This article explains how the knowledge and experiences I gained from taking various liberal arts courses at Seoul National University have had a profound impact on the way I look at life and the way I think. The broad perspective I gained from my liberal arts courses has been an important asset in guiding my life, and I believe that these lessons will continue to be of great significance in my life.
Everything has a beginning and an end. If you start something, you’re bound to end it. The same is true for university life. After dedicating your life to college, you’re heading towards graduation. How you end up is important, and the goal is to graduate with good grades and enough credits. In order to graduate, most engineering majors at Seoul National University require a minimum of 130 credits. That’s more than 16 credits per semester for a full four-year programme. If you subtract the required 50 credits of general education and 60 credits of major courses, you’re left with only five or six classes, ranging from 15 to 20 credits. Based on the school’s course suggestions, I was left with no more than five free electives to graduate.
I’m in my sixth semester and have taken 122 credits up to this semester’s classes, 72 of which are liberal arts. After removing 50 credits of required coursework, I’ve spent 22 credits on frontline and liberal arts, or ‘useless’ classes. But I can assure you that I took away from these classes things that I could not have filled in other 100-credit courses.
The classes I took over the course of three years were as diverse as the field itself. The Freshman Seminar taught me about the five senses and how to accommodate them, German and Latin taught me about the structure of each language as well as the foundations and history of each country, Principles of Economics taught me about the economy as Homo Economicus and the role of the individual in society, and Fundamentals of Ink Drawing and Painting taught me about art and the depths of it. The subject of politics and political ideology gave me diversity, and the understanding of Western theatre and the visual arts taught me how to translate life into stories and stories into life.
It was a vast amount of information. It’s a lot of information to take in in one semester. I didn’t have the foundation or the time to process it. In fact, as a result, I failed to get good grades in these courses. This is because these liberal arts classes were a deeper choice, as opposed to a choice of easy-to-grades and easy-to-study subjects that were being chosen as graduation requirements to get better grades.
This choice was anticipated from the time of university admission. I chose Seoul National University without hesitation, as it is the top university in the science and technology field. The reason for this choice was that I was fascinated by the fact that Seoul National University is a comprehensive university and its historical and humanistic foundations. I was never wrong.
The breadth of Seoul National University’s liberal arts curriculum, which spans multiple foreign languages, art and history, philosophy and politics, and more, is unmatched in the country. This is a great advantage of being a comprehensive university and the largest university in Korea. Whether it’s the only Swahili language course in the country or an archery class taught by an Olympic gold medallist, the diversity of liberal arts courses available at Seoul National University provides students with unique opportunities. It was invaluable to learn from professors who not only have years of research experience, but also excel at practical and creative work in the field. It would have been a shame not to take a wide variety of classes at a school like this.
I realised that what I learned from my various liberal arts courses in college was not just about acquiring knowledge; they shaped my way of thinking and expanded my perspective on the world. For example, in my Western Philosophy class, I learned about Plato’s Ideas, which helped me understand that the real world is not just made up of material things. Similarly, in my Western theatre class, I was able to go beyond simply watching a play and think deeply about how human emotions and social interactions are portrayed on stage. These liberal arts classes have given me the ability to look at things from different perspectives.
My solo trip to Germany last winter brought this home to me. On the streets, I was able to fully experience the unique emotions that come from the German language, which is neither Korean nor English, and the architectural styles and historical meanings of the many historical sites. In art museums, I could feel the mind of the artist as they painted, and their food, tea, and alcohol gave me a glimpse into their culture. In the newspapers and news that I pass by, I learn about the values of people who lived in a different history. All of these are things that I would have never noticed if it weren’t for the liberal arts classes I’ve been taking, and all of a sudden they become so vivid.
These classes, which began at a young age, have had a profound impact on my self-reflection. They were invaluable resources that kept me centred as my adolescent, rigidly structured life floundered in the flow of freedom that came with university. What to look at, what to take away, and how to organise it. These liberal arts classes gave me direction and will continue to be a pillar in my life. I will never stop taking liberal arts classes to make them stronger.
