Who would have guessed that the elementary school war concerning intelligences would continue all the way into post-secondary? Within universities all over, there is the definitive struggle between contrasting teams – Engineering and the Humanities. Since the scale of knowledge is tipped, due to biased assumptions, towards the sciences, quite an uneven set of opinions has been formed on the helpless opposing faculty: Humanities.
Comparing intellectual worth in terms of literacy and science, or literacy and math for that matter, is about as relevant as comparing a burger and fries – they are both great, and math, science and language compliment each other in the same way that beef compliments potato. Imagine learning fractions without someone being able to speak and explain the process, or imagine trying to live any day without money or calendars. It’s inconceivable.
In what almost seems like a three-tiered circular system, a person’s opinions about schooling are influenced, formed, and then acted upon, until the entire circle repeats over again. For example, take a student who loves English but is fairly confident in Science, as well. This student’s parents began impartial to anything other than their child’s happiness until media bias and third parties manipulate their opinions. The parents gradually form the nonsensical opinion that the Sciences are greater than the Humanities, and by sharing, they unknowingly influencing the choice of their child.
‘Be a doctor,’ becomes a commonly uttered statement by parents around the world. ‘Whatever you do stay away from becoming a musician or writer’ is another. The idea of a ‘poor musician’ and a ‘struggling artist,’ so often portrayed in movies and other media, is sometimes true, but there is also a high number of Engineering students who drop out of their chosen field because they lack passion for it.
With this discouraging attitude towards the arts, how would these people enjoy anything? The arts hold onto every beautiful thing that those sassy scientists fill their free time with – music, movies, theatre, visual art, all of it belongs to the Humanities.
Marshall McLuhan, a big name in the current Canadian literary sphere, started university as an engineering student, yet realized in his studies that he was truly meant to specialize in English. A lot of the engineers find that they love English, the Arts, Music or Linguistics, but are further pressured into something that they don’t love. They tolerate it, however, because of the assumption that the pay cheque is of greater value than happiness.
This is not to say that Engineering and Science are unimportant; of course the world would be less functional without engineers and doctors. But never do the Psychology majors publically undermine the education of astronomy students. So, why do humanities students take the brunt of the engineer’s inflicted pain?
Even though the jeers of engineering students are quite explicit in their verses of humiliating mockery, the message behind them that is undermining the students is one much to do with their own uncertainties. So stressed out with the hours and hours of work, the threatening risk of dropping out, and the lack of room for creativity, those in the sciences are left more jealous than truly judgmental of those students who do what they truly love.
Those who publically judge others on their intelligence are actually just passing on the negative energy from their own insecurities. The war of intelligence is an internal, rather than external, war. But does calling someone stupid really make you feel any better?
Neither the Humanities nor any other faculty is necessarily smarter or better than the rest. Each person, not only in university but in all areas of life, is intelligent in a unique way, and so each person is equally important to society. If only the Engineers could build a bridge all the way to reality, they could finally see they’re really in the same place as the rest of the students in university: stressed, drowning in work, and doubting every second.