The Australian Academy of the Humanities warns that universities cutting the humanities is a “sovereign risk” to the nation’s “skills and knowledge capabilities.”
In particular, Academy president Stephen Garton (Uni Sydney) slams ANU for proposed cuts to HASS programs and centres which, “represent the loss of irreplaceable national assets.” He points to “similar recent cuts” at the University of Tasmania and Macquarie, Wollongong and La Trobe universities.
“Our nation’s understanding of key regions – such as Indonesia, Russia and South Asia – is already imperilled. Programs and expertise that have taken generations to build are vanishing,” he said.
“The consequences for Australia’s international positioning and domestic cohesion are real and immediate.”
And he calls on the Australian Tertiary Education Commission (ATEC) to, coordinate, “a national audit of disciplinary expertise and to assess the implications for Australia’s future knowledge base.”
However ATEC’s enabling legislation is yet to be put to parliament.
Professor Garton adds the Job Ready Graduates student fee model is “disproportionately harming” regional, Indigenous and disadvantaged humanities students, “who are more likely to take courses in society and culture than other disciplines.
He urges the Government to match its funding for manufacturing, to “back Australian thinking.”
The Academy’s call is in line with the other peak HASS body. Chair of the Council for the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, Frank Bongiorno (ANU) argues, HASS graduates are needed given, “democracies are under threat and disinformation undermines public rationality.”