Sitting in the Indianapolis airport recently, I watched a lighted billboard repeatedly flash advertisements for health science and technology programs at my university.
I’m a professor of religious studies, so on my pessimistic days, such marketing reminds me of the uphill battle that humanities programs face in today’s educational environment. Though many employers know the value of a humanities degree for educating well-rounded, adaptable employees, it’s harder to convince students that there are real career possibilities outside of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics).
Universities have made matters worse with their constant emphasis on assessment. Every degree and every course must have measurable outcomes. Pedagogy worth its salt should integrate high-impact practices, the current educational buzzword for internships, practica, projects, or other products that can be showcased on a student’s résumé.
I don’t dispute the value of these practices. I’m a parent, so I too have felt my college-age children’s legitimate need to graduate with marketable skills.
But alongside more career-oriented courses, the curriculum should include—and even require—courses that push beyond what is conventionally knowable.
That’s where religious studies comes in.
In today’s STEM-saturated environment, which stresses rational mastery of the world, it’s precisely the illogic of religion that makes it so needful as a subject of study. In all of its cultural expressions, religion reminds us that not everything in life conforms to human expectations. Not everything is quantifiable or even comprehensible by human calculus. Some mysteries will always elude our grasp.
One need not believe in God to appreciate these truths. But one must give up some of the instrumentalist view of education that focuses chiefly on the acquisition of practical skills. While religious studies can teach practical skills too (historical or social-scientific methods, for example), its value for general education is ultimately much broader.
Religious studies pushes back against today’s digital culture in which there’s an instant answer (“There’s an app for that”) to every question.
Because the object of religions can be so elusive (God, transcendence, enlightenment), religious studies is qualitatively different from other fields. As a subject in the general education curriculum, it invites students to think beyond everyday assumptions and solutions.
Religious studies revels in contradiction and ambiguity. Religious studies immerses students in the intricacies of unfamiliar doctrines and devotions.
In the secular university curriculum, the study of religious traditions means learning to appreciate the strangeness and wonder of life itself.
This appreciation is difficult to assess. As any assessment czar will tell you, “appreciate” is too vague a verb for a measurable course outcome. Yet if my students leave my classroom with a deeper appreciation for the world’s ambiguities, I’ll have done my job.
And I’ll bet that prospective employers—the good ones, at least—will appreciate such graduates. The ability to deal with complexity is a pearl of great price, a skill whose value can’t be measured.
© 2023 by Peter J. Thuesen. All rights reserved
Illustration credit: Billboard at Indianapolis International Airport advertising health science programs; photo by Peter J. Thuesen