What is the Liberal Arts?

The value of a liberal arts education may be more important to you now than ever before!  Our increasingly technological and global society simultaneously puts you in contact with people around the world, yet threatens to isolate you behind a keyboard and computer screen.  The very specialization needed in a technological society can make you feel less human; less in touch with real people and the human experience. 

Historically, the term “liberal” arts is taken from the Latin word liber, meaning freedom.  Today, the term liberal arts is used to describe a range of subjects that traditionally includes art, literature, history, philosophy, theater, politics, film, music, and sometimes science.  Each of these areas teaches you something about the human experience, but in slightly different ways. 

Philosophy and politics compel you to ask difficult questions about who we want to be - individually or collectively as a people.  History teaches you where we came from and what kind of people we were.  Art, theater, film, and literature provide you with a mirror that reflects how society sees itself.  Science forces you to confront difficult questions about human potential.   In short, a liberal arts degree provides you with a better understanding of who we are, where we came from, and who we want to be as a people.  And of course, connecting the past, present, and future allows you to understand the human experience more fully.  It is for this reason that the liberal arts is sometimes referred to as the “humanities.”

The time for action is now!  The liberal arts allow you to reconnect to the human experience.  A liberal arts education provides you with the freedom to think, to imagine, to choose, to understand, and to realize your own human potential.  By studying the past and present, as well as speculating about the future, the liberal arts makes you a better person, a better decision-maker, a better leader, and a better citizen.  The liberal arts makes you a better human being by freeing you from ignorance.   

The Liberal Arts in the Information Age!
Excerpt from article by Charles L. Currie,
Chronicle of Higher Education,
December 9, 2005; Volume 52, Issue 16,
Page B10 entitled "What Do Educators Want Students to Be and to Do?"

"The goal of education was once to educate the Athenian statesman, then the Renaissance gentleman, and more recently the responsible citizen. What is our goal today? For some, it is to prepare for a meaningful job. While that is a practical reality that can't be ignored, most of us are looking for something more.

Both the liberal arts and technology can serve the kind of education we seek. An authentic experience of the liberal arts can broaden one's horizons and help establish linkages, connectedness, and coherence in an often fragmented, yet global, world. Through the liberal arts, students can develop the skill to discern — to separate sense from nonsense — and to effectively use the vast information resources available today. The liberal arts educate both mind and heart; they also stimulate an imagination that frees one from the limitations of the present."