social sciences. • Often placed in juxtaposition to more “practical” studies, which are designed primarily to help us make a living.

3. National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act (1965) • "The term 'humanities' includes, but is not limited to, the study of the following: language, both modern and classical; linguistics; literature; history; jurisprudence; philosophy; archaeology; comparative religion; ethics; the history, criticism and theory of the arts; those aspects of social sciences which have humanistic content and employ humanistic methods; and the study and application of the humanities to the human environment with particular attention to reflecting our diverse heritage, traditions, and history and to the relevance of the humanities to the current conditions of national life."

4. Word “Humanities” May be Misleading • Many aspects of science deal with “humans”, with “human matters”. • Also, people speak of the social sciences as “having humanistic content and employing humanistic methods”. • However, these branches of knowledge and inquiry are not counted among the humanities. • Boundaries of the humanities are often very fuzzy.

5. Humanities and Science • No single world view in Humanities -- generally much more agreement in Science. • No universally accepted network of truths. • Humanities much more diverse than Science.

6. No Real Linear Progress in the Humanities • Science, Medicine etc. clearly manifest progress. • The same sense of progress does not exist in the Humanities. • We probably do not really know “more” about Shakespeare’s works -- in the same way that we know more about, say, DNA -- than we knew 20 years ago [Ross Atkinson, LRTS, 1995]

7. Science is Cumulative • “Literature of science is cumulative in the sense that the important ideas and observations of the past are included in the current literature” Urquhart. • Arguably, if all scientific literature over 30 years old were destroyed, vast majority would still exist in literature produced in recent years. • “If you were a scientist trying to discover the structure of DNA when Watson and Crick published their article on the double helix, there was nothing you could do but pick up your marbles and go home. The structure had been discovered; nothing more need be said; and scientists moved on from there. But if you are a music scholar preparing a monograph on Bach and a book on the composer comes out, you are of course interested, but you do not burn your manuscript. You know that no one (including yourself) will ever be able to say the last word about Bach and his music” Garfield.

8. Many Different Layers in Humanities • It is one thing to understand words in a text, it is another to understand them in relation to a time and its culture, e.g. Ancient Athenians on democracy. • Ultimately the search leads to the life that stood behind the text.

9. Humanists study VALUE • Scientists are concerned with: • objective, empirically verifiable data • experimental results that can be replicated by other scientists. • Typical scientist is primarily interested in most recent research literature/materials. • Typical humanist may be just as interested in far older material.

10. Serious Implications for Libraries • Unlike the sciences, the humanities do not “withdraw” older secondary materials. • When a critical work is no longer in fashion, it becomes valuable as a work to be used in studying the history of the field. • Also the humanities cannot summarize effectively earlier publications.

11. The scientist studies the structure of rainbows, not whether they are aesthetically beautiful. • The psychiatrist studies how a brain functions, not whether one’s brain’s activities are morally good. • Scientist studies technological aspects of printing, not how printing revolutionized the world in so many manifold ways.

12. Humanities Mostly the Work of Individuals • Though it is changing with computerization, humanists tend to work on their own. • Unlike scientists, they engage in relatively little team work. • Scientist works with colleagues, grad. students etc. in a lab. • Social scientists spend much time with co-investigators planning and executing field work, surveys, and data analysis.

13. Humanist usually focuses on the less tangible, less concrete. • Humanist relies less on empiricism of the laboratory, and more on the views of other scholars. • Humanist seldom deals with measurable, quantitative entities.

14. Bibliographic Databases in Humanities • Not always of great use to Humanities scholar. • Humanities scholars often stress primary sources -- generally covered less well by bibliographic tools. • Some Humanities databases do not include abstracts. • Humanities concepts and terminology less standardized than those of science -- less susceptible to effective management through a controlled vocabulary. • Science databases often updated more frequently -- scientists require more current literature.

15. Humanities and Scholarship • Studies reveal that 70%-90% of citations in science are to materials 15 years old or less. • “The Science Citation Index® consistently demonstrates that about 90 percent of the millions of references cited each year were published sometime in the past three decades. And 50% involve papers published in the last ten years. As in earlier decades, the vast majority of citations are to relatively recent papers” (Garfield & Pudovkin, 2003). • The figures for humanities citations are 40%-45%. • “Having retrospective coverage may be more important to the humanist than having access to current material” (Sue Stone, 1982). • In most sciences 3%-10% of citations are to books, 90%-97% to journal articles. • In humanities, however, 60%-75% are to books.

16. Humanists and Books • Humanists like books! • They like being surrounded by them • They often prefer original texts to copies • Many need all editions, all drafts, all galley proofs • The old book may be at least as important as the current book • They want texts in the original language

17. How Do Humanities Scholars Identify Their Research Material? • From references in publications they read. • From communicating with colleagues. • From bibliographies. • From librarians.

18. Information Gathering Strategies • Humanist places paramount importance on the library. • Scientist often more dependent on personal collection. ______________________________________ • Humanist views browsing, serendipity as worthwhile (perhaps a necessity due to relative lack of organization of the materials in the field). • Scientist is much more structured.

19. Centrality of the Library • Laboratory often central to the scientist. • The “field” to the social scientist. • But the library to humanists. • The creative and performing artist are exceptions to the “library as center” rule of humanists.

20. Still, Much Research Can be Done Remotely • Though the author is referring primarily to social scientists, her point is increasingly applicable to at least some humanists: “. . . with the development of digitization and the availability of numerous online full-text databases, the possibility of doing research at home, from an 'armchair,' and perhaps unschooled in the rigours of academic research, . . . exists. Libraries and archives that required researchers to schedule appointments, travel to inconvenient locations, and spend endless days researching a topic can now, in many cases, be accessed from a computer, with source materials available online (Sandra Shoiock Roff, 2005)

21. Difficult for Librarians to Satisfy Humanists • Impossible to collect in so many languages. • Libraries also greatly feel the pull between retrospective collecting and buying/subscribing to latest electronic materials.

22. Very Broad Research Vistas of Humanists [There is an] increasing acceptance among humanities scholars that any consciously created human product, any symbolic artifact, is an acceptable object of study. . . .[This] has led to the general position that virtually every symbolic creation must be considered equally worthy of study. Because any publication or human creation can have research potential, humanities scholars – and the information professionals who support them – have become increasingly unwilling and incapable of coming to terms with what should be collected and maintained, and what should not” (Ross Atkinson, LRTS, 1995).

23. Humanists and Libraries • Humanities scholars tend to use reference librarians relatively little. • Opposite is true in archives and special (rare books, manuscript) libraries. • Greater spread of individual titles used by humanities researchers. • Almost inevitable that they use libraries other than their institution’s. • ILL won’t suffice for much primary material -- accordingly, they have to travel. • The growing study of the masses and the common man creates needs for such materials as comic books, TV Guide, Newsweek, Cosmopolitan, Wired, and Details -- any publication can have research potential.

24. Other Humanist Characteristics • Humanities scholars tend to be reluctant to delegate bibliographic searching to others -- perhaps due to a lack of trust. • Humanists often believe that the search for information is important in itself -- journey is as important as the destination.

25. Barriers to Access • Lack of books and journals. • Sometimes lengthy delay between request and receipt of materials (e.g. ILL). • Loss of material (theft, mutilation etc.).

26. Humanistic Study is Broad • Retreat from the canon. • Humanist’s work is diffuse. • Hard to focus on a narrow specific area. • Subjectivism necessarily creeps in.

27. Humanities not as “Precise” as Science • Johan Huizinga once spoke of history as a loving reconstruction by the moonlight of memory, work which can never have the clarity of work done by daylight vision. • Humanist’s work often opaque.

28. Brief History of Humanities Study • Interesting that there was no article on the “Humanities” in the famous 11th edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (1910-11) though there was an entry on “Humanism” (Steven Markus, 2006). • “The first edition of the OED, whose supplement appears in 1933, does not include [the term “Humanities”] at all. Humane, Humanism, humanist, humanity, humanitarian: these are familiar cognates of the word human, but humanities was not the term of choice for an area of knowledge and set of fields of study until after World War II. The more usual (and broader) rubric was Liberal Arts, Arts and Sciences, or Arts, Letters, and Sciences” (Marjorie Perloff, Crisis in the Humanities)

29. Brief History of Humanities Study • Greek Paideia • Roman Humanitas

30. Paideia • PAIDEIA is generally distinguished from TECHNE, i.e. an education that is narrowly vocational. • Paideia was composed of • gymnastics • grammar • rhetoric • music • mathematics • geography • natural history • philosophy

31. HUMANITAS For Cicero, the primary function of education was the inculcation of HUMANITAS: • The attributes of the individual whose particularly human capacities had been developed to their full potential, and who had therefore become HUMANISSIMUS. • These capacities included the gifts of speech and reason, but also the social, moral, and aesthetic instincts that are peculiar to human beings. His ideal of HUMANITAS gives Cicero a right to be regarded as the father of classical humanism and by extension of HUMANITIES as an educational ideal.

32. Middle Ages • “Paideia” and “Humanitas” were adapted to a program of basic Christian education.

33. Middle Ages Boethius Cassiodorus

34. Monastic Education Made Up of . . . Quadrivium:arithmetic geometry astronomy and music theory Trivium grammar logic rhetoric

35. Artes Liberales • Seven Liberal Arts were taught in the monasteries, cathedral schools, and, from the 12th century on, in the universities, they constituted the principal university instruction until modern times. • So called liberal (Lat. liber, free) because they serve to train the free man and develop her/his humanity – they were intended to liberate man. • In contrast with the artes illiberales, which are pursued for economic purposes.

36. Renaissance Umanisti: that is, professors or students of classical literature. The word umanisti derives from the studia humanitatis, a course of classical studies that, in the early 15th century, consisted of grammar, poetry, rhetoric, history, and moral philosophy.

37. Renaissance Humanitas Ideal of Humanism: • Qualities associated with the modern word humanity--understanding, benevolence, compassion, mercy. • But also such more active characteristics as fortitude, judgment, prudence, eloquence, and even love of honor. • Possessor of humanitas not just a sedentary philosopher or man of letters but also a participant in active life. • Renaissance Humanitas called for a fine balance of action and contemplation.

38. Renaissance • The wellspring of humanitas was classical literature. • For Renaissance humanists, there was nothing dated or outworn about the writings of Plato, Cicero, or Livy. • Recovering the classics was to humanism tantamount to recovering reality. • The humanists were convinced that the study of literature (notably of the classics and their enormous source of wisdom and moral reflection) would encourage humane and civilized behavior.

39. Renaissance • An important distinction was that the Humanities were seen as opposite to Divinity. • Humanists struggled against the dominance of dialectics and theologians who were entangled in abstruse speculations. • Dissatisfied with Scholasticism. • The Middle Ages were truly over.

40. In the sixteenth century this line of thought was continued (by Erasmus and Montaigne for example).

41. 17th Century • The belief that the classics, the mainspring of Humanities, are an inexhaustible source of practical knowledge was increasingly subject to doubt. • Francis Bacon and Science: • Mistrusted the humanist tool par excellence, the word. • Advocated a more systematic and methodical way of thinking than the humanistic exegetists were used to. • Was a great advocate of science.

42. Royal Society (1662) "The Business and Design of the Royal Society is: to improve the knowledge of naturall things, and all usefull Arts, Manufactures, Mechanik practices, Engynes and Innovations by Experiments – not meddling with Divinity, Metaphysics, Moralls, Politicks, Grammar, Rhetorick or Logick."

43. Humanities versus Empiricism/Science • Essentially there was disagreement not only on which was the best method to gather true knowledge, but also on which approach resulted in the most useful knowledge to guide human action. • To this day these problems play a role in the discussion on the legitimacy of the HUMANITIES.

44. 18th C. • Humanities and the natural sciences as complementary rather than contradictory disciplines.

45. 19th C. • The natural sciences gained momentum and prestige. • Materialistic, utilitarian and biological views of reality gained ground under the influence of the natural sciences (and philosophical reflections on them).

46. The Forming of Nations • Now, the HUMANITIES constituted a great vehicle for the enthusiastic study and preservation of national cultures. • This implied a change of course with respect to the classical HUMANITIES, which had focused on the universally human.

47. 20th and 21st Centuries The influence of “leveling” on Humanities: • The increasing numbers in education; • The growing influence of mass culture (emancipation); • Cultural pluralism; • Change from a culture based primarily on texts to a culture based on images. • Role of Internet

48. Classification of Disciplines A long history Many classification schemes Question of a hierarchy of disciplines

49. Which are the Humanities? • A very practical problem for librarians and educators • University Disciplines/Departments • Often a useful way to define disciplines. • Each university has its own characteristic departmental organization, and consequent categorization of humanities. • More traditional, conservative colleges often don’t teach newer humanities subjects.

50. Check a Library’s Current Periodical Stacks • A perusal of the current periodical stacks of a large research library also points to a host of innovative and esoteric research areas.