In this day and age, the humanities matter more than ever, yet these degrees are still looked down upon as being “less than” their counterparts in STEM. Now, there is nothing wrong with a STEM degree– in order to have a functional society, we need scientists and engineers. But, on the contrary, in order to have a functional society, you need writers, artists, philosophers, historians, and religious leaders too. For my first litany against the slander of the humanities, I want to dive into the importance of protecting and saving the one closest to my heart, literature.
Did you know that as of 2025, America has an average literacy level equivalent to a 7th grader? According to the National Literacy Institute, 54% of adults read below a 6th-grade reading level, and 21% are considered “functionally illiterate.” I want these facts to sink in for a moment.
George Orwell’s book, Animal Farm, serves as a warning against dictatorship and tyranny, and sits at a 9th-grade reading level. Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 is about a futuristic American society where books are banned, outlawing freedom of thought, enforcing conformity, and ultimately curating a society of robots. This book reads at a high school level, grades 9-12. 1984 by George Orwell, spoke of extreme government surveillance, propaganda, and manipulation. Just like Fahrenheit 451, this book has a high school reading level. So what does this mean? That means these books, which warned us decades ago about government overreach and the loss of individual intelligence, are not accessible to half of American citizens. We are in a literary crisis. Yes, some of the books have had movie adaptations created, but I hope we can all agree that the movie is never the same as the book, and rarely how the author intended. It almost seems as if the government we are experiencing today is what we were warned about over 50 years ago, but half of America will never know.
So, why do I bring this up? Because I don’t believe that it is a coincidence that we are experiencing an illiteracy epidemic in this country at the same time as the rise of Artificial Intelligence, attacks on journalism, and government extremism.
Aside from current governmental corruption, we are witnessing an entire rising generation being infiltrated by nothing but blue lights and screens, forgetting the magic of storytelling within a book. The data is all there: how children of the upcoming generation are suffering from little to no attention spans from these dopamine-hijacking machines. These devices are seeping their way into early childhood education with lesson plans and assignments all online during elementary students’ most formidable years. Where does it end?
We are going so far ahead with technology that we forget what kept us alive as a civilization thus far– books.
I fear that one day we will forget about the printed words on pages that compromise wonderfully articulate stories, filled with magic, fascination, and curiosity. My fondest childhood memories come from the picture books I read, inspiring me to go play outside and imagine fictitious and creative worlds in my own backyard. I am scared that children today are being robbed of that joy because books are slowly not being emphasized or encouraged anymore. If that is the case, I do not want to know what will happen when the rising generation takes precedence.
With all that being said, it is crucial that we protect the humanities. Humanity degrees are what create the minds behind artistic writing, such as literary societal warnings, all the way to magical childhood storytelling. Art, writing, literature, history, religion, philosophy, anthropology, sociology – they are what remind us that we’re human.
