A couple of interesting items on the benefits of Classics have meandered through my social networks and email this week. First, and most recent (within a few minutes) is an ‘open letter’ in the journal Genome Biology, in which a Science professor smacks down SUNY Albany’s prez for their recent cuts to, among other things, Classics (about which I hope to blog in the near future) … an excerpt, inter alia (the whole thing is definitely worth reading):
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you have trouble understanding the importance of maintaining programs in unglamorous or even seemingly ‘dead’ subjects. From your biography, you don’t actually have a PhD or other high degree, and have never really taught or done research at a university. Perhaps my own background will interest you. I started out as a classics major. I’m now Professor of Biochemistry and Chemistry. Of all the courses I took in college and graduate school, the ones that have benefited me the most in my career as a scientist are the courses in classics, art history, sociology, and English literature. These courses didn’t just give me a much better appreciation for my own culture; they taught me how to think, to analyze, and to write clearly. None of my sciences courses did any of that.
(tip o’ the pileus to Bill Caraher for that one)
Elsewhere, Bettany Hughes was giving an interview on the BBC’s Woman’s Hour and made a spirited defense of Classics … an excerpt inter alia:
JM: But how impressed do you think an employer would be, with a kid with
straight-As in Latin, Greek , Ancient History, as opposed to the one
whos done Business, Finance, and I.T.?BH: The fantastic thing, we have some great statistics, luckily, to back
up our campaign. If you talk to Cambridge University, theyll tell you
that of all their Arts graduates, excluding law students, if you call law
students Arts graduates, classicists are the most highly employable. And
actually, if you go to businesses, across the board, particularly
international businesses, they love a classical degree, because it shows
you can deal with quite complex data, it shows that you have an interest
in the wider world, and it also shows that you have a fundamental interest
in humanity, and increasingly, businesses of all kinds are realising that
thats an absolutely essential skill to have.
… full transcript over at Constantina Katsari’s Love of History blog ..
rogueclassicism 