Improving the relevance of humanities higher education in Bangladesh

Abstract

This qualitative study deals with the question of how humanities education imparted at tertiary institutions in Bangladesh can be made relevant to the country’s socio-economic, intellectual, political, cultural, aesthetic, moral, and ethical needs. Using an interpretive approach and relying mainly on printed materials – from both primary and secondary sources, the researcher explores the topic under study and shows that through appropriate curriculum, pedagogical, structural, and policy reforms the humanities disciplines can be made relevant to Bangladesh and its varied needs and exigencies. The researcher looks at the issue of relevance from historico-theoretical, doctrinal, and epistemological perspectives and attempts to resituate existing knowledge, models and paradigms in Bangladesh context in order to reform its humanities higher education. Unique in its kind in Bangladesh’s scholarly arena, this study is expected to have significant impact on improving the current dilapidated state of humanities education in the country concerned. In addition, this study, as a sequel to its wider exploration of the field, endeavours to identify the current overall contour of higher education as well as make prognosis about its dimension in the foreseeable future.