IHM - Bachelor of Arts in Integrative Humanities

The Integrative Humanities Major at the University of Providence provides students with a unique multidisciplinary education designed to awaken and nourish the intellectual, affective, and creative skills and dispositions necessary for seeing and meeting the needs of contemporary societies. Students will engage with transformational historical texts in philosophy, theology, and literature that help attune them to the ubiquity of both suffering and beauty in the natural, social, spiritual, and artifactual worlds. Courses in art and creative writing further hone students’ abilities to see and respond to suffering and beauty even while becoming more deeply aware of their own strengths, needs, and vulnerabilities. Taken together, the Humanities curriculum, including internship opportunities and a capstone project, equip students for a lifelong journey of contextualizing, wrestling with, making sense of, and impactfully responding to contemporary needs associated with suffering and beauty.

The ideal graduate of this program will be uniquely situated within professional, personal, and social settings to see and respond to sources of both suffering and beauty; will be equipped for a lifelong journey of self-discovery and service; and will be a skilled writer, an excellent reader, a creative problem-solver, and a compassionate advocate for beauty and goodness. These skills and dispositions will ensure that graduates are invaluable assets to both employers and employees, as well as to their broader communities. In addition, Humanities majors will have the option of choosing from three Humanities minors that partner with other departments in order to equip them to pursue careers in fields that directly and concretely mitigate suffering and advocate for beauty.

The Humanities minors integrate perfectly with the Humanities major but may also be pursued with any other UP undergraduate major. Non-degree seeking students coming in with a previous bachelor’s degree may take the Humanities minors as certificate programs.