Pathways, June 2026
Each month, we keep track of the different paths that modern life is taking and how writers are keeping up. Here are some routes we recently found in our modern life.
Welcome back to “Pathways!”
One of the more consequential conversations of this past month was the debate about the future of the liberal arts and the humanities, fueled in large part by the publication of two documents in early April: first, on April 5th, the “Report on the State of Scholarship in the Humanities and the Humanistic Sciences,” and second, on April 10th, the “Report of the Yale Committee on Trust in Higher Education.” The documents circle around key themes like the over-politicization of higher education, objectivity and truth, the alleged breakdown in scholarly standards, the challenges that AI poses to higher education, and social trust. As you can imagine, they have provoked a range of responses.
What I offer below are several points of entry into the sprawling debate about what the liberal arts and the humanities are for.
Len Gutkin and Evan Goldstein interview the authors of the April 5th report for the Chronicle of Higher Education. Read this one to get a great overview of critical takes on the report. See also Richard Moran’s unfavorable evaluation.
For a particularly spirited and incisive description of how the humanities arrived here—and who is to blame—see Justin Smith-Ruiu’s recent essay.
In late May, Jennifer Frey, philosophy professor and stalwart defender of the liberal arts, was a guest on Ross Douthat’s podcast discussing the state of the liberal arts. A few weeks later, N. Ángel Pinillos, also a professor of philosophy, critiqued her in the Chronicle for offering the “standard” case for the humanities—one revolving around intrinsic value and human freedom—and argued that cases for the humanities ought to be more “straightforward and persuasive,” emphasizing their instrumental value, especially in an age of AI. See Frey’s excellent rebuttal in her Substack—and stay tuned: there is apparently a debate being scheduled between Frey and Pinillos in January.
Last, for a genealogical sketch of the modern research university, see Nils Gilman’s “The University As We Know It Is Finished.”
Other work that caught our eye this month:
In Commonweal, Anthony Domestico reviews Melanie McDonagh’s new book about British writers’ turn to Catholicism in the early twentieth century, and GenMod friend Kit Wilson (see his excellent essays in GenMod from last November here and here) takes a closer look at Michael Pollan’s latest book on the mystery of consciousness.
Anne Snyder of Comment interviews Manuel Dürr, a painter who nearly gave up his craft before he was chosen to paint the latest Stations of the Cross for St. Peter’s Basilica.
The Economist shows that the politics of AI models skew secular and liberal.
In Church Life Journal, Timothy P. O’Malley explores how Augustine’s life—in particular his response to the sack of Rome and the rise of Donatism—offers a genealogical resource for the Church in our troubled times, while Michael Wee wonders whether we lean too heavily on Augustine as originator of “just war” theory in a moment when the nature of war and peace have changed drastically.
We’ll see you at the end of July—and we hope you have a great Semiquincentennial celebration this 4th!
