What are the Humanities?

“The humanities are a group of academic subjects united by a commitment to study aspects of the human condition and a qualitative approach that generally prevents a single paradigm from coming to define any discipline.”

National Endowment for the Humanities

“ What is it to be human?”

Hominid: any of a family of bipedal primate mammals, including modern humans and ancestors. The earliest is Australopithecus.

Ca. 5 million – 30,000 BCE

WHO ARE WE?

The humanities reveal how people

have tried to make spiritual, moral,

and intellectual sense of a world.

What is CULTURE?The shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors, and artifacts that the members of a society use to cope with their world and with one another. These are transmitted from generation to generation through learning.

Based on offerings of Bates & Plog

CULTURE: The artistic and intellectual expressions of a people Bailey

How did the past develop?

Are we impacted today by the past?

The humanities offer clues The humanities offer clues

to these questions but never a to these questions but never a complete answer!complete answer!

As humans we crave meaning in our lives, and we communicate

these cravings through our

expressive behaviorexpressive behavior..

Pages 1 & 9

Visual Images

Words

Music

Dance

Performance

Ritual/Religion

Expressive Behavior

Page 135

ARTS - Important Cultural Documents

Art reflects

culture!

Page 113

THE HIGHEST POINTS OF CIVILIZATION

HAVE PRODUCED

THE GREATEST WORKS OF ART!

The pyramids of ancient Egypt attest the magnificence

of pharonic rule.

Ancient Greece producedthe Parthenon.

Romanesque and Gothic cathedrals sprang up during the Middle Ages.

Renaissance men like Michelangelo produced art like the DAVID.

Prehistoric man Prehistoric man created asceticallycreated asceticallypleasing paintingspleasing paintingson cave walls.on cave walls.

How do we know about our past?

Primary Sources

Primary Sources

Artifacts - a man-made object that has some kind of cultural significance

Epigraphy – “writing

on things” - The study of ancient text in their original context

What have others said about certain cultures?

Literature

Dance

MUSIC

Performance

Religion & Ritual

How do cultural differences shape our expressions?

*Norms *Customs*Taboos * Laws

Norms: agreed upon expectations and rules by which a culture guides the behavior of its members

Customs: standards of behavior that are approved but not morally significant

How we bury our dead?

Windover Excavations: 7,000-year-old Pond Cemetery

Taboo: Behavior absolutely forbidden by a culture

SEXUAL

BEHAV IOR

KILLING!

Taboos often become laws.

Laws: a formal body of rules enacted by the state

Our approach to the study of humanities …

Geography

Government

Economics & Commerce

Religion & Ritual

Arts

“To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.”

Cicero, 1st Century

“Anyone who cannot give an account to oneself of the past three thousand years remains in darkness, without experience, living from day to day.”

Goethe, 19th Century AD

““In times like these, it helps to recall In times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times that there have always been times like these.” like these.”

Paul HarveyPaul Harvey

Study smartly and enjoy the class!