Comment by rpiguy | Hacker News Reader

Comment by rpiguy | Hacker News Reader

The article sites the financial crisis and post-crisis job market as the catalyst for students taking a more pragmatic approach to choosing a major; however, it was a realignment that was probably overdue.

For decades in the US we have largely avoided the debate over whether college should be primarily vocational (income securing) or educational. We avoided the debate because for a long time having any degree served both purposes. Just going to college set you apart and raised your income regardless of what you studied (it still does statistically, but not as significantly as before).

The middle class was sold on college in the US largely on the promise of more income. Even if students in the 60s and 70s said income wasn’t important to them personally, certainly very few of their WWII generation parents would have ponied up the money without the promise of more income or security for their kids.

I don’t necessarily see this is as a crisis, kids really passionate about humanities will always pursue the humanities. The net effect of this is those classes will have fewer kids just there for their degree. This isn’t a bad thing. Better to graduate 100 kids really interested their fields than 1000 just there in hopes of landing a higher paying job.

If you time traveled back to 1980, when nurses were underpaid, but advertising, magazines, and newspapers were hot industries, and told them in fifteen years you’d make more money as a nurse than you would with an English degree they wouldn’t believe you. That’s not the world we live in anymore.

> "I don’t necessarily see this is as a crisis, kids really passionate about humanities will always pursue the humanities. The net effect of this is those classes will have fewer kids just there for their degree. This isn’t a bad thing. Better to graduate 100 kids really interested their fields than 1000 just there in hopes of landing a higher paying job."

In principle I agree with this, but the economic reality of North American universities is that programs that don't draw a large enough income will lose to those that do. New programs are introduced based on how many people they can attract (the Market), not based on how necessary they are for the generation, preservation and transmission of knowledge.

Universities aren't the only avenues for the generation, preservation and transmission of knowledge. Especially the humanities stuff can mostly be done from your armchair as a hobby.

I suspect you did not mean it this way, but to me your statement sounds extremely belittling to the humanities.

This is generally not true. While you can consume classics from your couch, putting together a critical edition of a book with provenance and, ideally, accompanying research and commentary takes expertise and devotion. And if you say, "I'll just read the great classics that everyone knows about," well, most of those were rediscovered or brought to prominence in the first place by a scholar who lovingly created a critical edition and made a case for why the book was important. As the humanities is gutted, increasingly there will be no one to do this work, and great pieces of literature will be lost at at a much faster clip.

Also, the idea that you can preserve anything from your armchair is laughable. If you knew the resources that go into preserving even one collection or digitizing a small set of works, you would be shocked. There have been a few people who have meaningfully preserved works outside of an institution of higher learning or a library system, but they are far outliers.

I think this is untrue and perhaps alarmist. The people doing this work in the humanities will continue to do this work, shrinking enrollment in humanities is not a precursor to an age of ignorance. What percent of undergrads going for their English or literature degree actually contribute to the greater body of knowledge, to preservation, etc.? Likely very few, though I’d like to find some actual statistics. The percent of students published is tiny at the undergraduate level, for example. It is no loss to culture for someone not to enroll in a major they were persuing just to get their degree in something.

Now if the number of programs drops to such a degree that those actually excited and engaged in the humanities have nowhere to go, then it becomes a problem.

Note that I wasn't responding to the issue in the article, but OP's statement about armchair humanities work. I'd generally agree that the level of work done by the average humanities grad could probably be done from an armchair by someone not trained as a humanities major. I work in the humanities and decreasing support for this kind of work is a reality, related to but not 100% connected to the decline discussed in the article. Adjunctification is one cause.

I agree self-learning/armchair is not the same, it’s not necessarily inferior, but it is very different and you don’t engage in the kind of ancillary activities you would in a program. And yes the TA/Adjunct professor situation in the US is terrible.

The original purpose of adjuncts were to evaluate academics for future positions, find the right fit for your department. Today those future positions aren’t there in most cases they are just cheap labor.

Yes the closing or shrinking of humanities departments will be part of the realignment, but again it is hard to say what the natural or optimal number of available programs is. More isn’t always better, but too few isn’t good either. If there is a strong core remaining overall we should be ok. (And I do sympathize with those who will laid off, and that even fewer academic positions will be open for those that want to persue academia).

In fifteen years you will make more money as a nurse than with a CS degree.

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