Just Another Stump Speech on the Liberal Arts

We should dare to know the values that define us.

Credit: Jasper Langley-Hawthorne

“Who are you? What are you? Where do you belong?... You belong with the legions of toil, with all that is low, and vulgar, and unbeautiful. You belong with the oxen and the drudges, in dirty surroundings among smells and stenches…and yet you dare to open the books, to listen to beautiful music, to learn to love beautiful paintings, to speak good English…Who are you?”

- Jack London

It is a true and regrettable assertion that 2025 has been characterized by acts of vicious political violence. Commentators and columnists have opined on the root cause of such antisocial behavior: negative partisanship, irony-poisoning, even justified resentment. I think Mike Cosper, writing for The Dispatch, has it right, or at least presents a prognosis which encapsulates many of the aforementioned catalysts for violent action. Cosper argues that secular, liberal modernity has ‘unbundled’ certain questions which make up our identity—“Am I a Christian? What do I want to be when I grow up? Where will I live?”—that were previously defined by birth or cultural tradition. The modern individual must now decide for themselves what religion to subscribe to, what career to choose, and where they want to reside while participating in both. This has undoubtedly enhanced the liberty of choice which people in the West enjoy, and opened the doors for greater success and the realization of the good life. Yet, this unbundling also places the burden of answering existential questions upon us, by no means an easy undertaking. Should these questions go unanswered, purposelessness and lack of community can drive people into the embrace of conspiracy theories, political radicalization, and unreality. The transience of contemporary employment, the decline in religious faith, and the turgid slew of life-hacks, quack philosophies, and commodified ideologies on social media all seem to reduce the world to a heap of broken images. A church, employer, or local community connects us with something greater than ourselves. If I lack any of these grounding ties, or actively despise those which I am tethered to, the draw of poisonous online communities and fringe ideologies expands tenfold. 

 I argue in this article that a liberal arts education in the United States can and should act as one means to answering our previously bundled questions of identity. My work is not the first to raise this claim. This is also not the first Forum article lauding the boons of the liberal arts, nor do I hope it will be the last. Consider it a stump speech for the ever-ongoing reappraisal of the meaning of higher education, or an annual inoculation against the apathy that creeps into our attachment to a style of learning that is easy to take for granted.

Writing in The Forum, Henry Long defined the liberal arts as being “concerned with knowledge insofar as it is intrinsically valuable.” Articles in the New York Times describe them as “a model of teaching derived from the ancient Greeks,” and key to “initiating students into a culture of rational reflection on how to live.” These interpretations capture many of the hallmarks of a liberal arts education: a pursuit of truth divested from commercial or pragmatic considerations; the use of the Socratic method and lively engagement with competing ideas; the study of humanity’s various schemes of morality and politics ranging from the hills of the Peloponnese to the streets of Philadelphia. However, I submit that another crucial facet of the liberal arts is their incorporation of students into a tradition of study. As one sits down to begin their first slog through the Nicomachean Ethics, one can imagine that a student quite similar to themselves (somewhat sleep-deprived and over-caffeinated) sat down to the same exercise five, ten, or even fifty years ago. The liberal arts grant a measure of appreciation for the warp and weft of the intellectual cloth from which Western civilization was tailored. 

That civilization is now more polarized, lonely, unhappy, and overwrought than ever. As Cosper puts it, “lots of lonely people are gathering online in an environment of poisonous political rhetoric, dying to give themselves away to something.” The modern, secular, liberal American is presented with a smorgasbord of lifestyles, moral principles, and ultimate values by which to define themselves. As religious affiliation, civic association, and face-to-face interaction decline, these values are increasingly propagated through the internet. Consider the TikTok-driven tradwife trend, hustle culture, or #VanLife. There are also far fewer innocuous spaces accessible to individuals starved for meaning. Instances of left-wing, right-wing, and indiscriminate violence now feed on one another through insidious online forums where inhumanity becomes synonymous with social clout. I maintain that the liberal arts offer an alternative path to defining one’s identity insofar as they teach three principles: moral intuition, connection to tradition, and respect for institutions.

First, on moral intuition. The liberal arts acquaint students with the breadth and diversity of human endeavors: the natural sciences, social sciences, religion, arts, philosophy. Enshrined in this approach are competing schematics for what one ought to value and what warrants sustained attention, time, or money. Do students sympathize with Cicero that morality and practicality are one and the same? Perhaps—or perhaps not. Maybe they are more persuaded by Plato’s defense of justice in The Republic, or Isaiah Berlin’s staunch support of pluralism. Perhaps the student disagrees with every moral sensibility they are exposed to in college. The fact remains that they approach genuine answers to those questions which define the course of their life. I call this moral intuition as students may not find definite conclusions to all the questions of their human identity over the course of only four years. But, they will hoist upon their shoulders a patchwork shroud of possible answers to guide them over the course of their life. The same cannot be said for time spent grinding CAD and SolidWorks certificates, or asking 4chan or Usenet groups to define eudaimonia.

Second, on connection to tradition. Part of the ‘unbundling’ described above is the profound transformation which institutions of Western society have undertaken over the course of the last few decades. Work has been redefined by the internet and artificial intelligence, the sexual revolution has upended traditional notions of relationships, and religious affiliation is in free fall. The liberal arts present a lifeline to a rich heritage of intellectual thought which retains its usefulness regardless of technological or cultural shifts. This heritage can provide a grounding to one’s economic, social, and political life that they might heretofore have been missing. The Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment, Romanticism and Empiricism, the Modern and Post-modern: these are cornerstones of civilization which allow us a better sense of the grand building as a whole. My argument here brings the liberal arts closer to what is commonly described as a ‘great books’ curriculum of the kind taught at St. John’s College. While I think the liberal arts is more expansive than a mere great books program, the great books are a salient example of the kind of touchstone of tradition for which I am advocating.

Arguments against the Great Books and any kind of Western canon typically stem from claims amounting to white-washing or Eurocentrism. I find these contentions demonstrably unconvincing. First, studying the ‘Western’ tradition in no way precludes one from studying works from other continents and cultures. The great thing about liberal arts education is that its breadth allows for plenty of student-specific examination of other works. Indeed, reckoning with the worldviews of cultures quite different to one’s own no doubt improves one’s moral intuition. Second, and more importantly, students in the United States inhabit a world fashioned by the ideas resplendent in the Western canon. It is foolhardy to suggest that one should not study and take seriously the judgements and values which formed the Constitution under which we live and the economic structure we interact with on a daily basis.         

Third, on respect for institutions. By learning the intellectual tradition described above, students of the liberal arts gain insight into the ideas which have shaped our political, economic, and social systems. With this understanding, hopefully, comes a measure of respect. Having read Montesquieu’s The Spirit of the Laws, the Declaration of Independence, and a few of the Federalist Papers allows one to see the institution of the U.S government and its constituent branches as more than a tool of the opposing party to debase the country, stamp down the marginalized, or perpetuate a sex trafficking ring. A different portrait ought to be painted instead, that of the United States as a flawed yet aspirational and revolutionary political ideal. As Jonah Goldberg writes, “The remarkable thing about America—and Western civilization generally—is not that we had slavery, but that we ended it.”

Institutions are also well-positioned to shape the values of individuals which comprise them, for better and for worse. Knowing which groups to take part in is vital to the development of personal identity. We may not have a choice in our membership in certain institutions, like the U.S. government or one’s family, but having insight into the principles which compose those institutions can help us manage our forced responsibilities. This insight is critical for those institutions which we join voluntarily, such as workplaces, volunteer organizations, and universities. It is within my power to choose whether I work at Palantir or the ACLU. The liberal arts allow me to critically consider the values which I hold in relation to the values of those institutions, and whether joining one would be favorable or inimical to my principles.

The virtue of a democracy is defined by the virtue of its institutions and the citizens that comprise them. No democracy survives when its citizens pursue ends indifferent or antithetical to the survival of their constitution. Political violence is contrary to the fundamental principles which hold our nation together, and poses an existential threat to the American experiment. The moral intuition, connection to tradition, and respect for institutions which the study of the liberal arts confers are thus beneficial in two respects. They are, on the one hand, a powerful tool of the individual to interrogate their goals in life. On the other, these three values are critical components of virtuous citizenship. Despite this, it seems a common thread of the last decade that the liberal arts, and humanities more generally, are ‘under threat,’ and that their worth must be consistently proven to the public and the elite alike. Equally, data shows that younger generations value democracy less than their predecessors. Hence why I call this a ‘stump speech’; it is simply another pitched battle on a long and arduous political campaign. I believe that it is a campaign aimed squarely at the pursuit of the good life.We all want to know who we are and what we stand for. Sempre aude. Dare to know.