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Who needs the humanities? — Harvard Gazette

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Scholars detail how disciplines offer value in cultivating mind, character but also enable fresh perspectives on societal, practical problems Eileen O’Grady Harvard Staff Writer Tarun Khanna (from left), Doris Sommer, Moira Weigel, and Martin Puchner. Niles Singer/Harvard Staff Photographer When Moira Weigel was living in Silicon Valley in the mid-2010s, she noticed a surprising trend: Tech entrepreneurs were actively engaged with the humanities. Venture capitalist Peter Thiel was citing philosopher and critic René Girard; LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman was reading Nietzsche and extolling the virtue of his ideas; and blogs about Stoicism aimed at startup founders were saturating the industry. “I think there’s a temptation as a humanist to be a bit snarky about this kind of thing,” said Weigel, assistant professor of comparative literature, during a late November discussion titled “Who Needs the Humanities?” hosted by the Department of English. “But I want to take it seriously as refle

Who needs the humanities? — Harvard Gazette When Moira Weigel was living in Silicon Valley in the mid-2010s, she noticed a surprising trend: Tech entrepreneurs were actively engaged with the humanities. Venture capitalist Peter Thiel was citing philosopher and critic René Girard ; LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman was reading Nietzsche and extolling the virtue of his ideas ; and blogs about Stoicism aimed at startup founders were saturating the industry . “I think there’s a temptation as a humanist to be a bit snarky about this kind of thing,” said Weigel, assistant professor of comparativ

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