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I’ve been meaning to comment about this for awhile now, but it was brought home to me during the World Choir Games here, where all the venues were packed and sold out with people wanting to hear the choirs from around the world singing and performing…
Our educational system is in a monetary crisis, and everywhere school boards and state governments are cutting funding. The first cuts that are made? Yep, the Humanities are the first to go: music, art, creative writing programs. Those programs are gutted before anything else is touched -- which is an implicit commentary on the perceived value of those programs. We don’t need to teach our kids art, music, or creative writing. We’ll teach them English; we may even force them to write papers on some classic literature, but show them how to actually produce their own poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction? Nah. We’ll show ‘em paintings, sculptures, and ancient edifices, we might let ’em listen to classical and ancient music in History classes, but actually teach them how to paint or play an instrument? Nope.
It’s much better for them to learn math or chemistry or biology. And heaven forbid that we cut the precious sports programs...
Mind you, I’ve absolutely nothing against math, chemistry, or biology. Great subjects all. (The sports programs? -- well, honestly, I think they should be the first to go, or be funded solely by those who play them rather than with public or school money.) But…
When we look at cultures and civilizations and we talk about their great accomplishments, what is it that we talk about? To a very large extent, we judge a culture by its accomplishments in art and architecture, in music, in literature. For Western culture, we revel in our Beethovens, our DaVinci’s, our Shakespeares, our Van Goghs, our Rembrandts, and on and on and on. Look at any culture, and what impresses us is what their version of the Humanities has produced. But we don’t seem to value our own current artists or want to help our students reach their potential in those fields.
The Humanities aren't important, and we demonstrate that by not being willing to fund those programs. Does it make sense that the Humanities are first on the budget chopping block? It doesn’t to me.
What do our budgeting priorities say about our culture and society? What does it say about the things we supposedly value?