"I Think They Barely Tolerate Us": How Humanities Cuts Impact Students
Ryleigh Johnson | September 9, 2025
Photo of Jensen by Vivian Bryan
In 2009, at Warren Wilson College (WWC), you could be a Women’s Studies, Global Studies, History/Political Science, Modern Languages, Religious Studies or Theatre/English major. In 2025, these options no longer exist. The disappearance of these humanities programs at WWC reflects a larger pattern of cuts to the humanities across higher education, along with the rise in popularity and institutional support of STEM majors like Animal Science, Biochemistry, Data Science and Environmental Science.
Jay Roberts, WWC’s provost, situates these cuts in a larger, nationwide story of a devaluation of the humanities, caused by factors as wide-reaching as the 2008 financial recession, the perception that earning a humanities degree will not lead to a job after college, and the rising cost of higher education in the United States.
“We're in this neoliberal moment where the instrumental value of education is the degree to which it supports your career…” Roberts said. “Folks are voting with the principles of their wallet.”
Roberts noted that lower numbers of college students seeking humanities degrees, combined with larger budgetary issues experienced by higher education institutions, have left “provosts and presidents [asking], ‘Wow, can we continue to invest in an area that has one or two majors a year?’”
Despite this larger national story, humanities programs at WWC have maintained persistent popularity. Creative writing consistently ranked as one of the top five most popular majors at WWC between 2022 and 2024, along with majors that include aspects of the humanities, such as environmental studies.
Carol Howard, associate provost and professor of English, emphasized how the humanities often play a part in more science–leaning majors.
“Anytime you see a major called something-studies, it means it's interdisciplinary,” Howard said.
“There will always be a humanities element. If you take environmental studies, you will be taking environmental ethics…Our [humanities] class enrollments are large; there is a false impression that they're not. I think that's part of the way that the national conversation has colored [students], because mom is saying, ‘Don't go major in something other than business,’ [but the humanities are] where students are gravitating in colleges.”
Chloe Raines, a senior creative writing major, was unsurprised to learn that creative writing was a popular program. She did note that, despite the program’s popularity, she and her fellow creative writing majors receive less institutional support than their more STEM-oriented peers.
“At the end of every semester, the Warren Wilson College Instagram will post little snapshots of people who have just graduated, about their capstone, or people who graduated in the past couple years and about what they're doing now,” Raines said. “Never once since I have been here have they posted a creative writing major. Not once, ever. Also, have you been in Jensen? It's very scary in there.”
Jensen Hall, the building where classes in creative writing, English, philosophy and history are held, also acts as the office space for faculty in the humanities departments. Philip Otterness, former chair of the History/Political Science department at WWC, also noted that Jensen was a less-than-ideal academic setting.
“When they built [Boon Hall], where the social sciences are, it was like, ‘All right, who's going to move into there?’” Otterness said. “They said, ‘Well, we're going to move the social sciences and not the humanities’…I mean, of course, you have to make a decision…but it also gives you the sense that we value humanities less than we value the social sciences. At the time, they told us, ‘But don't worry, we're going to renovate Jensen. Jensen is going to be a fabulous building!’ None of that ever took place except on the first floor, and that was only because that's where the social sciences were.”
Otterness, who first began working at WWC in 1996 and retired in 2022, watched the end of the history/political science major in real time. In the fall of 2022, Otterness was asked to come out of retirement for a semester to help navigate changes within the department.
“The history and political science department was strong right up until the point when it essentially disappeared,” Otterness said. “It was hugely sad for me to see as I went through the fall of ‘22…I had 25 advisees. The department was still flourishing. It wasn't as if they got rid of the history and political science department because we couldn't get any students to enroll.”
Despite this popularity, WWC’s administration made the decision to end the major. In the fall semester of 2024, history/political science was reconstituted as the public humanities major, which offers concentrations in either philosophy or history, but not political science.
“I think part of it is what [the administration] would say is, ‘Well, look, there aren't that many students going into [the history/political science major]...’” Otterness said. “I would have accepted [the major closing] if all the history and political science majors had gone away. [The administration] could point to national data, which showed that history departments were losing students like crazy. But that was not true at Warren Wilson.”
Mac Ware, a senior, was one of the last students to declare a history/political science major. Though he is able to finish his major because he declared during a catalogue year when the major was still an option, he has faced significant challenges.
“I have a lot of difficulty finding courses that work,” Ware said. “We have difficulty finding faculty. I'm a senior now, I'm looking at doing [my] capstone. Having relationships with faculty and being able to utilize faculty is so important, especially when you get into your final years here. The fact that we haven't really had faculty who've been here long enough to create those relationships does really do some harm.”
Ware acknowledged that history and political science might not have been a flagship program at the school, but still emphasized the importance of equal support for all students, regardless of their major.
“At Wilson, the sciences…get a lot more support than the humanities, even though we are not a science-specific college, in fact, we're a liberal arts college,” Ware said. “I would not say the administration does a fantastic job of supporting the humanities. I think they barely tolerate us.”
The administration maintains that they are actively working to improve WWC’s humanities programs and are thinking critically about the role they play in a liberal arts education. Roberts insisted that, despite cuts to the humanities at the college, there are reasons to be hopeful, like the $1.5 million grant that the college received in 2024 from the late Helmar Nielsen for the purpose of promoting the humanities on campus.
“Through this wonderful donation from Helmar Nielsen, we now have significant resources to bring to bear, including bringing speakers onto campus and creating what we're hoping is a humanities Fellows Program,” Roberts said. “It's not all bad news. It's actually really good news. We've [just] got to take a hot second to reorganize what and how it is that we want to approach the humanities.”
For now, humanities programs at WWC remain an option for students, though in smaller numbers each year. Since 2009, the college has cut six humanities majors, even as they have added an additional six STEM majors. These cuts come alongside the loss of essential humanities faculty like Spanish professor Christine Swoap, whose departure marked the end of WWC students’ ability to study a foreign language on campus.
Whether adequately supported by the administration or not, students like Raines continue to value their humanities education, not only for the academic skills it can hone but also for its potential to challenge them as people.
“[The humanities] make you take the time to breathe and look at things and think critically so that you have the capacity to comprehend more than just what's right in front of you…” Raines said. “The capacity to enjoy these things and think about them is so taken for granted because it's just like, ‘What are you gonna do with that major?’ instead of, ‘Are you becoming a better person? Are you bettering your craft? Do you have a deeper understanding of the world? Do you have a deeper understanding of yourself?’”