Home > Revue internationale d'éducation Sèvres > n° 49 > Abstracts

What is the future of human science studies ?
n° 49, December 2008

The future of humanities and social sciences teaching (sometimes referred to simply as “the humanities” or “the arts”) is regularly discussed. The debates are often passionate, sometimes contradictory but always productive. This is as true outside France, where the questions are asked in a very different way and yet still converge on the same essentials.

How should the humanities be taught? That is the pedagogical question. Why teach the humanities? That is the question of social utility. In what framework should the humanities be taught? Deep down, that is the question of European and international comparison.

These questions explain the steps taken by the CIEP (Centre international d’études pédagogiques) regarding innovative teaching methods in higher education and the future of the humanities and social sciences.

For a long time, in France at least, the done thing was to recruit graduates in these disciplines, who formed a recognised, powerful and highly valued intelligentsia of sorts. Now, this seems to be giving way to graduates of other disciplines, from the natural sciences to economics and management studies.

Today, changes in research patterns and in the international ranking of universities are inspired mainly by the natural sciences, structured around very large laboratories, sometimes with thousands of researchers. The humanities and social sciences are structured in small teams, usually around eminent individuals. Some are predicting their rapid demise, even though academics from these disciplines are involved in discussing most of today’s big questions.

What skills can the humanities and social sciences produce and how are they defined? What is their sphere? Are they relegated to becoming “supporting disciplines”, bringing a bit of polish or a “finishing touch” to other fields? Why and how should they be taught in both secondary and higher education? All these questions and more are being asked, both in France and abroad.

The Revue internationale d’éducation de Sèvres is devoting its 49th edition to this issue, which has rarely been approached systematically, looking at the cases of Algeria, Brazil, Denmark, France, Italy, Kenya and Russia, as well as studying the situation in European universities.

These reflections on little-studied national situations reinforce the wider question, on a global scale, of the future of humanities and social sciences. They also form an indispensable support for the activities of the CIEP in these fields.

The collection clearly identifies a particularly fruitful field of research, whose intellectual, cultural, social, economic and political implications calls for the full attention of scientists, experts, decision-makers and ordinary citizens alike.

Abstracts :
What is the future of human science studies? (n° 49, December 2008)

Introduction
Human and social sciences at the crossroads
Michel Lussault

From Utopia to reality
The place of human and social sciences in European universities
Alain Renaut
An analysis of the data showing the start of a decline in human and social science education in Europe leads the author to question the hopes pinned on these disciplines and the difficulties in matching these hopes to reality, particularly in terms of the professional and social insertion of students. The origins of the current crisis are sought in a Utopia which consisted, during the 1960s and 70s, in making the human and social science sector into the new faculty that would steer the university as an institution.

A lively debate
An overview of the status of human and social sciences in Denmark
Jesper Eckhardt Larsen
This article essentially deals with the changes in human science research and teaching in secondary and higher education in Denmark since 1945. It analyses the field of human sciences which are grouped, at university, under the term humaniora. In Denmark, the human sciences are reduced to general culture and a means of civic education up to secondary education level. In debates on the human sciences at university, these issues are more or less neglected because the only aspect taken into consideration is their usefulness in terms of the job market. This exclusive relationship between highly specialised university courses in human sciences and access to employment generates a political pressure which is currently leading to many programmes being abandoned, so as deliberately to reduce the numbers of applicants for university courses in human sciences.

Transformations in human and social sciences in Russia
Liudmila Pipiya
For more than 15 years, Russia has been experiencing a spectacular change in its economic, social and political system, and a no less significant evolution in higher education and research. The author notes, in particular, a marked increase in human and social science courses as well as a burgeoning of scientific departments in universities and independent research and expertise institutions. This dynamic breaks with the Soviet period during which human and social science research was mostly done outside universities, and when higher education was strictly controlled. However, the situation today is characterised by high growth in the numbers of courses, of students and of scientific works, which is not necessarily accompanied by a concern for quality, particularly since the severe shortage of resources means that the search for funding is given priority to the detriment of quality.

Philosophy, the project and the laboratory
Human and social sciences in Italian secondary education
Anita Gramigna
Traditional secondary education in Italy, that of the elite, is based on the priority given to philosophy and to Latin language and culture. A minority of students go to lycées [grammar schools], the majority following technological, economic and scientific courses. There is little communication between the two systems. In the last ten years or so reforms have been initiated and education has been regionalised, which has led the establishments to experiment widely in terms of curricula and methods. In this context, while the teaching of philosophy remains marked by academicism and historicism, other human sciences, such as psychology and sociology, appear more likely to enable students to succeed in their studies. All these changes have seriously destabilised the system and blurred the image of secondary education schools and colleges and universities.

What is the future of human science education in France?
Round table
France Bessis-Favard, Alain Boissinot, Olivier Faron, Daniel Filâtre, Tristan Lecoq, Michel Lussault, Pierre Tapie
This text is based on the transcription of a round table which took place in two phases. Firstly, the participants presented their analyses of the present status of human and social science teaching, whether at lycée [grammar school], the preparatory classes for the grandes écoles, at the grandes écoles, or at university. The speakers mostly stressed the difficulties in positioning human science courses and the related difficulties in offering students a number of attractive career options. Based on these observations, a second round of discussions served to evoke various recovery strategies. All the participants stressed the need to review the curricula and teaching practices.

The place of human and social sciences in Algerian higher education
Yassine Ferfera, Tchirine Mekideche
Universities in Algeria are a recent creation. Since independence, the secondary and higher education system has undergone many reforms, although the problems have not really been resolved. The fast and continuing increase of student numbers in human and social sciences is now putting Algerian universities under pressure. Today, the curricula must again be better organised in order to manage the growing numbers of students. The choice has been made to develop the Bachelor’s, Master’s and Doctorate model, in order to propose more flexible, modular courses that are more adapted to the European standard. The need was also stressed to give courses a better professional profile in order to improve the professional insertion of human and social science graduates, which is still very mediocre.

From intellectual to expert
African social sciences in turmoil: the case of Kenya
Hélène Charton, Samuel Owuor
As in many African countries, the university scene in Kenya has undergone profound changes during the past 20 years. The liberalisation of the availability of higher education has generated unprecedented forms of competition between courses and public and private establishments which now offer options which best meet market needs. The article describes the emergence of new paradigms brought about by these structural changes. The commercial dimension of higher education, in which areas of knowledge are reduced to mere marketable goods, determines the very nature of these areas of scientific knowledge as well as the conditions for their production and transmission. In this new context, what is the place of the humanities and of human and social sciences, and how do they manage to adapt to this new paradigm?

An original experiment in Brazil
Renato Janine Ribeiro
An experimental interdisciplinary project in higher humanities education In the late 1990s, the author produced an interdisciplinary humanities university programme. It offered a completely new course using teaching methods based on and focusing on experimentation. The curriculum was a break from strictly disciplinary courses and was intended to give students a broad culture that would enable them to understand the complexity of organisations and situations. The article describes in detail the six semesters of this course and its expectations and goals. In particular, the author stresses the need to prepare students for the many changes they are bound to experience in their working and social lives.

Bibliography
Bernadette Plumelle