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Good news from the NEH
The National Endowment for the Humanities has just launched a new grant program called Enduring Questions, a welcome program that will provide $25,000 grants for new undergraduate courses designed “to encourage faculty and students [to] to grapple with the most fundamental concerns of the humanities, and to join together in deep, sustained programs of reading in order to encounter influential thinkers over the centuries and into the present day.” This is a very good thing, and a terrific way to spend NEH money. The American Scholar reports on some of the questions that the program is designed to get students asking:
What is the good life?
What is justice? Mercy?
What is freedom? Happiness?
What is dignity?
Is there a human nature, and, if so, what is it?
What are the limits of scientific understanding?
Is there such a thing as right and wrong? Good and evil?
What is good government?
What are the origins of the modern world?
O, happy day. Thank you, NEH.
back to top14 Comments to “Good news from the NEH”
I have a question of my own: What is a merry heart?
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Hey, sounds pretty good at first glance especially since we have trained ourselves to expect solutions from the federal government. However, NEH $$$$ is American taxpayer $$$$. Should the taxpaying citizen give grants to universities to do what they should have been doing all along? Isn’t the whole purpose of higher education to grapple with the most fundamental concerns of the humanities, etc.? It’s too bad colleges and universities have gone the path of least resistance regarding disciplining the mind, but to me this is just another taxpayer bail out. Don’t thank the NEH. Thank me and all the hardworking people I know who get up everyday and provide jobs and work jobs so the government can give money to people who ought already to know better.
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Thanks Harrison,
I sent it along to some of the faculty in my program. Hopefully one of them will want to take a try at it. It would be super fun to be involved in something like this.
Are you prepping your application now?
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Yes thanks Harrison – I note the grant says:
“Courses may be taught by faculty from any department or discipline in the humanities or by faculty outside the humanities (e.g., astronomy, biology, economics, law, mathematics, medicine, psychology), provided humanities sources are central to the course.”
I’ll be thinkin’ about it …
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Your tax dollars at work here, folks.
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I’s sure the Marxist and Socialist professors that permiate the universities will tell the world the truth for once, that Socialism and Marxism cause most the suffering in the world today.
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Sounds like more politically correct pabulum as the NEH takes credit for giving away other peoples’ money.
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It will be a happy day when Harrison understands that goodness, truth, beauty, and happiness involves giving proper consideration to things in our circle of concern in proper season . . . such as on the day Republicans face the consequences of their economic theories and reverse course and violate their principles to take a 79.9% equity interest in a financial company, in return for a loan of up to $85 billion (after other bail-outs), and to assume the right to veto payment of dividends to shareholders . . . from Washington, and without the involvement of Democrats!
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HSK omitted one:
What is liberal education?
blogging!
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I just added a note to NT that at the Volokh there is a thread about the national service programs of Obama and McCain. Obama’s will scare you.
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A government program that can be eliminated.
I wonder just how many more could as easily be identified? This just shows that our federal government is too big to be rational.
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Geeze, I just get this impression that HSK just isn’t happy anywhere. Not critical enough for the leftist crowd. Not cynical enough for the right wing. It’s hard growing up.
Meanwhile, I’m kicking around ideas for a submission.
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About right, Luke.
Well, perhaps I should say, “about correct.” Tricky business, language.
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“A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone.”
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