Competency Areas

Humanities offers a flexible yet structured curriculum. The core humanities courses introduce students to the foundations of human knowledge and understanding. They develop skills in synthesizing knowledge and expressing ideas. And they expose students to a wide variety of subject areas. Moreover, humanities students benefit from attentive advising and faculty input in selecting electives. Rather than simply allowing students to graduate with a random collection of courses, the Humanities Program guides them through six competency areas that lend coherence to all of their college work:

• Aesthetics
  The more we “read” or interpret verbal and non-verbal texts and imagery, the more we refine our abilities to make, articulate, and explicate informed judgments.  Aesthetics in general refers to the ability to reflect on the importance of artistic and humanistic pursuits to human existence.
• Communication
  We must be able to communicate effectively, in a variety of communication situations, using the media of the 21^st century, which means being aware of how choices of language, rhetoric, and action affect the ways messages are understood.  Effective communication also entails understanding the traditions and purposes of many different modes of expression.
• Ethics
  Ethics is about the practice of moral judgment, which involves the ability to reflect on what it means to be human, the ability to reflect critically on notions of validity and truth, as well as willingness to explore issues and events from a variety of perspectives.
• History
  History is about recognizing patterns in past events and seeing their relevance to present-day life,  demonstrating how contemporary social issues are rooted in past events and political choices.  It’s also about being able to speculate in informed ways about how present-day trends might affect the future.
• Critical Thinking
  Critical thinking deals with how value systems shape human knowledge.  Critical thinking includes epistemology, the ability and willingness to question the nature of human knowledge.
• Interdisciplinarity
  Interdisciplinarity refers to the ability to make deliberate connections among various academic disciplines; to comprehend and participate in more than one discipline.  It’s also the ability to reflect on the nature of interdisciplinarity itself and to articulate the value of an interdisciplinary perspective.

Faculty and staff affiliated with the Humanities Program "think outside the box" by teaching special topics courses, by trying the latest and most innovative teaching methods, by providing opportunities for fieldwork and community engagement, and by organizing exciting campus and community events.