Setting the Record Straight on the Practical Value of the Humanities and Anthropology
Bridging the Gap Between Academia and Real-World Applications
by Robert J. Morais
The humanities are under assault. State legislatures don’t see the return-on-investment to taxpayers for humanities degree holders when compared to those holding degrees in engineering and business. An education in the humanities does not prepare students for employment options beyond academia, humanities detractors claim. Even back in 2011, disparaging the practical utility of anthropology degrees, then Florida Governor (now Senator) Rick Scott said, “We don’t need a lot more anthropologists in the state. It’s a great degree if people want to get it, but we don’t need them here.” That kind of argument worries students and their parents and it can discourage students from majoring in, or even enrolling in, humanities courses. Astonishingly, even a philosophy professor says she doesn’t see value in the humanities.
Given those dire pronouncements, I decided to ask generative artificial intelligence for another point-of-view to a question on how the humanities can be useful in business, one of many domains for the application of the humanities. ChatGPT noted that that the humanities bring critical thinking, communication skills, and cultural understanding to business. Studying literature, history, and philosophy fosters analytical skills, contributing to problem-solving and decision-making. ChatGPT pointed out that effective communication, honed through the humanities, enhances interpersonal relationships and business interactions. Ethical lessons from philosophy inform responsible business practices. Humanities derived cultural awareness enables companies to traverse diverse and complex global markets successfully. Overall, ChatGPT said, an education in the humanities cultivates a well-rounded, adaptable workforce capable of addressing multifaceted challenges with creativity and empathy.
If ChatGPT’s examples are too broad, consider cultural anthropology, which is often classified among the humanities, although it is also deemed a social science. (Full disclosure: I am an applied anthropologist.) Cultural anthropologists apply their skills in a wide array of organizations to improve collaboration and productivity. Anthropologists contribute to sustainability by studying community-based resource management and conservation. They inform public health by researching culturally-driven healthcare beliefs and practices. Anthropologists work in product innovation and marketing to comprehend consumer habits, preferences, and rituals. They make technology more accessible and easier to use. Anthropologists contribute to an appreciation of sociocultural differences to help manage conflicts and improve cross-cultural relations.
Anthropologists have worked for Google, FACEBOOK, Intel, IBM, General Motors, Nissan, J. P. Morgan Chase, The WD-40 Company, Procter & Gamble, Revlon, Airbnb, and IDEO, among countless other global enterprises. Jim Yong Kim, an anthropologist, was president of the World Bank. Financial Times journalist, anthropologist, and Provost at King's College, Cambridge, Gillian Tett, recently authored Anthro-Vision: A New Way to See in Business and Life, which argues persuasively that anthropology enables us to address many of the world’s most promising opportunities and pressing problems.
One way of activating this applied potential would be for humanities departments to co-create courses with schools of business, engineering, public affairs and diplomacy, medicine, architecture, journalism, and professional studies.
It is not wise to be ignorant about the practical value of the humanities. State legislatures are missing opportunities and their local graduates will suffer, as will organizations that could benefit by hiring them. When academics shun the practical applications of philosophy, literature, anthropology, and other humanities, their arguments evoke a chicken crossing the road so wrapped up in thoughts of getting to the other side that she doesn’t see the speeding car about to squash her. For academics, that squashing could be tantamount to the elimination of their departments and their jobs. An academic’s contention that the task of humanists is to invite, to welcome, to entice, to excite, to engage is not wrong; it is simply not thinking laterally to see the humanities can be all that and also have real world applications. One way of activating this applied potential would be for humanities departments to co-create courses with schools of business, engineering, public affairs and diplomacy, medicine, architecture, journalism, and professional studies. It is time for legislators, scholars, university administrators, organizations of every kind, along with students and their parents, to become schooled on the value of the practical humanities.
Robert J. Morais is an anthropologist and a Lecturer at Columbia Business School.
He can be reached at rm3075@columbia.edu
Although there is a lot of great food for thought here and a lot of causes that I believe are linked to this problem that warrant much more elaboration, I think many academics within anthropology and humanities ultimately tend to suffer from a perennial problem of poor communication and personal connection with the wider public. I've heard a number of academics within humanities even declare that it isn't our job to do so. That's shameful to me.
When I first began my tour into anthropology as an undergraduate I was immediately struck by how unintelligible many professors and graduate students were when discussing their ideas. I came from a small rural midwestern town where I knew that people who speak in convoluted sentences are met with suspicion and the very minute you are perceived to be talking down to someone you lose respect and any hope of establishing rapport. You'd think this would be Anthropology 101, but I've only seen this inability to speak to wider audiences exacerbated over the years as the humanities churns out evermore unintelligible jargon and condescending tones and behaviors that slow-drips into our public discourse in perplexing and unfortunate ways.
I think virtually everyone in academia suffers from the "curse of knowledge" which is understandable because one has to learn the specialized language and conceptual frameworks of any discipline or trade by default, but you can't get so wrapped up in your ivory tower lingo and political echo chamber that you forget how to speak and relate to the rest of humanity, especially if your position largely depends on state and federal funds coming from taxpayers. I've always thought we needed courses specifically for those of us interested in writing and speaking to the public (kudos to those at This Anthro Life for pushing that envelope into the new media space).
I place a lot of the onus on those within the humanities at the moment for the failure to show (not tell) people why anthropology is important. The humanities may be under assault from the outside, but their wounds are also self-inflicted to some extent. I worry that too many are not willing to examine their first principles and lend an ear to their critics and have open honest discussions.
Part of why I'm on Substack trying to learn how to write and connect with a wider audience right now is because I LOVE anthropology and think what anthropology and archaeology have to offer us is an incredibly valuable perspective-maybe THE most important perspective-but I don't see the current trajectory that the discipline is on all that attractive or compelling to vast swaths of our population.
If I am correct, many of those taxpayers and their representatives perceive the humanities not just as impractical, but incoherent, out-of-touch, and sanctimonious. We've spent so much energy over the years TELLING people what we're against and left no room for SHOWING people what we are for. I agree wholeheartedly with the statement "It is not wise to be ignorant about the practical value of the humanities." But I worry our problems are much deeper than listing out what the practical applications of anthropology and the humanities are.
I'd love to be a part of an anthropology that is curious, civil, and has a sense of humor and humility about itself. I don't have the impression that those are the personality types being drawn to this discipline at the moment and we need a far more optimistic and hopeful outlook on humanity moving forward.
Well said. Often with clients, the first hurdle I have to address is the general perception of what anthropologists do; study old bones. Then explaining that it's a much broader discipline. My training in cultural anthropology stood me well for 20 years as a marketer of technology. Now I do a lot of netnography work for businesses; UX research, brand analysis and product development and launches. As Justin says below so well, it's about communications. Anthropology is about telling stories, so we should be good at telling the story of anthropology to the wider world. But we're not. Some of us are, but as we know, perception is everything.