The Humanities in Australia Today: an appraisal of current activity and likely trends in teaching, learning and research across the humanities in Australia

在澳大利亚，人文学科的“生态学”从未被全面地绘制出来。学术人员和学生群体在目前的优势和劣势以及可能的未来趋势方面都相对缺乏了解。对澳大利亚人文学科研究活动和潜力的清晰理解对于制定明智的方法来管理我们在广泛学科中的国家知识需求至关重要，包括伦理学，历史，亚洲和欧洲研究，社会和文化，宗教研究，考古学和语言学。人文学科教学的详细知识也同样重要。社会依靠人文学科培养毕业生，使他们在不同的领域胜任：文物管理；了解外国语言和文化；澳大利亚历史、文学和艺术；还有媒体和通讯。目前的统计数据收集提供了一种不完整和不一致的关于澳大利亚人文学科配置的观点：我们无法非常精确地说出人文学科在最近的过去是如何排列的；在不久的将来，很难对该行业的概况和能力做出自信的预测。这项计划将分析现有资料，并提供补充资料，以完善整体情况，并对高等教育中的人文学科整体，包括学生和学者，进行详细的概括性调查。结果将是澳大利亚人文学科能力的当前和未来发展状况的全面图景，这将告知政府、行业和社区对当前和新兴的国家劳动力需求和知识需求优先领域的反应。

The humanities ‘ecology’ has never been mapped comprehensively in Australia. Both the academic workforce and the student cohort are relatively poorly understood in terms of current strengths and weaknesses and likely future trends. A clear understanding of humanities research activity and potential in Australia is crucial to developing an informed approach to managing our national knowledge requirements in a wide range of disciplines, including ethics, history, Asian and European studies, society and culture, religious studies, archaeology and linguistics. Detailed knowledge of humanities teaching and learning is just as important. The community relies upon the humanities sector to produce graduates competent in fields as diverse as: heritage management; understanding of foreign languages and culture; Australian history, literature and arts; and media and communications. Current statistical collections provide a patchy and inconsistent view of the disposition of the humanities in Australia: we are unable to say with much precision how the humanities was arrayed in the recent past; and it is very difficult to make a confident prediction of the sector’s profile and capabilities in the near future. This project will analyse existing data and produce supplemental data to complete the picture, and conduct a detailed synoptic examination of the total humanities community in higher education, including students and academics. The result will be a comprehensive picture of the current and future state of play of Australia’s humanities capability, which will inform Government, industry and community responses to current and emerging national priority areas of workforce need and knowledge requirements.