There’s a common sentiment among humanities students, both conservative and liberal, that the world is crumbling down and that no light exists at the end of the tunnel. Considering my own generation has lived through catastrophic economic recessions, natural disasters and dangerous political movements, I’m not surprised that many humanities students feel no hope in the future whatsoever. And while many students in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHASS) are right to feel nihilistic about the current state of affairs, I want to argue that we should look at the glass from a half-full perspective — namely, that the humanities should make you optimistic for whatever future you envision.
While it’s easy to become discouraged by the various injustices of the modern era, CHASS students should be proud to remember the sociopolitical progress the world has gone through in the past decades and centuries. We cannot take for granted all of the positive work past and present activists have done, especially when social causes like racial equality and queer liberation have still not been fully fulfilled. Nihilism endangers these causes by inherently posing social change as impossible and social advocacy as futile.
This nihilism also erases the notion that our demands have never been listened to by the establishment or the public. There is comfort in knowing that despite all the reactionary naysayers, the 21st century has shown and will only continue to become increasingly more secular, tolerant and diverse.
Likewise, we cannot expect the advice of all the humanities to be the solution to all our problems, nor that our advice is any better from the advice of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) or arts students. If sitting through dozens of anthropology and philosophy courses has taught me anything, it’s that there are countless solutions to literally anything. This is no different in STEM and arts courses; for example, a conservation of natural resources course easily tackles the hundreds of ways society can address climate change, resource inequality and environmental degradation.
It is also disingenuous to pretend the humanities are a monolith for a singular, innocent worldview of progressive politics. If anything, the social sciences have shown an astounding array of sociopolitical ideologies, and painting all of these arguments as perfect dangerously erases the harm our fields have caused in the past. For example, the involvement of social sciences and economics figureheads in the Pinochet regime in Chile.
Perhaps one of the most optimistic messages I learned in a humanities class was when my first philosophy professor recommended that I read Albert Camus’ “The Myth of Sisyphus,” in which the absurdist philosopher argues that struggle, even when seemingly meaningless, gives life meaning. And while I cannot credit Camus for curing my nihilism — I’ll admit that I also get pessimistic from time to time — he and countless other humanities discourses sparked my militant optimism.
Considering our own opinion section has written extensively about how information overload causes mental health risks, it’s important that we also address how to combat nihilism beyond the classroom. Students should make use of supportive social networks as much as possible, whether that’s from therapy, a friend to vent to or an organization dedicated to a social cause. More often than not, we ignore the communal aspects of change and place all burden upon ourselves. Likewise, humanities faculty should give students comfort by affirming that systemic evils can be toppled down — after all, history teaches us that no empire is meant to last.
And maybe I’m just a naive optimist — a stubborn one for sure — but I do not believe pessimism can feed the fires of social advocacy. If students truly want to commit to change and progress in society, then nihilism needs to be replaced with a sense of purpose and a vision of hope. This does not mean abandoning their deep cynicism towards the establishment either; if anything, it means that it’s time to become more assertive in our demands.
After all, if the absurdists were right about one thing, it’s that life’s purpose comes from rebellion and struggle. Even if we’re trying to push a giant boulder uphill.
