Last week, at Widener University’s Humanities Division Awards Ceremony, Distinguished Graduating Senior (and Blue Route staff member) Phoebe Robbins gave a wonderful speech about the importance of the humanities. We thought readers of our literary journal would appreciate these sentiments.

Why do the humanities matter? Man, is that a hard question to answer. Because there isn’t just one.

I find that many of my science-minded peers are often looking for answers—clear answers, numerical answers, defined and rigid answers. No wiggle room. As an English major, I’ve heard, “And there’s no right answer, so throw anything out there” more times than I could possibly count.

Our brains, as members of the humanities, are wired to reject the easy answer and go searching for the possibilities that lie in the subtext. My friends and I can close-read the heck out of a single sentence, and we will all have different arguments by the end. For us, there’s a seemingly infinite amount of answers to any one question. So why do the humanities matter? The answer to that one can’t be found in some ancient text or a Virginia Woolf novel, much as I wish it could be. Although if you read closely enough, you’ll find clues everywhere.

If I had to summarize in one sentence why the humanities matter, I would say: they provide us with guidelines for understanding life. Because the humanities are not just about reading old books or looking at pre-Raphaelite paintings, they are about learning how to read the world. Our lives—our joys and our hardships—made bearable by books and art and a compassionate cognizance of all that exists around us. So as critical thinking dwindles and reading comprehension plummets, it’s up to us in this room to remain steadfast in our fields and champion our beliefs.

In a population that is increasingly susceptible to misguidance, the humanities are only becoming more and more crucial. Without the abilities that our fields provide—to read deeply, think critically, and interpret complex information—you get political discourse that collapses into slogans and logical fallacies instead of productive debates. You get people who are informed about their own representation only from their choice news network or, Heaven forbid, Facebook. You get people who scroll past headlines of war without understanding that the butterfly beat its wings to set things in motion long ago.

That’s not a coincidence. That’s a system at work.

Our lives are not politically neutral. If we no longer study the art of analysis, we’re left with a population who cannot understand their place within a political system hellbent on accumulating power, whatever the cost. When literacy declines, power concentrates. If you can’t parse a speech, you can be persuaded by it. If you can’t recognize bias, you can be manipulated by it. If you can’t contextualize a conflict, you can be convinced of the narrative those in power surround you with.

The humanities push directly against that. No easy answers, remember? We train ourselves to slow down, to interpret, to question. We do not blindly accept truths. We ask: who is telling this story, and who is missing from it?

Because of the humanities, in the battle over narratives, we are better equipped to win.

As a transfer student, I can’t speak to every department within the humanities. I do, however, believe I am qualified to speak on the English and Creative Writing departments. Most of my classes here at Widener have been in those fields. Each one has introduced me to new texts, new theories, and new intersections of identity I was previously unfamiliar with and in doing so, has trained me to see how stories are built—and how they can be challenged. I’ve learned that reading is never passive. No, reading is an active engagement. My classes have taught me how to sit in discomfort long enough to realize how much I don’t yet know. How to take language apart and put it back together again with the knowledge that every word carries weight. Influence that does not stay bogged down by the weight of the page but takes flight in the minds of readers and writers.

In a world that is constantly searching for the easiest truth, the humanities teach us to resist. To look closer and think longer. To care more. Our active minds and compassionate hearts may be just what the world needs.