UNIT 1: LESSON 1: Humanities
and The Arts
“MAN IS THE MEASURE OF ALL
THINGS.”
-Protagoras
What is Humanities?
 are academic disciplines that
study aspects of human society
and culture.
 Scholars in the humanities are
“humanity scholars” or
humanists. It also describes the
philosophical possession of
humanism.
Why Study Humanities?
 The word humanities came
from the Latin HUMANUS
which means human, cultured
and refined, Man is thought to
be as what the term exactly
means: being cultured and
refined;
 Humans have the characteristics
of rationality, benevolence, and
care, he is cultured and refined
as shown by good tastes and
manners indicative of good and
proper education;
 Humanities contains the records
of man's quest for answers to
the fundamental questions he
asks himself and about the
world we live in;
 Humanities studies man and the
manner in which he conducts
himself from the time of his
existence to the present (Martin
& Jacobus, 2004);
 Humanities is composed of
academic disciplines that make
it distinctive in both content and
method from the physical and
biological sciences and from
the social sciences;
 The study of humanities is
devoted to understanding the
different phenomena within the
human cultural contexts;
 Humanities studies how people
process and document the
human experience using
philosophy, religion, literature,
art, and history as a way of
understanding the world;
 It studies how individuals’
manner of expression varies as
they record human experiences
and how the way of
documenting these forms a
connection between and among
humans of the past, present, and
future
FUNDAMENTAL PRINSIPLES
OF HUMANITIES
1. Human nature is inherently
good.
2. Individuals are free and are
capable of making choices.
3. Human potential for growth and
development is virtually
unlimited.
4. Self-concept plays an important
role in growth and
development.
5. Individuals have an urge for
self actualization.
6. Reality is defined by each
person.
7. Individuals have a
responsibility to both
themselves and to others.
ART EXPLAINED:
 Art is a diverse range of
human activities in creating
visual, auditory, or
performing artifacts
(artworks). Expressing the
author's imaginative,
 conceptual ideas, or
technical skill, intended to
be appreciated for their
beauty or emotional power.
The three classical branches of
art:
 Music, theater, film, dance, and
other performing arts as well as
literature and other media such as
interactive media, are included in a
broader definition of the arts.
 In modern usage after the 17th
century, where aesthetic
considerations are paramount, the
fine arts are separated and
distinguished from acquired skills in
general, such as the decorative or
applied arts.
 The nature of art and related
concepts, such as creativity and
interpretation, are explored in a
branch of philosophy known as
aesthetics.
NATURE OF THE ARTS
1. Art or arts is of Aryan root “ar”
which means to join or put together
and has its Latin term being “sars”
or “artis” which means everything
that is artificially made or composed
by man.
2. Art is one of the oldest and most
important means of expression
developed by man.
3. Art is subjective as it employs the
use of perception, insights, feelings,
and intuition.
4. It refers to the skilful arrangement
or composition of some common
but significant qualities of nature
such as sounds, colors, lines,
movements, words, stone, and wood
to express feelings, thoughts,
imaginations, and dreams in an
amazing, meaningful, and enjoyable
way. (Adams, 2002)
5. It is the heightened expression of
human dignity, and weaknesses felt
and shared so powerfully in a world
increasingly aware of its successes
and failures.
6. It is man's expression of himself
as an individual and how he views
his existence, and
7. Art also provides enjoyment and
stimulation especially when people
understand them.
FUNCTIONS OF ARTS
1. Express freely oneself;
2. Socially express his need for
display, celebration, and
communication; and
3. Physically express the need for
utility of functional objects.
THE FORMS OF ART
DIFFERENTIATED
FUNCTIONAL ART
 It's art that serves a
function, but it's designed
artistically for the purpose
of beauty. They meet a
 need for use and our works
of art as well.

FUNCTIONAL ART
 It's art that serves a
function, but it's designed
artistically for the purpose
of beauty. They meet a
need for use and our works
of art as well.

NON-FUNCTIONAL ART
 is art that serves no
utilitarian purpose. These
pieces usually seek to
engage with the viewer on
an intellectual, emotional,
or aesthetic level. The
exploration of these
sensibilities, rather than
their utilitarian merits,
determines the artwork’s
worth.
LESSON 2 – ARTS AND
PHILOSOPHY

 Philosophy and Arts Related

Philosophy is a field of
discipline which has attempted
to explain almost all aspects of
human existence. Philosophy is
the study of general and
Deception” that combines both
fundamental questions about
art and philosophy.
existence, knowledge, values,
reason, mind, and language.
Such questions are often posed
as problems to be studied or
resolved. The term was
probably coined by
Pythagoras.
 Art or Aesthetics, on the other
hand, is the study of beauty
and taste, concerned with the
The Artistic Philosophers
nature of art and used as the
The following are just a
basis for interpreting and
few of the philosophers whose
evaluating individual works of
advocacy is not only focused on the
art. It is a branch of philosophy
philosophic ideas but also shared a
that deals with the nature of
few of their conceptions about the
beauty and taste, as well as the
Arts.
philosophy of art. It examines
1. Plato (428-347 BC) is a
subjective and sensori-
philosopher of ancient Greece who
emotional values, or
is known for his Dialogues together
sometimes called judgments of
with Socrates. He loved and hated
sentiment and taste.
the arts at the same time which
 Philosophy of art is the study
makes his philosophical views on
of the nature of art, including
art unexplainably complicated. With
concepts such as interpretation,
the Republic being his work, Plato
representation, and expression,
was seen as a good literary stylist
and form. It is closely related
and great storyteller and considered
to it aesthetics, the
the arts as threatening. He believed
philosophical study of beauty
that though arts can be used to train
and taste. In short, one cannot
citizens to have an ideal society,
do away with philosophy when
using arts to accomplish this should
explaining an artwork. Also,
be strictly controlled. He also
one cannot produce an artwork
explained that the physical world is
without considering the
a copy of a perfect, rational, eternal,
importance of the philosophy
and changeless original which he
behind its production.
calls FORMS.
 Below is an example of an art
form entitled “Art Is a Friendly
 Self-control, especially control of
the passions, is essential to the soul
that wants to avoid the temptations
of sensuality, greed, and admission,
and move on to the Ideal World in
the next life.

2. Aristotle (384-322 BC) was a

student of Plato who first
distinguished between “what is
good and what is beautiful”. For
Plato’s Ideas of the Arts may be him, the universal elements of
summed up by the truths according beauty are manifested by order,
to him that: symmetry, and definiteness. As
1. Art is imitation. exemplified in his Poetics, he stated
2. Art is dangerous that physical manifestations of
beauty is affected by SIZE. He
considered art as imitation or a
representation of nature and his
emphasis of the art is on POETRY
which for him is more
philosophical than Philosophy itself.

Beauty, Justice, and The Circle are

all examples of what Plato called
Forms or Ideas. Other philosophers
have called them Universals. Many
particular things can have
the form of a circle, or of justice, or
beauty. For Plato, these Forms are
perfect Ideals, but
they are also more real than physical
objects. He called them the “Really
Real”. The world
of the Forms is rational and
unchanging; the world of physical Poets imitated the following
appearances is changeable according to Aristotle:
and irrational, and only has reality 1. Things and events which
to the extent that it succeeds in have been or still are;
imitating the Forms. The mind or 2. Things which are said to
soul belongs to the Ideal world; the be seen and are probable; and
body and its passions are stuck in 3. Things which essentially
the muck of the physical world. So, are.
the best human life is the life of the
mind, the life of the Philosopher 3. Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)
(literally, the lover of wisdom). was a German, Enlightenment
philosopher who wrote a treatise on
Aesthetics: Observations on the
Feelings of the Beautiful and the
Sublime. His main interest was not
on art but on BEAUTY that it is a
matter of TASTE. Kant explained
that TASTE can be bought
subjective and universal. For Kant,
Beauty is a question of form and
color is not important.

The Kind of Aesthetic Responses

according to Kant are:
1. Beauty results in pleasure if there
is order, harmony, and symmetry;
and
2. Beauty leads to a response of awe
that overwhelms the viewers of the