Abstract

WAGER, Joseph. No Easy Way Out: Crisis, Excellence, Value and the Future of the Humanities in University Education. Lit. teor. hist. crit. [online]. 2015, vol.17, n.2, pp.129-148. ISSN 0123-5931.  https://doi.org/10.15446/lthc.v17n2.51280.

Written in the vein of the literary genre "essay," this text emphasizes the way in which the humanities have been questioned and, more alarmingly, assumed the need to justify themselves. Often, this justification takes the form of value, a touchstone in today's world. However, the humanities are not alone in feeling the need to produce, for the dominant cosmovision-i.e. world-view-makes demands that naturally give rise to this anxiety. Though justifying humanistic education via its production of more "fulfilled" is tempting, succumbing to this logic is dangerous insofar as it plays into the existing cosmovision rather than challenging it. The classic binary of content/form is eluded in an attempt to grasp, explain and proffer insight into the present state of the humanities and their future with generous cultural, personal and literary references.

Keywords : Humanities; crisis; value; excellence; essay.

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