#Humanities

[an-atlas-or-other]

I would rather do math (which is basically just plugging numbers into equations, which isn’t even hard-) than have to write anything about anything ANY day. If I went into humanities I would throw myself off a cliff

Hence why I am in STEM lmao

being a humanities major who’s friends with stem majors is so funny because you’ll ask your friends what they’re doing today and they’re like “UGH it’s so stressful i have to stabilize the reactor core for my nuclear power midterm and then i have to build the supercomputer from i have no mouth yet i must scream for my electrical engineering homework :/ what about you” and you’re like “oh well i have to read a fun little book and write an essay about gender.” and they still think you have it worse

[prokopetz]

I fully understand why "character A is astounded at the sight of character B's penis" is a specific kink that gets tagged for, but the fact that some platforms choose to tag this kink as "penis awe" is unintentionally very funny. Now I'm picturing penis experience kink tags for all those other allegedly transcendent emotions in the glossary of your Philosophy 101 textbook. Penis faith. Penis Weltschmerz. Penis apprehension of the absurd.

[animentality]

[blvvdk3ep]

I love you people going into "useless" fields I love you classics majors I love you cultural studies majors I love you comparative literature majors I love you film studies majors I love you near eastern religions majors I love you Greek, Latin, and Hebrew majors I love you ethnic studies I love you people going into any and all small field that isn't considered lucrative in our rotting capitalist society please never stop keeping the sacred flame of knowledge for the sake of knowledge and understanding humanity and not merely for the sake of money alive

[macmanx]

"I believe that humanity is meant to thrive and flourish, and that doesn't happen without context. And the arts and the humanities? They are our vessel for context." - LeVar Burton

[discoursets]

[jstor]

In a post-truth world, where emotional appeal sometimes drowns out factual accuracy, the humanities are our compass. They help us question the narratives we’re presented with, cultivate empathy, and dig deeper into the layers of truth behind media, politics, and culture.

By embracing literature, history, and the arts, we enhance our critical thinking and foster a connection to the human stories that shape our collective experience. 💭

Check out our latest blog post on how the humanities equip us to navigate the complexities of a world filled with conflicting truths.

[mysharona1987]

[thebellekeys]

And a reminder that higher education cannot be considered truly democratised if students can still be doomed to poverty with multiple or advanced arts and Humanities degrees...

[joytri]

Julien Baker, Loss Protocol

[3sbeee]

Can we talk about how the idea that STEM and the humanities are mortal enemies with no overlap is actually incredibly harmful and is not only preventing people from pursuing their passions but also part of the reason why the humanities aren’t given their proper respect? No, artists are not all snobby pretentious assholes who think they’re more cultured than everyone else and no scientists are not all emotionless robots who think they’re smarter than everyone else and it’s possible to be an artist and a scientist at the same time. By acting like you have to choose between STEM and humanities we are eliminating thousands of potential careers and causing unnecessary divisions in a time where nothing is more crucial than unity. I’m so tired of people acting like STEM majors are incapable of understanding art and humanities majors are incapable of understanding math when the two fields are crucial to one another. Who would design our architecture if it weren’t for artful engineers? Who would discover the rules of composition? At the end of the day we are all just people trying to learn and make a living, and all of these careers are important to humanity. People can’t say that STEM is more important than humanities if there’s no such thing as STEM vs humanities.

[vexwerewolf]

It is my solemn duty to inform you that reddit came out with a banger

[prokopetz]

Sometimes I think about how we don't know whether caves actually had any particular significance to so-called "cave people", or whether that's just where their art and culture happened to survive for us to see it, and I wonder what disproportionately durable aspect of our present culture is going to give future civilisations entirely the wrong idea about us. I bet it's going to be something really stupid.

[animentality]

[elizabethminkel]

My latest fandom column for Atlas Obscura is live! This one is on @terrorcamp, a Terror fandom con + polar history conference that truly feels like it straddles both fandom and academia. Many thanks to the brilliant group of people who spoke to me for this piece, especially TC organizer @areyougonnabe, of course!!

There are so many quotes I love, but one of my favorites was from Hester Blum, a Penn State English professor, on how the event reshaped her thinking about current teaching in the humanities:

Watching the presentations from younger fans also made her reassess the way she and her colleagues approach their students; many academics discuss younger generations’ interest in “relatability,” and how it prevents them from engaging with history and literature. “One of the things that this conference made me realize is how fundamentally we have misunderstood what it means to be ‘relatable,’” she says. “And it’s not simply a lack of critical distance or affinity—but the kind of passionate fan response, as something that is deeply critical and deeply thought-through. It was one of those moments that was like, ‘Oh, this can be the future of engagement.’ This was incredible.”