Why Liberal Arts ?

The “Generation Y”, me included, is often accused of being choosy and undecided, while “Generation X”, (now mostly parents) are blamed for being liberal and tolerant. I guess the growing demand and rising popularity of a Liberal Arts Education then, is no shocker.

Liberal Arts, is not music, drama, literature or fine arts in isolation. Rather it is an amalgamation of them all. It’s about using one discipline to understand another, finding new approaches to substantiate ancient theories and being able to delve deeper, discard redundant principles and broaden general knowledge and experience.

The word “liberal” has multiple meanings. Knowing that a stream or subject is not forced upon me based on the marks I secured or based on availability of seats gives me and others like me a sense of security and safety, that I am human and my likes and dislikes, interests and passions are likely to change over time. It may mean freedom from the traditional styles of education or freedom to choose and change one’s major at will. It’s about merging the right amounts of technical knowledge with adequate experiential and practical training, thus equipping one for the challenges and complexities of the real world.

The world today, so globalized and interconnected, that interdisciplinary education is a necessity as absolutely nothing can be viewed in isolation. From my lectures on Descartes, I began questioning the obvious like why 2+2 = 4 or what really does define the colour blue? And sometimes not coming to a sole conclusion is oddly satisfying, as there is no right or wrong. It’s about taking a stance and accepting something as right as long as one is able to justify and convince others of the thought process behind it.

A year into this course and it’s been an absolute pleasure. From engaging classroom discussions, to actually observing the effects of commercialization on Durga Puja celebrations in Delhi’s Chittaranjan Park, to conducting field research at the Nizamuddin Dargah. I have learnt the significance of the community and the essence of the phrase “it takes a village to raise a child”. The key to holistic learning is the ability to take away from and give back to the society at appropriate times and to be able to question and apply all the million theories, principles and ideologies across various disciplines in reality. It pushes you to think out of the box and at times even think deeper while being confined to a particular concept or topic. The Liberal Arts has pushed my own sense of possibility and I now find myself spending hours in the library researching or in deep conversation with professors, writing multiple drafts or proof reading essays on topics so contextualized that it’s almost intimidating at times. Today when I stand in a room amongst fellow classmates, professors and other well-educated individuals I don't feel intimidated but rather empowered.

A Liberal Arts Education is about getting off the “conveyor belt” and finding one’s own niche or at times even creating it. And having said that, an education of this nature does not make you unfit to step back onto the conveyor belt at any point in time and start from where you left off.

In the words of Robert Frost, it’s about taking the road less travelled by, that has made all the difference. And in India today, a Liberal Arts Education is still available and known to only a small portion of our population, but I’m glad to be off the conveyor belt and on the road less travelled, because a year in and it’s already making a difference. It is the new age of education and it’s high time India start exploring and expanding this. And just like the White Revolution or the Green Revolution, I think India is nearing her Education Revolution.