Former Emory University President and UGA Faculty Discuss the Question
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THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA Spring 2010 • Vol. 23, No. 2 “Where Have All the Humanities Majors Gone?” Former Emory University President and UGA Faculty Discuss the Question n September of 2009, Dr. William M. Chace, I former president of Emory University, published an article in The American Scholar titled “The Decline of the English Department.” He began with the following observation: During the last four decades, a well-publicized shift in what undergraduate students prefer to study has taken place in American higher education. The number of young men and women majoring in English has dropped dramatically; the same is true of philosophy, foreign languages, art history, and kindred fields, including history. Shortly thereafter, our own Red and Black cited a New York Times report that the most popular undergraduate major in American colleges and universities is now business. The Willson Center has invited Dr. Chace to join Dr. William M. Chace a panel of UGA humanities scholars for a Willson religion, and philosophy, to speak other languages Center Roundtable on the question “Where Have and therefore to understand other cultures, to All the Humanities Majors Gone?” It will take become thoughtful participants in our legislative place at 4:00 p.m. on Monday, February 1, in 148 and judicial systems, and to be intelligent leaders. Miller Learning Center. Dr. Chace will open the Panelists will consider the possible long-term discussion with a twenty-minute presentation of results for our country of the declining interest in his ideas and then will join the panelists to explore the humanities. the implications of the decline of the humanities Dr. Chace is Professor of English at Emory in higher education. The panelists will be Doug University, where he served as President from 1994 Anderson (English), who will be moderator, Hugh to 2003. He is author of two books: The Political Ruppersburg (English), Dana Bultman (Romance Identities of Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot (1973) Languages), Bethany Moreton (History), and Alan and Lionel Trilling: Criticism and Politics (1983) Godlas (Religion). Betty Jean Craige will make and numerous articles on early twentieth-century introductory remarks. British and American writers. This academic year he The humanities prepare students to think clearly has taught a course on James Joyce and co-taught a and write well, to understand history, literature, course on “Ancients and Moderns.” n Spring 2010 1 Advisory Board From the Director Levon Ambartsumian en years ago the Center for Franklin Professor of Violin T Humanities and Arts, now the Jane and Harry Willson Center for Antje Ascheid Humanities and Arts, moved from Associate Professor of Film Studies Peabody Hall to the ground floor of the Psychology Building. The Catherine Jones new space included a large storage Professor of French room which we converted into a conference room with a mural Asen Kirin commemorating the humanities and the arts at the turn of the Associate Professor of Art twenty-first century. Art Rosenbaum, Wheatley Betty Jean Craige Jean Martin-Williams Professor in Fine Arts at the Professor of Music University of Georgia, created the mural between April of 2000, when I invited him to do the project, and August of Susan Roberts 2001, when the University honored its completion. The Professor of Art mural, titled “The World at Large,” is one of the University’s artistic landmarks, and its story is worth repeating. Susan Rosenbaum In January, 2001, after spending eight months taking Associate Professor of English pictures—many of them double- and triple-exposures—with his thirty-year-old Polaroid camera, Art glued canvas to the Bala Sarasvati 8’ x 23’ wall and began applying an orange-brown undercoat. Then, working from a large charcoal sketch he had drawn as a Professor of Dance guide, he mapped out a series of figures in blue. By March he Jane Willson Professor in Arts was applying full color. Throughout the spring, faculty in the Lamar Dodd School Administration of Art brought their classes to the Center for Humanities and Arts to watch the artist at work. Art welcomed the students, telling them what he had done and what he was planning to Betty Jean Craige do, explaining the process of applying the acrylic paint, talking Director about the value to society of public art, and discussing the University Professor of Comparative Literature dynamic interrelationships of the figures to one another and what areas of inquiry and performance the figures signified. I Lloyd Winstead often joined the students. Associate Director In the catalogue produced for the mural, Art wrote: Managing Director of the Delta Prize Program Since the mural would be situated in a fairly small room dominated by a large conference table, I designed Julie Dingus it to engage the viewer and open the wall visually into a Administrative Associate deeper space. In that space the eye moves among various figures representing the arts and the humanities— The Willson Center for Humanities and Arts scholars, sculptors, poets, painters, dancers—some active, is published each fall and spring semester. some contemplative. The center foreground figures, It circulates to all faculty at UGA, to other humanities which are almost life-size, are at eye level with viewers and arts centers around the country and to agencies sitting at the conference table; some seem to make eye that fund humanities and arts programs. contact with those viewers. With this scale I intended to imply a movement in Lloyd Winstead, Editor time and space back into the composition along the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts orthogonals left and right, with shifting stages for the 164 Psychology Building figures. Some figures are depicted through multiple Athens, GA 30602-3001 images, encompassing two or three or more movements 706.542.3966 • 706.542.2828 fax in time. Other figures either suggest movement with [email protected] • www.cha.uga.edu gesture toward other forms or express a contrasting stasis. Pyramid shapes anchor the center of the composition, The University of Georgia is committed to principles of while the circular and linear movements carry the eye equal opportunity and affirmative action. back and around. (Continued on page 11) 2 Willson Center for Humanities and Arts Announcements Goldfarb, Stephen J. The South in Black and White: The Current Competitions Works of James E. Routh Jr., 1939-1946, exhibition Deadlines January 21 and February 18 catalogue with an essay. Athens, GA: Georgia Museum of Art, 2009. The Willson Center Research Fellowship Program supports University of Georgia faculty engaged in Halper, Edward. One and Many in Aristotle – Books Alpha- humanities research or artistic creation or performance Delta. Parmenides Press, 2009. by providing release time (two courses) from teaching. Priority may be given to applicants who have solicited Kadish, Doris, co-ed. Revised and expanded edition external funding to support their research. Willson Center of Translating Slavery: Gender and Race in French Research Fellowships may be awarded to individuals only Abolitionist Writing, 1780-1830 (co-editor Françoise once every five years. Applications will be judged in one Massardier-Kenney). Kent State University Press. 2009. of two categories: Tenured and Untenured. Deadline: The Ogre’s Progress: Images of the Ogre January 21. Krell, Jonathan F. in Modern and Contemporary French Fiction. Newark: The Willson Center Faculty Seminar Program provides University of Delaware Press, 2009. $2,000 to faculty organizing interdisciplinary discussion groups on particular research topics. The funds are to be Manoguerra, Paul. Lord Love You: Works by R.A. Miller used to bring to campus scholars from other institutions. from the Mullis Collection, exhibition catalogue with an Proposals for the following academic year, which may be essay. Athens, GA: Georgia Museum of Art, 2009. submitted by email to the Willson Center (ctrha@uga. edu), will be considered on February 18. Moreton, Bethany. To Serve God and Wal-Mart: The Making of Christian Free Enterprise. Harvard University The Willson Center Distinguished Lecturer Program brings Press, 2009. to campus in the following academic year distinguished scholars and artists, nominated by faculty and selected by Ojo, Akinloye and Lioba Moshi. Linguistic Research and the Advisory Board, whose appeal transcends disciplinary Languages in Africa. Cascadilla Proceedings Project, boundaries. Deadline: February 18. Somerville, MA, USA, August 2009. The Willson Center Publication Subvention Program Ojo, Akinloye and Lioba Moshi. (eds.). Language Pedagogy supports scholarship in the humanities and the arts at and Language Use in Africa. Adonis and Abbey the University of Georgia by providing subvention when Publishers Ltd., London, U.K, October 2009. necessary to ensure the publication of excellent research that brings credit to the author and to the University of Ladis, Andrew, ed. Corpus of Early Italian Paintings in Georgia. Deadlines: September 3 and January 21. North American Public Collections: The South, 3 vols by Perri Lee Roberts. Athens, GA: Georgia Museum of Art, The Willson Center receives nominations on a 2009. continuous basis for the Delta Prize for Global Under- standing. Since its creation in 1999, the Prize has been Starkweather, D. A., ed. J.S. Bach Six Suites for Violoncello awarded to President and Mrs. Jimmy Carter and The Solo, music edition. Dayton, Ohio: The Lorenz Carter Center, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, President Corporation, October 2008. Mikhail Gorbachev, Mrs. Sadako Ogata, President Václav Havel, Ambassador Gertrude Mongella, Mr. Ted Starkweather, D. A., ed. J.S. Bach Six Suites for Violoncello Turner, President Nelson Mandela, President Martti Solo, 3-DVD set. Dayton, Ohio: The Lorenz Corporation, Ahtisaari, and Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei. Faculty, staff October 2008. and students are invited to submit nominations for the Delta Prize. Nomination details can be found at www. Sutter, Paul S., and Christopher J. Manganiello, eds. uga.edu/news/deltaprize. n Environmental History and the American South: A Reader.