The Korean educational environment since the late twentieth century has been characterized by a so-called English fever, making its mark in numerous ways, as seen in the popularity of extracurricular cram schools (hagwons), private tutoring, and even living and studying abroad apart from one or both parents.¹ At the tertiary level, this has led to an increased popularity of English medium instruction (EMI) policies, whereby content area courses are taught in English. Yet English departments and related departments are not necessarily thriving, and various language and humanities programs are more at risk. Neoliberal pressures and a decreasing Korean population have led to some humanities and social science departments facing reductions or closures.² Humanities departments are seen as more likely targets for cuts, as their social value and importance seems less obvious to stakeholders—students, parents, university administrators, government policy makers, and the general public. This is attributable not only to common stereotypes of humanities and language fields, but also due to neoliberal pressures on the tertiary education sector.

In response to current trends, this paper explores philosophical and educational frameworks that lead to some suggestions for more clearly articulating the importance of language departments, and more generally, humanities and social science disciplines. As such, this is intended as a broader exploration of ideas for explaining the importance of these fields to stakeholders, and how scholars can better communicate this to those outside our communities. This paper will argue, perhaps surprisingly, that humanities and language education can be elucidated by a framework in the philosophy of science, namely, paradigm theory. This can actually be beneficial for non-science scholars for introspecting about the value and values of our academic disciplines. Bridging this theory with teaching practice involves considering practical educational philosophy and learner-centered instruction. When considered in light of recent social trends and needs of contemporary society and students’ needs, we can not only adapt our programs and teaching methods, but also better articulate the relevance of our fields.

In discussing language departments, a number of course topics and specializations are included, namely, literature, language skills courses (e.g., English writing and speaking courses), language education and teacher training, theoretical and applied linguistics, culture studies, and media studies (e.g., film courses). Linguistics is generally a social science³, but in Korea, linguists are generally housed in language departments or humanities divisions, and some linguistics courses seem more akin to humanities, especially undergraduate courses and theoretical linguistics. The departments housing all these disciplines and subdisciplines face significant obstacles in the current environment. The following section will summarizes these challenges, and subsequent sections will sketch out suggestions for these problems, by discussing (1) gaining a better understanding of our fields, (2) understanding our goals in teaching, and thus, the practical significance of what we do, (3) the soft skills gained from language education and their value in today’s world, and (4) suggestions for improving language programs to better serve students and thereby provide evidence for their social value.

One challenge in communicating the value of the humanities is that many of the skills gained from it are soft skills, such as analytical skills, creativity, and sociocultural skills, which are more intangible and more difficult to quantify (Lee, Moon, and Kwon) (and references therein). Yet these are quite relevant to today, especially at a time when research shows that American college graduates, for example, lack important and valuable skills, namely, critical thinking, problem solving, complex reasoning, verbal communication, and writing skills (Arum and Roksa). Such soft skills are important for functioning in society, for employability, and for career success. Similarly in Korea, research (Grubb et al. 47) has shown that companies and industry groups have expressed dissatisfaction with new hires lacking important skills, such as English skills, Chinese skills (for some companies), mathematics skills, an understanding of how markets function, problem-solving skills, and group work skills. Students’ needs for better cognitive and practical skills can be addressed by humanities studies, including courses in language departments, since such courses can develop these intellectual and personal skills.

Yet humanities departments face increasing challenges to their survival, in Korea and globally from neoliberal attitudes toward higher education. Neoliberalism and so-called academic capitalism in education utilize the language of competitiveness, efficiency, practicality and marketability, and focus on job-related skills and goals, including economic concerns of graduates’ job placement rates and salaries. In North America, neoliberal pressures have led to downsizing or cutting university humanities programs in the name of academic prioritization (Dutt-Ballerstadt), which itself is a value-laden and biased concept that raises concerns. The worst cuts to humanities and liberal arts in the US have occurred at public universities, due to a mindset that mistakes education for vocational training and workforce productivity (Arum and Roksa; Dix). For Korean students, humanities degrees may seem less appealing if their employment prospects seem poor (Lee, Moon, and Kwon).

Similar trends have been afoot in other countries. In Japan, for example, significant cuts have been made to humanities and social science programs (Jenkins). Compounding this is the fact that the value of humanities studies is unfortunately not being conveyed to students. Students in humanities courses are often unable to articulate clear reasons for studying humanities; even if they find such courses worthwhile, their understanding of the value of the humanities seems superficial (e.g., Dallinger and Mann, on students in the US). At German universities, the humanities have undergone a gradual decline in recent decades, as humanities students express concerns about the relevance of their fields and their job prospects (Multrus, Bargel, and Leitow). Humanities programs at some German tertiary institutions face risk from provincial governments’ utilitarian and often vague evaluation criteria for program effectiveness in the name of education reform (“Bayern soll neues Hochschulgesetz bekommen”). Such reforms and criteria are imbued with neoliberal values (“Reform des bayrischen Hochschulgesetzes”), the sort that are decried by German scholars as mercantilistic reasoning or values (Heller 7). These also have the unfortunate effect of pitting humanities and social sciences against the hard sciences and business fields. Similar attitudes have been problematic throughout Latin American countries (Nussbaum), where the “commercialization of education” (Herrera 85) manifests itself in government evaluation and accreditation criteria that have disfavored or hindered humanities programs in recent decades (Herrera). This global trend of devaluing or not understanding humanities needs to be addressed urgently.

Demographic pressures in Korea have compounded this situation. With population declines in Korea, the Korean government (i.e., the Ministry of Education) in recent years has pushed for reductions and closures of some departments, reductions in student admissions, and even closures of some under-performing universities. Particularly hard-hit have been humanities and social science departments, which face pressure to close, merge, reduce course offerings, and reduce student enrollments. The government has pushed for reducing student admissions to some humanities and social science departments, and increasing enrollment in STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) majors,⁴ and as Park argues, this top-down government pressure represents a threat to academic freedom. Also, these changes often occur without sufficient input from the students affected (Park, “As the Humanities Fall”; Chung).

Neoliberal and utility-based views of college majors are reflected not only in public policy, but in the treatment of humanities departments intramurally and extramurally. In Korea, the humanities are increasingly considered less relevant to the modern world, and instead more value and relevance are accorded to skills relevant to finding jobs, and to STEM and other fields that are viewed as more relevant and employable (M. Choi). Employment rates for humanities graduates are lower than for other graduates (Kim and Kim). In Korea, as in Western nations, humanities scholars and social scientists encounter inequalities and disadvantages in obtaining research funding or recognition for their work, and this situation is worse for female scholars (Kim and Kim). Korean universities face increasing pressure to restructure humanities departments that are viewed as not valuable for finding good jobs (“Universities Need Reorganization”). In light of recent reductions to humanities programs, Korean policy makers seem unaware of, and not properly informed of, the value of humanities studies.

EMI is another manifestation of both English fever and neoliberal policies in Korea. This is despite questions about its appropriateness for some majors, and the problems reported for EMI instruction. EMI often happens at the expense of educational quality, especially when the students and professors are not sufficiently proficient in English, and students thus learn less effectively (Lozano and Strotmann; Altbach). Even for students and professors with stronger English skills, as in northern European nations, EMI can hinder learning and teaching effectiveness (Jensen and Thøgersen; Vinke, Snippe, and Jochems). Such problems have been well attested for EMI courses in Korea, where students reportedly cannot adequately comprehend lectures well enough, or do class tasks or assignments in English; students see little or no substantive improvement in their English skills; and at the same time, professors report difficulties in conducting lessons and covering course contents in English (G. Lee; Cho; S.-J. Choi; G. J. Lee; Kim, Kweon, and Kim). Often EMI is often implemented in an inflexible manner, without allowing for sufficient use of students’ first language. EMI seems to work best with native English speaker instructors (Kym and Kym), and in departments where students and faculty have better English skills, such as English, international studies, and business departments.

Current English language policies can in fact be counterproductive, in that they can hinder the study of other foreign languages, which are also important, and it can hinder the work of humanities scholars in Korea. The trend toward EMI is partly inspired by increasing pressure to publish papers in English in international journals, and this pressure is inspired by neoliberal assumptions, e.g., that it is up to individual universities to improve their quality and output, or publish in English or perish (H. Lee and K. Lee). This can be burdensome for humanities scholars outside of English departments. Furthermore, having to publish research in English can limit the domestic influence of humanities scholars and departments, e.g., in promoting humanities in the local language, engaging in relevant debates about domestic issues, and countering fake news and popular misconceptions in the local language (Altbach). English fever, especially at the university level, has had a detrimental effect on foreign language education, as seen in the decline in the popularity of European languages and other languages (Finch) and the closure of some European language departments at Korean universities (J.Y. Park; Kang).

The nation’s English fever and EMI have not necessarily promoted students’ communicative competence in English. Despite students’ effort and exposure to classroom English, they do not necessarily have the English skills needed for some jobs. Also, the value of EMI for other departments seems debatable, as EMI (in the ambitious manner in which it has been implemented in Korean universities) seems ill-suited to STEM fields and other fields. Rather, a vigorous EMI policy seems like a more sensible option for certain departments like English. Finally, the popularity of English, including EMI, does not seem to have benefited language departments, and it does not necessarily protect English language departments (or related departments) from government or university pressures to undergo reductions.

In this current challenging environment, we need to articulate more effectively the rationale, social value, and utility of our programs, and we need to approach EMI more strategically. For those questions, we turn to paradigm theory and educational theory in the following sections.

Thomas Kuhn’s famous opus (The Structure of Scientific Revolutions), which analyzes the scientific enterprise from a philosophical and sociological perspective, describes how scientists view their fields and their work via a structured social and conceptual framework known as a paradigm. While Kuhn focused on science fields, his description of disciplinary paradigms are applicable to our fields as well, as it can help to understand and describe the values of language and humanities fields and subfields in all their complexity.

An academic discipline is characterized by a set of guiding assumptions and principles that are shared by a community of scientists, or for our purposes, communities of scholars. This includes the following: (1) what the field is about, including the important questions that drive the field, and the issues to be dealt with; (2) shared values (axiology), e.g., regarding the worth the objects studied, and how and why it is studied; (3) the purpose and goals of the field or of research areas (teleology), and what scholars wish to accomplish; (4) what is considered worthwhile knowledge, and how one gains new knowledge of the subject (epistemology), which in turn shapes the field’s research methodology; and ultimately, (5) the theory, or explanatory principles, of a discipline. The theory or theories of a discipline define much of a scholar’s worldview. In scientific and academic English, a theory is not a guess, conjecture, or hypothesis; rather, it is an explanatory framework—a complex explanatory conceptual framework that is designed to explain certain phenomena or to answer certain questions. A discipline’s theories can define its values, goals, and epistemology, e.g., in that it defines what topics and issues are important, what warrants investigation, the research goals, and how scholars view and pursue new knowledge in the field. All these components constitute an academic paradigm, or an academic worldview.

A field’s paradigm, including its goals, theories and research, constitutes a scholar’s academic worldview. A paradigm also shapes how we do research, in that the types of values, questions and theories of a community of scholars impart a preference for theoretical, qualitative, or quantitative research. For example, linguistics is not just learning languages and translation, but the study of human language and the language faculty. Various schools of linguists believe their work to be valuable for understanding language in different ways for different purposes, and pursue different types of theories and research methodologies accordingly. This may involve qualitative, quantitative, theoretical, or mixed methods research, depending on their particular goals and how they conceptualize language as a topic of study. Theoretical linguists focus on understanding the internal, abstract workings of language; applied linguists focus on how languages are learned or taught; and others focus on language as a social or cultural subject matter. Others take a more cognitive or scientific approach, assuming that language can be studied empirically as a cognitive faculty. Literature scholars believe in the value of literature for its own sake, for aesthetic reasons, for its intellectual value, or for understanding the human condition. Their field and their courses are considered valuable, since students can better understand the target language, their world, themselves, and human experience by the worlds and realities presented by literary works, which often present experiences that differ from those of the readers. Their field is driven by goals like understanding the craft of particular literary pieces, and how readers interact with literary works. Schoalrs also understand that literary analysis is beneficial for developing critical thinking skills or creative thinking skills.⁵ Each field or subfield can be identified by these and other values.

It is important to consider how we would communicate our core beliefs and values to outsiders. This, however, is not straightforward. Scholars in a particular field or subfield belong to a particular community composed of those sharing the same goals, theoretical interests, and research methods. We all belong to a community of like-minded scholars, and as such, we have our own values, nomenclature, in-group attitudes, and in-group ways of talking. Our “dialect” and beliefs will not be clearly comprehended by outsiders, such as students, administrators, or the public. This itself is not a fault, as it is typical of any academic discipline, but this does pose challenges when dealing with those outside our communities. As educators and scholars trained and socialized in a particular discipline, we also face another problem. Experts in any field have difficulty explaining concepts of the field to students (or outsiders), an effect known as the expert paradox (Bransford, Brown, and Cocking). Students do not see the connections that professors automatically see between facts and ideas, nor do they understand the terminology that we freely use. When we attempt to explain our academic fields, key concepts, our research, or its importance, our explanations can easily fail to communicate. This can be problematic if students graduate with a weak conceptual understanding of what they have studied (as most do not go on for graduate studies to become more fully socialized into the paradigm; most will complete a terminal bachelor’s degree and enter the job market).

Academic paradigms can characterize the research interests and work of language scholars, but this may not seem meaningful to students or others. To better articulate the social value of our respective disciplines, scholars in various departments need to reflect on and verbalize the various values, goals and methods of their research and classroom teaching. As we identify various ideas, we should realize that some paradigm-specific values may not be very meaningful to others. For example, the value of language, literature, or particular research methods may not resonate with others. However, we can identify values that are comprehensible to others. This might include ethical and moral concerns related to our fields, or the practical language skills that students gain from literature and linguistics. Students also gain some training in analytical skills by reading, critiquing, or engaging in research, and exposure to research of any form can be valuable. Whether they engage with theoretical, qualitative, quantitative, or critical work, whether via literature, culture, education, or linguistics, they can gain critical thinking and analytical skills. These are valuable soft skills and experiences for students in their lives and in the job market. These are also practical benefits that are worth articulating to stakeholders.

Language departments have a fairly diverse lot of scholars, paradigms, and subparadigms. It is important to reflect on our specific goals, values, and assumptions as scholars. The sample descriptions of some paradigms above is necessarily general, since multiple academic disciplines and subdisciplines, paradigms and subparadigms, and departments are included here. Scholars in these communities need to engage in frank discussions with each other about the specific values, goals, motivations, theoretical assumptions, and benefits of their fields that need to be articulated to our students and to the public. Our ideas, when verbalized, can be diverse, depending on our own motivations, subdisciplines, and research interests. Scholars of various paradigms also need to identify specific, meaningful goals for how they teach and mentor students. To bridge this gap, we turn next to pedagogical philosophies.

An understanding of practical pedagogical philosophies can provide further rationale for the educational value of our programs. These are principles, often implicit in the minds of classroom teachers, that guide their teaching methods, and that shape how teachers use class time, how they teach via lecture and other methods, and the contents they choose to focus on (Zinn; Conti). For example, one might teach according to a classical liberal philosophy, which views the teacher as a guide for immature learners, and emphasizes the transmission of knowledge from teacher to student, with the goal of the students’ intellectual development, or training and intellectual preparation for a career. Intellectual development, character development, and the search for truth are more the focus of more idealistically inclined classical liberal teachers. More pragmatic or realist classical liberal teaching focuses on vocational preparation and skills needed for the real world, such as rational and critical thinking skills and specialized skills (Conti). A progressive teaching philosophy emphasizes the social aspects of learning; this is of course shaped by educational theories of John Dewey and Lev Vygotsky (see, e.g., Glassman). Students do not learn well by listening passively, but require social interaction and intellectual engagement; they learn via social interaction and via hands-on learning or experiential learning. Paulo Freire’s radical education takes this further, emphasizing the need to impart students with practical skills for future jobs (since Freire was concerned with helping those in poverty), to be active citizens in society, and to prepare students to change society. Humanistic education (from humanistic psychology of the 1960s) emphasizes the role of education and of educators as facilitators in improving students’ lives, and helping them to grow and meet their core psychological, social and intellectual needs, such as self-understanding.

The various values and goals of these pedagogical approaches can help us identify specific ways to better meet students’ needs, and further points that need to be articulated to stakeholders concerning the nature of our programs.

Various aspects of these teaching philosophies point to how we can better argue for the social value and necessity of our programs. Humanities and language education can impart soft skills or cognitive benefits for students, and the value of these skills and benefits become clear when we consider the needs of students as they leave college, enter the world, and face the unique challenges of contemporary society. Some of these skill benefits can be explained to the public with relevant educational research as evidence for these benefits. These benefits also need to be made clearer to our students, who may be concerned about their job prospects and the relevance of their majors. This approach also points to ways to improve education in language and humanities departments; such improvements then need to be publicized in order to better explain the importance of these programs.

The classical liberal ideals may be more familiar to the general public. In contrast, the more modern ideals—the progressive, radical and humanistic ideals—are less familiar to the public, but probably familiar to those in modern language pedagogy, as these values are implicit in the framework of communicative language teaching (CLT) and related approaches such as task-based language teaching (TBLT). The classical liberal and radical approaches value analytical and critical thinking skills, which are needed for employment and job success. These are also important skills for citizens in our modern world. With the rise of conspiracy theories other erroneous beliefs propagated through social media and the Internet, these skills are increasingly crucial for surviving and thriving in contemporary society. Character development is another concern of some in the classical liberal tradition, while the humanistic perspective goes further in how it values moral reasoning, humanistic ethics, and prosocial behavior. The progressive and radical perspectives value experiential and practical learning, including learning that is relevant to career preparation and advancement. In the humanistic, progressive and radical perspectives, cross-cultural skills would also be valued. In all these traditions, written and verbal communication skills would be seen as important for various reasons, such as for vocational success, for personal benefits, for cultivating better citizens, and so students can become future agents of change in society. These various skills can be imparted by humanities and language studies, and these can be selling points as we argue for the value of our academic departments.

Arguments can be framed based on empirical research from educational psychology on the cognitive benefits of humanities studies, which may communicate to the public more effectively when abstract, logical arguments fail to be persuasive. Various psychological studies have shown cognitive benefits of reading and studying literature, including learning new information about the world (Marsh, Meade, and Roediger). Broader perspectives are gained via the psychological phenomenon known as transportation, whereby a reader is transported into the story, leading to greater empathy, emotional understanding and perception, and prosocial behavior (Johnson; Bal and Veltkamp). Through fiction, readers can experience emotions and better understand their own emotions (Oatley). Engaging with literature creates deep, simulative experiences that improves readers’ experience, understanding, and communication of social information, a sort of learning by virtual experience; this can lead to a better understanding of others who are different from the reader, better empathy, and better social inferencing skills (Mar and Oatley). Literary experiences have this effect, at least in part, by engaging and developing readers’ theory of mind, or their ability to conceptualize others’ mental states (Kidd and Castano). For these reasons, studying literature can also help students develop their emotional intelligence (Mai). Studying and reading literature can also help students in learning an L2 and developing a more positive attitude toward an L2 (Khatib and Askari).

By studying language arts (and other humanities), students can gain cognitive flexibility, i.e., the ability to adapt their analytical skills and strategies to new situations or conditions. This flexibility is important for problem solving and creativity (Ionescu), and for developing better study habits and attitudes toward studying (Önen and Koçak). It correlates with emotional intelligence, self-efficacy, general mental health, and life satisfaction (Odacı and Cikrikci; Malkoç and Sünbül; Jen, Chen, and Wu). It also correlates with cognitive intelligence or flexibility, i.e., the ability to function in new and diverse cultural contexts, interact with people from other backgrounds, and being willing to learn about other cultures (Bernardo and Presbitero). Those lacking cognitive flexibility can behave in a nonfunctional manner in a new environment, and can make poor decisions and make errors (Canas, Fajardo, and Salmeron). Language learning, for example, can impart cognitive flexibility, as learners learn to have flexible mental representations (e.g., expression of words and ideas in two languages), attend to non-linguistic and pragmatic cues for interpretation, and become less bound to literal interpretations of sentences (Deak). Not surprisingly, bilingualism correlates with cognitive flexibility and other cognitive advantages (Ibrahim et al.).

Intellectual integrity in our contemporary social environment requires scientific literacy, media literacy, and critical thinking skills. This leads to another line of argumentation for the value of our fields. Humanities programs can help impart critical thinking skills and media literacy skills, and these share some principles in common with scientific literacy. The cosmologist Carl Sagan popularized his “baloney detection” or necessary skills and criteria for scientific and media literacy. These include independent confirmation of facts (versus popular rumors or unsubstantiated claims), information and debate from qualified experts on a topic, not trusting arguments from authority, examining multiple possible hypotheses or explanations, not being emotionally or personally attached to one hypothesis, and only entertaining an explanation or hypothesis that is falsifiable, i.e., it can be tested, and if wrong, it can be shown to be wrong (Sagan). Some of these principles parallel those of media literacy, i.e., relying on reputable sources and multiple sources of information, confirmation of information, and objectivity.

Students can learn not only critical thinking skills, but skills for deconstructing false beliefs, e.g., by countering false narratives. Humans follow implicit psychological narratives to make sense of their lives and their worlds. These are often implicit, unverbalized mental conceptual structures with a narrative-like form that explain complex phenomena (e.g.,key events that shaped my life and made me who I am, or why our society is the way it is). Just as a literary narrative or story can shape readers’ attitudes, opinions and evaluations of characters (Green and Brock), a psychological narrative is a mental framework that persons construct, or adopt from others, which colors how they view others—fellow believers, non-believers, and political figures. This is important for understanding how conspiracy theories work. A conspiracy theory provides unsuspecting amateurs with a narrative, an informal story of sorts, that offers a sense of coherence and understanding to a large set of unrelated events. For example, an Illuminati type conspiracy theory provides a detailed history that seems to make sense of geopolitical and economic developments that seemingly explain whatever perplexes the cognitive victim, such as liberalizing cultural changes, the effects of modern science on culture and politics, economic changes, and why s/he cannot find a good job. The popularity of such false beliefs in North America and in European Union is familiar, but we cannot assume that Koreans or other Asians are immune, given not only the popularity of social media, but also daunting social problems like economic inequality, or the poor job situation for recent college graduates. Many here are potential targets, such as those who cannot find good jobs, those lacking media literacy, those who lack scientific literacy and do not see the need for it, those who are attracted to extreme political beliefs, or those who do not understand the need for feminism, gender equality, or addressing discrimination in society.

Clear arguments can be made for the value of humanities and social science programs for the cognitive skills to protect against false beliefs. Such issues can also be dealt with explicitly in content and language skills courses, under the rubrics of critical thinking skills and Internet and media literacy skills. These and other soft skills are crucial for students’ employment, career success, and professional development, and also for their own personal development and their effective participation in society. We can then point to how our degree programs impart these crucial life skills such as critical thinking skills, analytical and problem solving skills, baloney detection, media literacy, creative thinking skills, cognitive flexibility, cross-cultural abilities, communicative abilities in English and other languages, emotional intelligence and stability, and overall life satisfaction.

To better meet students’ needs and to better argue for the social value of language programs, departments also need to undertake improvements to revitalize their programs. This includes updating classroom pedagogical methods when needed, embracing appropriate use of EMI in English departments⁶, addressing particular needs for cognitive soft skills in contemporary society, and more interdisciplinary collaboration. Then the strengths and improvements in these programs need to be articulated and publicized to the general public.

Teachers’ classroom practice is shaped by one or more pedagogical philosophies and their teaching experiences. A classical educator tends to rely on lecture format, while those influenced by other philosophies might rely on a mixture of lecture, group tasks, interactive learning, and other modern methods. The trend toward modern teaching methods has been influenced by progressive educators, a wealth of education research demonstrating the benefits of interactive and inductive teaching methods, and developments in particular fields. This has arisen in language teaching fields, particularly in CLT. These approaches belong to the wider rubric of active learning methods that have arisen in education in the past half century, as interactive, experiential, and problem-solving methods have arisen independently in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) pedagogy, health science and medical pedagogy, and other areas of secondary and tertiary education (Bransford, Brown, and Cocking). For language educators, the basic tenets of CLT can be helpful starting points in identifying how other courses can be improved.

Content area courses in English departments in Korea (e.g., linguistics, literature, pedagogy, culture and media studies) might be taught in lecture, lecture-discussion, or active learning styles. Pure lecture classes represent passive learning, and while lecture-discussion is a move in the right direction, this alone is not enough. A consistent move to active learning courses throughout our programs is needed to improve students’ learning and cognitive development. A large body of research shows that students in active learning classes gain more conceptual knowledge (not just factual information), learn more deeply, better retain what they have learned, and are able to transfer their skills to other areas beyond the classroom, learn teamwork skills, and often learn better in group activities than alone (Bransford, Brown, and Cocking; Chi and Wylie; Michael). Deeper conceptual learning and understanding come as students construct their own internal mental representations of concepts, rather than passively receiving information. These benefits are likely familiar to those who teach language skills courses in a CLT framework, where students gain better communicative skills, language strategies, reading skills, and understanding than in traditional classrooms (Spada; Tegegne; Whong). Active learning and CLT methods are flexible, and need not entirely replace lectures. Rather, professors can alternate between brief lectures, discussion, and interactive activities. Short think-pair-share tasks can complement lecture-discussion forms (e.g., students are given a question to discuss briefly with one or two neighbors in class before whole-class discussion of the topic). Other group activities and tasks include problem-solving activities, case study discussion, inductive discussion and learning tasks, peer based learning (where students must explain to each other their reasoning for an answer to a problem), and minor or major group assignments. Many lecture topics can provide opportunities for group discussion; instead of providing information via lecture, professors can instead have students discuss questions in groups. Discussion questions can be open-ended, or guided toward a specific answer, as in problem-based or discovery learning.

Content area courses in English departments in Korea may be taught in Korean, English, or a mixture, depending on the professors and their comfort levels with all-English instruction. To promote students’ language skills, most or all courses can be implemented in an EMI format. This can be a more flexible EMI format, where at least the majority of class sessions is conducted in English, since the students’ first language can sometimes be a helpful learning scaffold for learning. Professors and students who are less comfortable with the demands of full-length lectures in English can benefit by combining EMI with active learning methods. Instead of long English lectures, professors can punctuate lectures with discussion activities and group activities. Small group tasks can provide students opportunities to use English (when encouraged or required to do so) in a setting that may be less face-threatening than having to speak up before an entire class. In fact, research shows that small group and interactive tasks can work with Korean students, and can help them to develop critical thinking and English communication skills (DeWaelsche).

A flexible EMI policy in English and related departments can allow for another change that is needed for revitalizing language departments in Korea. With the declining domestic student population, our departments need to internationalize by attracting more international students. One of the neoliberal or administrative rationales for EMI has been attracting international students and faculty, and for language departments, this is a must. EMI can be a strong selling point in attracting good-quality international students to boost our programs⁷. Likewise, other language departments can focus on advanced courses taught in their target languages (e.g., French, Chinese, etc.) to attract foreign students. This offers an added benefit of increasing educational diversity. Years of research data has shown that socially and ethnically diverse classroom environments exposes students to new perspectives, which leads to better learning, including benefits for cognitive, critical thinking skills, creative thinking skills, moral reasoning, cross-cultural skills, and social awareness (Gurin, Nagda, and Lopez; Gurin, Nagda, and Lopez; Smith and Schonfeld). These can be important life skills and job skills, especially for students seeking jobs with international companies. In fact, any attempt at internationalizing education in Korea, including EMI policies, needs to be framed within the ethical perspective of socioethnic diversity (Moon) and its social and educational benefits, in order to avoid the adverse effects of neoliberal pressures or policies.

By modernizing pedagogy in language departments, we can better prepare students for post-college life. Active learning with EMI can better prepare students with communicative, linguistic, cognitive and sociocultural skills, not only for their personal development, but also to better prepare them for the job market. In job interviews, students can explain the soft skills gained from their college studies as relevant reasons for hiring. Job interview questions typically consist of direct skills questions (what skills the applicants possess), experiential questions about how applicants gained or used their skills, situational questions (“what would you do if...”), and analytical problem-solving questions, with the last two aimed at testing their skills or knowledge (Hartwell, Johnson, and Posthuma). If students are aware of their soft skills, they can better answer these questions. If students possess these soft skills, they are more likely to succeed in work and life. Imparting these soft skills can come through humanities and social science education, especially if curricula and pedagogy are based on active learning methods. Students also need to be more aware of these soft skills so they can handle job interviews and succeed in their careers.

We need to also confront stereotypes that students with degrees from our fields are only qualified to work in traditional humanities related careers, or that these degrees doom them to being unemployed or under-employed. Students with these skills should be ideal candidates for jobs with international companies, start-up companies, educational institutions, government jobs, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Students need a stronger awareness of their soft skills, the relevance of their majors, and their employablility. This can be done with discussion questions in language skills courses (e.g., English speaking or writing) and content area courses, in which they discuss why they chose their major, the advantages of their majors, and how they can use their majors in life, for careers, and for finding jobs. This may also be helpful for those students who have weaker confidence or intrinsic motivation toward their majors. These issues can also be addressed by means of departmental workshops and seminars designed to help students discuss and become aware of their soft skills, and to prepare them for job interviews. Special programs like that could help students identify soft skills and transferable skills, which are valuable as life skills or job skills.

When language, humanities, and social science departments address these needs of students more effectively, they can better articulate their social value. When these departments can point to their effectiveness in preparing students via active learning to impart communicative language skills, cognitive skills, and other soft skills, they can also make a stronger case for their importance.

As we try to articulate the importance of our programs, we must also remember that we are not in competition with other departments, and that this is not a zero-sum game. In fact, more interdisciplinary collaboration among humanities, social sciences and STEM fields is needed for addressing complex social issues. As scholars reflect on the values and goals of their paradigms, some goals can be identified that they share with those in social sciences and physical sciences, which can form a basis for greater cross-disciplinary collaboration. Digital humanities need to be embraced, yet humanities scholars in Korea have been slow to embrace this, or to collaborate with researchers from STEM departments (Cha). This is of course not an option for every humanities professor, but at the department level, this is one avenue to revitalizing humanities education. Similarly, interdisciplinary research and programs (or so-called fusion programs) with social science and STEM departments are needed, including newer fields such as: (1) natural language processing, computational linguistics, and artificial intelligence research; (2) corpus-based research, e.g. qualitative and quantitative research on linguistic and literary corpora; (3) biolinguistics⁸, or the biological underpinnings of language, along with the evolutionary psychology of language; (4) psycholinguistics and neurolinguistics, e.g., the cognitive and biological underpinnings of language and of first and second language learning; (5) neuroesthetics, or the neurological study of how humans perceive artistic and musical beauty; (6) educational psychology research on humanities education; (7) medical humanities, which involves historical, sociological, cultural, artistic, and philosophical studies of medical education and practice; (8) environmental humanities; and (9) promoting media literacy and scientific literacy, which should go hand-in-hand. Active engagement in cross-disciplinary research is needed for revitalizing language and humanities fields, and to provide a stronger rationale and evidence for our existence; and when researchers and departments do engage in such work, this needs to be better publicized. More interdisciplinary course offerings would also provide more diverse training and preparation for students.

The humanities have not been promoted as well in Korea, and is not unheard of for those outside of academia to question the value of language and humanities education. These questions are often rooted in neoliberal or utilitarian assumptions about education, and a misunderstanding of the value of these fields. In articulating the value and need for language education, linguistics, and literature studies to the public or to university administrations, the temptation is to rely on traditional arguments rooted in traditional or idealistic educational philosophies, or that merely express the values of our disciplinary paradigms. However, this may not communicate effectively to outsiders—those outside our own paradigms, such as administrators, students, parents, and the general public. Paradigm theory serves as a starting point for understanding ourselves and our academic disciplines. Reflection on our disciplines as academic communities can help us to realize that some of our values may not be persuasive to others, and that we need to identify those that would be relevant to stakeholders. The cognitive skills and other skills gained from humanities programs needs to be explained more specifically to the public, for example, by citing empirical educational research and touting the soft skills relevant to students’ careers.

Reflecting on and verbalizing values and teaching philosophies can help scholars to articulate more cogently the value of their fields, as well as their practical relevance to students’ needs in contemporary society. That is, scholars can articulate the practical relevance of their disciplines without compromising their academic values, and they can better impart the relevant values and skills to students. We can also have students introspect on their own learning and goals, and how they plan to use their degrees. The language skills and soft skills that students gain from our programs are crucial for their success after college, and they need to be made aware of these advantages. This is especially so, given the current crises of false information and false beliefs that have morphed into behemothic social and political problems.

Finally, of course, active government support is essential for promoting humanities and liberal arts education (Lee, Moon, and Kwon). Also, more well funded humanities research foundations and government grant programs are also needed, and research accomplishments in humanities and social sciences need to be disseminated more widely (Song and Ra). This would require people in charge of education policy with a full understanding of humanities, social sciences, science, and academia in general. However, this is currently not forthcoming, so humanities and social science scholars need to confront current neoliberal policy trends more aggressively. Until substantive improvement occurs, humanities departments need to play a more active role in revitalizing and promoting humanities education, and in countering neoliberal policies and attitudes among stakeholders. A focus on individualism and personal ability inspired by neoliberal attitudes can not only contribute to, but also obscure, growing socioeconomic inequality in Korea (Abelmann, Park, and Kim). In contrast, our programs can help students better critique and counter these tendencies. Our programs are not merely job preparation programs, but preparing students for life by imparting skills relevant to both personal development and vocational success. But in doing so, we should realize that the soft skills gained from our programs are important job skills and life skills, and these goals are not necessarily in competition with each other. It is in fact desirable to prepare students with better cognitive skills, so that those entering business and government careers have better intellectual, cognitive, and sociocognitive skills to act as more positive influences and change agents in society.

Again, the description of values and benefits of our programs here has been necessarily general, since this covers a great variety of fields and subfields. It is up to scholars in these various fields to engage in frank discussions with each other to brainstorm about the specific values, goals, and benefits of our fields that need to be articulated to our students and to the public.