Stupid Humanities Classes

[Rageaholic]

Yet again, just when I think I'm finished with these stupid general ed courses, I am thrown another curve ball. Even though I took more than enough of these idiotic classes to have a minor in them, that's still not enough for these dickwads.

I am not majoring in humanities, I have no interest in them, and despite what self important college professors might think, I can live without having read crap like Amadeus. Everyone has different skills and if someone wants to major in humanities, all the more power to them. But don't act like everyone who doesn't take your stupid classes are missing out. I've been to several art museums, read many poetry, and learned a lot of history before taking your class, professor douchebag. I don't need to write papers on it to "prove" that I'm cultured, and even if I wasn't exposed to the humanities, I could certainly live fine without them.

I don't want to come across like I'm bitter toward people who are interested in the humanities. As I said, more power to you. But don't force your humanities down the throats of people who aren't interested. All these forced classes have done is make me hate the humanities with a burning passion. And it doesn't help that any enjoyment or interest I could have garnered from them is killed by the pain in the ass homework assignments I'm given on a weekly basis.

[bex1218]

Main reason I do not want to attend college in the states and go to a technical school. I do not want to be stuck doing English courses, or a science course when I want to do graphic arts. Math and business I can see. I don't want to waste my schooling and funding for 4+ years. Just let me do what I want to do. I already had enough in high school with that bs to know what I want. I know some people don't know and thats fine if they want to explore a little of each subject. I am not that person.

[Pixilated]

I luuuuuuv the humanities but of course they don't get you a job these days ...
What I can't stand are these lamebrain courses (like the one I'm taking now) that seem to want to give you life coaching. Week 1: "What is self-esteem?" Couldn't get out of that course either.

Hey, if you get stuck with research papers in English or history send 'em to me. I love writing that stuff.

[AccountingDrone]

Hell, back in 1981 I took "Relaxation Techniques" as a phys ed class ... thought the biofeedback was a blast, and the yoga was nice. Got me on the list to sign up for 1 hour sessions in the library for the little room with the comfy couch and the biofeedback machine - was great for the occasional nap

My favorite humanities class was jewelry making 200 level - soldering the cells for making enamel was restful. The teacher was weirded out at my machinists buckle. He did like one of my makework projects - I made a really cute mouse and wedge of swiss cheese on my lathe and mill. [I had just finished The Stainless Steel Rat and was bored.] I lost a lot of my old projects when an ex roomie up and moved out of our flat while I was at work one night - including around 3000 gaming miniatures, about 500 were painted, a complete run of Dragon magazine up through 109, all my D&D, AD&D books, including an unopened play test package of the original D&D from Gencon one year. I still will run into the occasional figure that I painted, I just flip them and look for my little 'A' looking monogram on the undersides of them snuck into the paint scheme.

I still like art for relaxation, I really should gt Rob to move the laundry out into the barn and move the kiln into the utility room, we could use it as auxilliary heating over the winter

[Greenday]

I took Politics of Diversity and History I for my social sciences/humanities courses.

Can't say I learned anything that I didn't already know from either class.

[Rageaholic]

I still like art for relaxation, I really should gt Rob to move the laundry out into the barn and move the kiln into the utility room, we could use it as auxilliary heating over the winter

I feel the same way about music. I used to play classical music to help me fall asleep at night. In the humanities class I have, we had an assignment where we had to identify all the instruments and elements of the music that we learned the week before. It was one of the biggest pain in the ass assignments I ever had.

I can enjoy music, art, literature without taking these classes where I can't help but feel an agenda is being pushed.

[Pixilated]

We get two electives in my current program (next semester and the first semester of the second year) and I'm debating whether to ask for an exemption for next semester ... one of the classes offered is one I took last year.

Barring that, I'm thinking of signing up for one of two online classes, if only because I like the freedom that online classes offer.

I really wanted to take French but it's not on the list. I was advised to take something "relevant" to law. How the hell is Canada's second official language not relevant to a law-related program??

[Rageaholic]

Two more days, two more days and I'm out of this STUPID, POINTLESS class. But it's not going to be an easy two days. These professors who have done the best they could to make this course as agonizing as possible have a grande finale of torture in store for us for the final. We have to write a ONE THOUSAND word paper on everything we learned. And somehow have to integrate it all relating to some humanities questions. (a favorite of theirs, you can't just write a paper, you have to relate to some grand theme).

And that's just the take home part!

We have another 3 hours of torture in store for us on the last day where we have more long essays relating to all the different humanities. It's like a fucking thesis for a class that has zippidy do da to do with my major!!!!

[protege]

We have another 3 hours of torture in store for us on the last day where we have more long essays relating to all the different humanities. It's like a fucking thesis for a class that has zippidy do da to do with my major!!!!

Yep, that sucks. Been there, done that. As a business major, why exactly...did I have to take a biology class? I didn't mind the history classes--History of Warfare was interesting. So was the Science Fiction English class...especially when we started throwing around quotes from a certain book about 42

[DGoddess]

Yep, that sucks. Been there, done that. As a business major, why exactly...did I have to take a biology class? I didn't mind the history classes--History of Warfare was interesting. So was the Science Fiction English class...especially when we started throwing around quotes from a certain book about 42

I like History too but that won't get me a job.

Sadly, I got to miss out on all that college bs - can't go if you can't find the dough.

There again, it may be for the better - I've learned a LOT of stuff that I wanted to - especially since the Internet opened up - when I wanted to and how I wanted to.

I'm a hopeless Wiki addict . . . check it every day to see recent deaths and check out some of their events for X day. Next thing I know, I'm browsing into different subjects due to clicking on links to see where that takes me.

As a plus, I don't have to contend with douchebag teachers or disruptive classmates (such was the life in HS for me) to distract my train of thought.

But if I could go to school, I'd probably go for a technical school - I love computers but can't see the need to waste money on English classes. Now if it's a course on computer languages, that would make more sense. But one doesn't program computers in English, it's a computer or machine language.

And even when I did take life science in HS, we never cut up any frogs like you see in the HS movies. Nor did I take Chemistry and get to blow up a lab.

[BlaqueKatt]

As a business major, why exactly...did I have to take a biology class?

My aunt, a music education teacher was required to take zoology.

though maybe it helped her deal with unruly children?

[Rageaholic]

Yep, that sucks. Been there, done that. As a business major, why exactly...did I have to take a biology class? I didn't mind the history classes--History of Warfare was interesting. So was the Science Fiction English class...especially when we started throwing around quotes from a certain book about 42

They say it's to make you more "well rounded", but I think the real reason is...

[fireheart17]

They say it's to make you more "well rounded", but I think the real reason is...$$$$]

Maybe the universities down here could learn a thing or two from that

As it stands, humanities are not a required component of degrees that don't require humanities ie science/nursing/medicine. The only exception to this rule is the education degrees, where if you are doing primary teaching and want to specialise as say, a PE teacher, you are still required to minor/dual-major in something else. (You can choose from Education/Arts or Education/Science. They've also caught onto the increasing number of special needs kids in mainstream classrooms and added the option of doing Special Ed as an undergrad education degree with the second degree being Disability Studies)

[Hyena Dandy]

I think that well-rounded is a fair justification. As much as I grumble, while I'd like to get a degree in a more humanities-y thing, I think that my having science and math classes helps a lot. With those, I can learn more about the way the world works. I try to take ones that are interesting to me, but really the all help you get into how the world works. It gives you context which prevents you from falling into something silly because you don't understand science and methodology. While a science or math often fail to explain a context for things, so you end up with people with science and math degrees who are blind to history and philosophy. Consider the rather large number of people throught the 19th and into the early 20th century who all figured they'd invented a weapon so horrible no-one would ever go to war because it was too horrid to use. Or you get people who make these blanket statements about history or politics or philosophy, who don't seem to have seen even a wikipedia on their work. Consider someone like Steven Pinker, who describes David Hume under the label of "Social psychologist, evolutionary psychologist, and cognitive neuroscientist." David Hume thought that cause and effect was a load of rubbish. You also get people who glorify Giordano Bruno as a hero of free thought and science against the evils of religion, when he was clearly a theologian. Despite the notions of A.M. Paterson, Bruno really DID come to the conclusion that the universe was full of other stars and solar systems due to a theology, not because he was a great scientist. Consider the amount of time Bruno spends in his writing talking about the religious justification (it comes down to God is Infinite - Earth is Finite - Other Solar Systems - Other Earths - God is Infinite - Creation is Infinite.)

Without an education in the humanities, you end up with people who are doing serious scientific work without any knowledge of what happened before it, so they say things that sound silly. Without an education in science, you can come up with people who consider that the ancient aliens are as likely as anything, because they don't understand how ridiculous that actually is, and declare something impossible for ancients to have done without asking an engineer first.

[hinakiba777]

My first year of university I did a program I will call Foundations. (not actually course name) It was a single class but it counted toward 8 out of 10 credits for first year. I basically counts for first year courses in all the humanities. English, History, Philosophy, etc. The course is hard as hell, but it gives you an overview of the complete history of Western thought. The second university I attended did not recognize the course, so I almost had to redo all of my first year. Luckily, my current university does recognize the course, so I've got all of my humanities covered. Actually, I have all of my electives completed to graduate. I just need all of my courses in my major.

Sadly, as I'm researching grad schools i keep finding out that while I okay to graduate in a bit, I have the "wrong" courses to get into grad school. Oh I have a science but it's not a Lab Science. Yes I have a math, but it's the wrong kind of math. Oh I have history, but is it Canadian History. Having to replace all these electives means i might not have enough free time to complete my minor. Plus math and sciences will definitely kill my GPA.