liberal arts

/ˌlɪbərəl ɑrts/

/ˈlɪbərəl ɑts/

The liberal arts are basic college subjects in the humanities, like English, history, and philosophy. Most universities don't consider professional subjects, like engineering, to be part of the liberal arts.

If you enroll at a liberal arts school, you'll get an education in general knowledge, learning how to read, write, and think about a variety of topics. Many universities distinguish between subjects by having separate colleges for liberal arts, sciences, and professional areas of study. In classical times, the liberal arts — or in Latin, the artes liberales, were the areas of knowledge that were seen as essential for a free person. Liberales, in fact, means "free."

Definitions of liberal arts

1. noun

   studies intended to provide general knowledge and intellectual skills (rather than occupational or professional skills)
   synonyms: arts, humanistic discipline, humanities

   types:

   neoclassicism

   revival of a classical style (in art or literature or architecture or music) but from a new perspective or with a new motivation

   classicalism, classicism

   a movement in literature and art during the 17th and 18th centuries in Europe that favored rationality and restraint and strict forms

   Romantic Movement, Romanticism

   a movement in literature and art during the late 18th and early 19th centuries that celebrated nature rather than civilization

   English

   the discipline that studies the English language and literature

   history

   the discipline that records and interprets past events involving human beings

   art history

   the academic discipline that studies the development of painting and sculpture

   chronology

   the determination of the actual temporal sequence of past events

   beaux arts, fine arts

   the study and creation of visual works of art

   performing arts

   arts or skills that require public performance

   Occidentalism

   the scholarly knowledge of western cultures and languages and people

   Oriental Studies, Orientalism

   the scholarly knowledge of Asian cultures and languages and people

   philosophy

   the rational investigation of questions about existence and knowledge and ethics

   literary study

   the humanistic study of literature

   library science

   the study of the principles and practices of library administration

   linguistics, philology

   the humanistic study of language and literature

   musicology

   the scholarly and scientific study of music

   Sinology

   the study of Chinese history and language and culture

   stemmatics, stemmatology

   the humanistic discipline that attempts to reconstruct the transmission of a text (especially a text in manuscript form) on the basis of relations between the various surviving manuscripts (sometimes using cladistic analysis)

   trivium

   (Middle Ages) an introductory curriculum at a medieval university involving grammar and logic and rhetoric; considered to be a triple way to eloquence

   quadrivium

   (Middle Ages) a higher division of the curriculum in a medieval university involving arithmetic and music and geometry and astronomy

   musical performance

   the act of performing music

   dance, dancing, saltation, terpsichore

   taking a series of rhythmical steps (and movements) in time to music

   acting, performing, playacting, playing

   the performance of a part or role in a drama

   painting

   creating a picture with paints

   carving, sculpture

   creating figures or designs in three dimensions

   architecture

   the discipline dealing with the principles of design and construction and ornamentation of fine buildings

   iconology

   the branch of art history that studies visual images and their symbolic meaning (especially in social or political terms)

   glottochronology

   the determination of how long ago different languages evolved from a common source language

   ethics, moral philosophy

   the philosophical study of moral values and rules

   aetiology, etiology

   the philosophical study of causation

   aesthetics, esthetics

   (art) the branch of philosophy dealing with beauty and taste (emphasizing the evaluative criteria that are applied to art)

   axiology

   the study of values and value judgments

   jurisprudence, law, legal philosophy

   the branch of philosophy concerned with the law and the principles that lead courts to make the decisions they do

   metaphysics

   the philosophical study of being and knowing

   dialectic

   any formal system of reasoning that arrives at the truth by the exchange of logical arguments

   logic

   the branch of philosophy that analyzes inference

   epistemology

   the philosophical theory of knowledge

   lit, literature

   the humanistic study of a body of literature

   comparative literature

   study of literary works from different cultures (often in translation)

   lit crit, literary criticism

   the informed analysis and evaluation of literature

   poetics

   study of poetic works

   classics

   study of the literary works of ancient Greece and Rome

   rhetoric

   study of the technique and rules for using language effectively (especially in public speaking)

   dialectology

   the branch of philology that is devoted to the study of dialects

   lexicology

   the branch of linguistics that studies the lexical component of language

   transcendental philosophy, transcendentalism

   any system of philosophy emphasizing the intuitive and spiritual above the empirical and material

   type of:

   bailiwick, discipline, field, field of study, study, subject, subject area, subject field

   a branch of knowledge