The Humanities major combines a rigorous general education in the humanities with a concentrated focus on a particular discipline or theme. The requirements for the major are designed to allow students to construct a program of study that fits their own intellectual interests.
The curriculum is cross-cultural in foundation and reflects the interdisciplinary strength of our faculty in areas including history, philosophy, literature, religion, film and media, and cultural studies. Humanities students engage with Asian, African, European, American, and Oceanian cultures and intellectual traditions. They learn to employ multiple disciplinary perspectives, and to engage with a wide range of different sources. Rather than developing career-specific skills, the Humanities major provides students with very general skills in reading, writing, interpretation, analysis and argument that are both highly valuable and highly transferable. Humanities majors graduate with the capacity to critically engage with our globalizing world, to contribute to contemporary scholarship, and to pursue a wide range of careers.
In the Humanities core courses, students acquire a set of methods for humanistic inquiry. Students then develop an area of thematic or disciplinary focus by taking courses in Shanghai and other NYU sites in consultation with faculty advisors. In the senior year, they take the Capstone Course and produce a final thesis to showcase their intellectual development.
