Axing arts

Tuesday 8th September, 2020

The University Grants Commission (UGC) is reported to have suspended external arts degree programmes. It has pledged to update the courses of study conducted by the arts faculties of the state universities. This, we have heard umpteen times, but nothing of the sort has been done for the last several decades. Reflected in the UGC action is the government thinking that preparing students for the job market is the be-all and end-all of university education, and the arts stream is something to be tolerated and not promoted.

The general consensus is that Sri Lankan arts graduates are not attractive enough in the job market. Governments have to employ many of them in the public sector for political reasons. Employability is of crucial import in a highly competitive world, where multitasking is the order of the day. Products of the state universities should be able to compete with those who pass out of foreign and private universities. Having had to provide employment to tens of thousands of unemployed graduates, the government may have thought the number of arts students who swell the ranks of the unemployed youth would decrease if the external arts degree programmes got the axe.

It is only natural that STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) has become the go-to approach in the modern world as it integrates four vital disciplines that propel industries. Countries have adopted it to achieve their development goals. But it must be stressed that liberal arts and humanities must not be deep-sixed in the process.

We have discussed the importance of liberal arts in several previous columns. In 2013, the Commission on the Humanities and Social Sciences, appointed by the America Academy of Arts and Sciences put out its report while some members of the then Sri Lankan government were questioning the wisdom of producing arts graduates. The commission, in its report, titled The Heart of the Matter: The Humanities and Social Sciences for a vibrant, competitive, and secure nation, recommended ‘specific steps that the [US] government, schools and universities, cultural institutions, businesses, and philanthropists could take to support and strengthen these areas of knowledge’. Sri Lankan politicians and the UGC panjandrums who seem convinced otherwise ought to secure a copy of this report, which is available online. (If they care to consult Google guru, he will take them there.) It is a must read for them.

The above-mentioned commission asks a very pertinent question: ‘Who will lead America into a bright future?’ It provides the answer itself: ‘Citizens who are educated in the broadest possible sense, so that they can participate in their own governance and engage with the world. An adaptable and creative workforce. Experts in national security, equipped with the cultural understanding, knowledge of social dynamics, and language proficiency to lead our foreign service and military through complex global conflicts.’ Such is the value the US has been asked to place on the humanities and social sciences.

What makes the aforesaid report particularly interesting is that it has been put out in one of the most industrialised nations, where STEM is in vogue. It answers some of the questions raised by our education pundits who are apparently having serious doubts about the possibility of changing the arts stream to suit the modern world. The document says: “There is no reason liberal arts education cannot flourish in a new environment using new tools. The future will still need the human skills that the liberal arts promote, and perhaps will need them more than ever: skills in communication, interpretation, linking and synthesizing domains of knowledge, and imbuing facts with meaning and value.” The commission says social sciences and the Humanities ‘help us understand what it means to be human and connect us with our global community’. This is something Sri Lankan politicians and policymakers averse to liberal arts should take cognizance of.