In recent days, some of beijing university's cold-blooded arts and literature professions have not been fully recruited in some provinces and municipalities, and have been invited to volunteer for discussion online。
Not only beijing university, the coldness of the arts has been a common challenge in recent years for both national and international universities. Last year, harvard university announced the abolition of more than 30 courses in more than 20 faculties of the academy, most of them in the arts。
At the same time, arguments such as the “disappearing of the arts” and the “no use of the arts” have continued to flourish on various web platforms, not only casting a shadow over the construction and development of the arts profession in higher education, but also adding to the anxiety of some students in secondary schools who love the arts in choosing their own future。
Is the disappearance of humanities really a worldwide wave? Are there any futures for the senior candidates to report to the college of arts and arts? To answer those questions, we must look at the essence of the phenomenon。
In the long history of human development, the arts have a vital and irreplaceable role. There is a problem with both the breadth and depth of learning for candidates, whether they report to cv or to science. Learning from any profession, provided that it reaches a certain theoretical level, can be a top priority for the national strategy。
Colleges are cutting back on arts. Why
Over the past few years, universities in several countries, including the united states, the united kingdom, australia, japan and the republic of korea, have opted to reduce their investment in humanities projects, including by cutting professions, cutting teaching posts, reducing curricula and opening places. In china, there are also a number of institutions of higher education that have reduced the proportion of students enrolled in humanities and have discontinued some of them. In the view of authors, the following are the main reasons:
First of all, there's a lot of literatureEmployment prospectsNo optimism. Studies have shown that among our 2023 undergraduate graduates, the rate of implementation in the fields of education and communication is relatively low; among the 2024 undergraduate graduates, the top 10 top-paid professions are all in engineering, with an average monthly income of over $7,000, but entry rates in the chinese language and history disciplines are generally below average。
The situation is similar abroad. The data for 2024 also show that the top ten majors with the highest unemployment rates in the united states are also mostly humanities, mainly arts, history, english and sociology。
Secondly, the pace of adjusting and optimizing the specializations of our institutions of higher education has accelerated further. In particular, in 2023, five departments, including the ministry of education, published the generalHigher educationAs a result of the programme for the improvement and improvement of professional careers in the field of education, a large number of humanities specialties with insufficient social needs and low employment implementation rates have been restructured. For example, in 2024 sichuan university, 31 undergraduate courses were abolished once, involving several subjects such as music, radio and television, and public service management. Public data show that, in 2024, the number of undergraduates abolished and suspended at the national higher education institutions combined totalled 3,648 and, naturally, the number of humanities included was not small。
It should be noted that the new scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation have placed new demands on the professional development of higher education disciplines. The accelerated breakthroughs and applications of the new generation of information technologies, especially those represented by artificial intelligence, are profoundly affecting the development patterns of higher education in the country and impacting on the survival of some of the arts disciplines in higher education and the employment of students. For example, news anchors for professional training in journalism and communications may already be replaced by digital persons; manual translation for language training may be replaced by machine translation; financial, accounting, sales and customer service for managerial professional development, and positions such as the processing of basic legal instruments for legal professions and contract review have been or are being replaced by ai。
It follows from this that the reduction of the humanities profession, both abroad and at home, is indeed widespread, but with regard to the disappearance of the humanities, there is some exaggeration。
It's important that you don't die
It is well known that, according to the state council degree committee and the ministry of education's most recent publication, in 2022, the professional catalogue of postgraduate education subjects (2022), the main subjects available in the country are philosophy, economics, law, education, literature, history, science, engineering, agronomy, medicine, military science, management, art science and cross-cutting subjects. In addition to the six university disciplines of polytechnics, military science and cross-cutting subjects, the other eight university disciplines (philosophy, literature, history, art, economics, law, education, management) are covered by the arts. In other words, the importance of the arts has become self-evident when it comes to taking over half of our disciplines。
Arts is a concept corresponding to science. Generally speaking, the arts is primarily the general title of the humanist social sciences, which study the social and cultural phenomena of human beings. Science is primarily concerned with the science of natural phenomena, physical motion and its basic laws and mathematical logic, and is the general term for form science and natural sciences, including mathematics, logic, physics, chemistry, biology, earth sciences, astronomy, etc. Philosophically, human society and the natural world are two different forms of material world existence, which together form the whole system of the material world through the interaction and interaction of human practical activities. In contrast, the arts and sciences are the opposite of a coin, which together constitutes the whole discipline of the world of human beings。
In particular, the importance of humanities may also be reflected in the following aspects: first, the recording and transmission of human civilization through the medium of writing, language, education, art, etc., the continuity of human history, culture and spirituality, the assistance of individuals in finding their own historical coordinates over a long period of time, the preservation of cultural identity, cultural self-confidence and cultural self-confidence and the nurturing of the human spirit. Second is the development of critical human thinking through historical research and philosophical thinking, the construction of systemic systems, value systems and aesthetic perspectives for the integrity of human society, helping individuals to form good value judgement, social insight, sustained innovative thinking and innovation. Thirdly, from a philosophical point of view, with the creativity of literature and art to break through the instruments of rationality, draw the boundaries of technological ethics, avoid the risks posed by the uncontrolled use of technology, safeguard the development of technology, and help individuals to protect their freedom of temperature, humanity and spirit. Not only is the arts of great importance to the growth of each of us, but it can also have a profound impact on the heritage and development of human civilization as a whole。
The autonomous development of quality new humanities is not only necessary but urgent
In 2019, the ministry of education, in conjunction with the ministry of science and technology and others, launched the version 2. 0 of the “six-six-six-six-six-six-six-six-six-six-six” programme, marking the official entry into the practical phase of the “new arts” together with three other “four new disciplines” (new engineering, new medicine, new agronomy). In 2020, a working meeting on the construction of new humanities was held under the auspices of the new humanities working group of the ministry of education, which established the national centre for the study of new humanities education and issued the declaration on the construction of new humanities, with the full deployment of new humanities in the country。
In recent years, the construction of new humanities in our country has accelerated, with the introduction of new humanities programmes in chongqing, zhejiang, gansu, guangdong and heilongjiang. At the national level, the adjustment and optimization of the humanities profession has been further accelerated, and the curriculum and teaching materials for the humanities have been continuously restructured and updated, and the humanities profession has been upgradedTalent developmentModel reforms are deepening and becoming more multifaceted。
However, the new literature currently in version 2. 0 also faces many pressing issues. For example, how to better respond to the new requirements of “indulging the new arts” set out in the education for power building programme (2024-2035), how to better respond to the new needs for “improving the fitness of talent development” arising from the region's economic and social development, and how to better respond to the new challenges posed by the scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformations to education。
One of the important tasks in the construction of the new arts is to build an autonomous knowledge system in china, including the academic, academic and linguistic systems. New humanities is an important part of china's academic system, not only to build its own academic system, but also to work together to build a system of disciplines in science, agriculture, military science and cross-cutting disciplines, and even to create a new chinese academic system that goes beyond the system of disciplines of the industrial age, driven by a new paradigm of research in the age of artificial intelligence。
China's autonomous academic system must be built on the concept, theory and methodology of new literature. It must be based on chinese modernization. It must be based on the conceptualization and theoreticalization of china's development and chinese governance practices. It must actively explore new areas, study new issues and work towards the creation of new concepts, new theories and new methodological theories of universal significance and chinese character. Building an autonomous chinese language system, the new arts and literature will seek a breakthrough in communicating collisions and innovation, focusing precisely on the objective of optimizing china’s narratives, enhancing china’s narrative capacity, and improving the effectiveness of international communication in general, and working to create a global platform for theory and practice, with a view to making china’s story more lively and better known worldwide。
Another important task in the construction of new humanities is to build china's autonomous talent development system. At present, it is imperative to continuously improve the suitability of new humanities education and to accelerate the development of more high-quality new humanities in national strategies and in the economic and social development of the region, so as to better support and service china's modernization on the basis of the promotion of free and sustainable human development。
High-quality new humanities consist mainly of two categories: advanced humanities in the basic fields of humanities (including philosophy, economics, chinese language literature, history, etc.) and complex humanities in the field of humanities applications, including global governance, international dissemination, foreign rule of law, intellectual property, etc. In order to develop high-quality new humanities on our own, we must further improve the optimization of the arts and culture, continuously upgrading the forward-looking and scientific nature of the arts and arts profession; further deepen the practical teaching and teaching reform of the arts and arts profession, continuously upgrading the integrated quality and innovative field skills of humanities; further improve the contribution of humanities education to industrial development through the integration of science and physical education and the collaboration of schools; further accelerate the quantitative and intellectual transformation of humanities education, strengthen synergy between science and technology and humanities, and constantly enhance the support of humanities education for scientific and technological development; further promote institutional innovation in the construction of the new arts and culture, making every effort to break through the pains and difficulties of new humanities and create a favourable climate for society as a whole to support the construction of new humanities。
(shanghai institute of accounting and finance, research fellow, centre for research on the construction of the chinese knowledge system)
