Week 1 | Two Cultures

    It wasn’t until recently when arts and sciences were truly separated in more aspects than one. When walking, I assumed North Campus to be everything North up to Kaplan Hall and Powell Library, as shown in the image below. Afterwards, everything downward would be South Campus. Whether it’s due to the greenery or the media, two cultures are visibly seen on the UCLA campus. The buildings around North Campus, where the majority of arts and humanities courses are, tend to be more modern, while buildings in South Campus appear to be more traditional. However, there are exceptions of the two that make me believe that the two used to be one central discipline. Such exceptions can be seen with various building names, decorations, and surroundings. 

As Snow mentioned in their 1959 Rede lecture, the disciplines are divided into “two cultures” primarily due to how curricula in higher education split them (UC Online). In the lecture, Snow also mentions the need for a third culture, and how only a third culture would merge the two again for a more holistic academic discipline. This concept was then supported in a later lecture video regarding education paradigms, and how modern days’ education system was better suited for the past, not the future (RSA).
    In this weeks’ readings, both the transcript from Snow’s lecture and Professor Vesna’s article emphasized the third culture. Snow’s transcript stated that differences started young due to the institution, and that it only deepened as time progresses (Snow 1959). Intellectuals were continuously criticized by the scientific community, and in doing so furthered the gap between the cultures. However, with that being said, it is ultimately up to both parties in working together for this separation to minimize. Such doing could be seen in contemporary work, in which academic disciplines bring the two together for a more sophisticated approach (Vesna 2001).  The perspectives of both writers are optimal, as both Snow and Vesna predict a future where the third culture would help resolve the two academic disciplines: students should have both sides of disciplines to enrich their academic experience, but to also see concepts in multiple ways. Only this would then allow the future to be less divided. Such a future is also supported by recent studies which show how an interdisciplinary approach lessened such difference (National Academies of Sciences).

Image 1: UCLA Powell Library, Interior Design

                                               Image 2: UCLA Powell Library, Exterior Design

Image 3: UCLA Broad Art Center (more industrial-like)

Works Cited:

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, et al. The Integration of the

Humanities and Arts with Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in Higher Education: 

from the Same Tree. Edited by Ashley Bear and David Skorton, National Academies Press (US), 2018. PubMed, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK513040/.

RSA. RSA ANIMATE: Changing Education Paradigms. 2010. YouTube,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U.

Snow, C.P. “The Cultures and the Scientific Revolution”, DESMA9, March 28 2022, University

 of California, Los Angeles, https://cdn.inst-fs-iad-prod.inscloudgate.net/86898b09-a91f-4cd6    a53d-05370a44e443/snow_1959.pdf?token=eyJhbGciOiJIUzUxMiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCIsImtpZCI6ImNkbiJ9.eyJyZXNvdXJjZSI6Ii84Njg5OGIwOS1hOTFmLTRjZDYtYTUzZC0wNTM3MGE0NGU0NDMvc25vd18xOTU5LnBkZiIsInRlbmFudCI6ImNhbnZhcyIsInVzZXJfaWQiOiIxNDgwOTAwMDAwMDAwNDU4MzQiLCJpYXQiOjE2NDg3MzUzMzgsImV4cCI6MTY0ODgyMTczOH0.NfN2miruYZBUwHHZBq_pUvHhhx1oFJCccieFvpn2qYv17Bs5WchoScM0UZ3-sE3l4zTp-x3tglDhu6xb2dCAaQ&download=1&content_type=application%2Fpdf, Accessed on March 29 2022. Class handout. 

UC Online. TwoCultures Part1. 2012. YouTube,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNI7dF3DIAM.

Vesna, Victoria. “Toward a Third Culture: Being in Between.” Leonardo, vol. 34, no. 2, 2001,

pp. 121–25.