Some basic things about the current situation.

Most of the disciplines that are now core, “arts and sciences” departments were created between the Civil War and WW2. We created general education and majors around the same time, about a century ago. Those basic divisions and structures still exist though the content of the courses has changed (more in the sciences than in the humanities but across the gamut).

The rising popularity of professional degrees over the last 40 years has shifted the relationship many college students have with the liberal arts. Accountants, engineers, computer programmers, nurses, physical therapists, etc.: those degrees all have very little encounter with the arts and sciences, sometimes just the gen ed requirements.

But what about the liberal arts? What about the knowledge and skill we need to thrive as citizens? I’m sure many would say that’s exactly why they are getting that professional degree, because it promises a better and/or more reliable salary. In America (and perhaps elsewhere in the world), we have made higher education almost entirely about career preparation. A big part of that is the cost of a degree; that financial investment needs to pay off financially. I don’t need to do my whole neoliberal university spiel here, do I? There’s nothing that original to it.

My interest and question is different. With all the caveats in place, if we tried to imagine a blank slate for describing what the liberal arts should be today, what would we say?

1. Scientific literacy, esp. how to evaluate scientific reports.
2. Mathematics, esp. an understanding of stats, reading data.
3. Computer science
4. Digital communication skills (fine arts, comm arts)
5. Digital media studies/rhetoric/literacy
6. American social-cultural history (humanities and social sciences)
7. Global social-cultural history (humanities and social sciences)
8. Current affairs (humanities and social sciences)

5 courses in each area? That’s 40 courses, 120 credits. 1 degree. You get 45 credits of STEM, 45 credits of humanities and social sciences, and 30 credits of arts, communication, and rhetoric focused on digital environments. Broad strokes obviously.

There were 7 original liberal arts, one for each sin I suppose: grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy. Those are still in there.

I know I can be forgiven the subjectivity of foregrounding digital rhetoric. It’s something any academic might do, understandably. I really do think that college students should learn how digital media function as rhetorical devices. Other people will have other words for this.

How our culture shapes and is shaped by these emerging technologies, how that affects our lives, and how we participate in this world, for we are surely actors, if but merely players.