1: Welcome to the Humanities

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This semester we explore the humanities, those areas of study that take as their subject human interests and activities.

Historical traditions of the West will serve as touchstones for a more global and self-reflective exploration of human accomplishment and artistic traditions.

Much of what we do in the Humanities is archival, discovering, learning about, and preserving documents, artifacts, artworks, and ephemera from across cultures and time. To keep that archive alive and growing, we need to transmit the knowledge.

Often, to learn about humankind, we must also interpret and narrate. That is, we tell stories, which we call histories because they are based on evidence and inference, about the development of societies and cultures. And it is important that we develop critical perspectives through which we evaluate materials, so that we are able to more accurately reassess transmitted histories and conclusions as well as to interrogate our own biases when interpreting findings.

Based on inferences about how cultures and societies currently function, on historical evidence from paper trails and artifacts, on associations between trade routes or other means of contact, and other forms of inquiry and research, researchers in the humanities are able to piece together how historical humans lived, loved, died, and created.