A personal reflection on the role of the humanities in undergraduate education, offered to future teachers by a future-oriented "traditionalist." (Editor/PG)

Starting with the principle that learning goes on only when the learner is engaged in the process with mind, will, and feelings, the author argues that humanistic study must be integrated with existential questions of personal and social development. (Editor/PG)

In this commentary the author responds to critics who question the value of teaching the humanities and also points out some weaknesses in the arguments of humanists themselves, including his opinion that most of their arguments are meaningful only to other humanists and do nothing to sway their critics. (JMD)

College education is essentially concerned with argumentation about interpretations. It depends on and trains for the capacity to assume different points of view simultaneously in order to interpret and predict, and it should celebrate playful acts of imagination. (MSE)

Not all of those teaching the humanities agree on a common agenda for the future, with traditional categories of instruction being encroached upon by new areas of scholarship. In the humanities, authority will no longer rest in the content of traditional texts, but in the activity of interpreting texts. (MSE)

There must be a return to classic texts in humanities instruction, but the selection of those texts is no longer simple, because of questions about (1) identifying which are classics and (2) connections made between the classic texts studied and a student's personal life. (MSE)

The American concept of religion as privileged and private acknowledges that religion can be culturally significant but suppresses informed public discourse about it. The issue of religion polarizes American education, and its study is skewed at all levels of learning. Religion should be taught as a subject, not a method. (MSE)

Despite the belief that liberal learning is a necessary component of the professional nursing student?s education, the scientific focus has held prominence in nursing education (Valiga and Bruderle 1997). In the twenty first century, thoughtful linking of liberal learning to professional nursing education takes on renewed urgency. As early as the…

A general discussion is offered of the future of the humanities and their need to adapt to the new methods of instruction and evaluation suggested by faculty development. (Author/LBH)

Rather than return to a core curriculum that reflects the structures of knowledge and education developed for other contexts and needs, the humanities should create new structures appropriate to the students', culture's, and faculty's needs today, particularly through interdisciplinary collaboration. (MSE)

Management, which generates wealth, determines the distribution of wealth, and helps control the direction and accessibility of careers in most developed countries, is a subject worthy of the humanities, and deserves to be pursued more aggressively as a point of contact among disciplines. (MSE)

For liberal education to be successfully integrated into engineering education, engineers must first be convinced that the humanities and arts are important and worthy of respect. In the brief exposure they provide, liberal arts teachers can inspire engineers through their own passion for what they teach. (MSE)

Four-year institutions as well as community colleges are concerned about maintaining the humanities in the curriculum. Several issues faced by advocates of the humanities are presented along with specific proposals for changes in instruction, curriculum, and patterns of support. (JMF)

Six undergraduate humanities courses and programs with a variety of structures and focuses are described, and sources of further information are given. (MSE)