Somebody said that the media only give you the little picture, never the big picture. The humanities give you the big picture. Sometimes it's so big that it's hard to apply to the immediate circumstances, but you always find the large perspective from the humanities. The humanities represent a striving for coherence in a society that today is frequently fragmented, that is intellectually fragmented. Certainly Mordecai was a disturber of Esther's peace.
Humanities bring moral perspective, moral insight.
They create a moral dimension to society. They challenge us to think deeply, to think so that we are not seduced by simplistic answers, by the rhetoric of politics and media and by the consequences of living in a consumer culture. Humanities cultivate critical intelligence. The suggestion, explicit or implied, is that rebuilding trust begins with listening to each other. As students of conflict theory, we were taught that conflict is the catalyst of change and that we shouldn't fear conflict, that it's good, unless it becomes destructive.