On Culture. “Culture” is where all three major branches of knowledge/university departments (natural sciences, social sciences and humanities) may intersect, as the term’s connotation expands. For example, the faculty may engage in the following research projects: “A Cultural History of Science Research in the University,” “Ethnography of a Cultural Event: A Grounded Theory Approach,” and “The Political Economy of an Art Form.” “Culture” allows for the convergences of disciplines. “Culture” is grounded in both the humanities and the social sciences and the potential collaborations that may be engaged through the said boulders of disciplines may help propel interdisciplinarity, multidisciplinary and pandisciplinarity in the university.

On the Arts. Inseparable from the humanities are the arts, which include literature, music, fine arts, media arts, digital arts and architecture. Broadly, it may refer to the “liberal arts,” which is the philosophical basis of the humane letters. It its contemporary sense, it also refers to the applied arts of painting, sculpture, music, film, broadcast, architecture, digital, popular art, folk art and other emergent art forms and modes.

On the Humanities. The humanistic research paradigm may be interpreted as the counterpoint of the empirical research. Firstly, humanistic research investigates the human sciences in their various connotations: the arts, culture and philosophy. Secondly, in an age of posthumanism and postmodernism, it may be beneficial to reassert the value of the human being through the following disciplines: philosophy, languages, linguistics, literature, media arts, art studies, religion and history. The humanities – both as epistemological bases and as a cluster of research paradigms – should be able to enliven both theoretical and applied researches in the university. Thirdly, the phenomenological and hermeneutical paradigms of qualitative research methods draw inspiration from the humanistic disciplines.