Question 11: On the basis of your reading of the passage, match the i…

Read the following passage and answer the given subquestions:
The Easy ‘A’
As opposed to the ‘true sciences,’ the social sciences are often seen as an “extra,” like an appendage to the main body. Even the content in liberal arts and humanities courses is considered to be supplementary. Such biases stem from the colonial mindset of “empiricism” as the metric for “good” or valuable research. Shibashis Chatterjee, a senior professor at the Department of International Relations at Jadavpur University states that the study of humanities and social sciences has been in a state of worldwide crisis for a while now: “Subjects that do not use quantification are labelled as easy.” However, the professor feels that the idea of a competition amongst arts, science and technology is wrong. “These are complementary fields. To me, it is an identification problem. If natural sciences set the bar and humanities must measure up to it, there is no way they can meet the standards. Unless we agree to create our own standards, these accusations would never end. Hence, we must stop making these comparisons,” he states. The professor of political thought and critical theory also adds that how society looks at knowledge is a political question. “From resource allocation to salaries, the logic of instrumentality trumps everything else,” Chatterjee states. The narratives through which liberal arts courses are shunned are all too familiar. Social sciences never had democratic equality with the
natural/biological sciences and technological education. They are dismissed either as questionable or as useless. Modern education is predicated upon science and technology. It has increasingly reduced the space for criticality and reflective variations on the theme of instrumentality, and humanities and social sciences are automatically downgraded.
In capitalist societies, education is just another financial sector and the loftier philosophical goals of education – the pursuance of knowledge and happiness in knowing – lie discarded. It is significant that the students who pursue humanities do not study for the money. Humanities cannot be made more appealing by tying it to vocational needs. “That would be sounding the death knell to liberal education,” states Chatterjee. Humanities can flourish when democratic values thrive in society, the spirit of questioning is highly regarded, and liberalism enjoys legitimacy. In other words, if philosophy matters to our lives, humanities is indispensable. But most researchers and students of humanities do not think that any autocratic state would be fundamentally interested in reviving humanities and social sciences since these disciplines encourage critical thinking and questioning of authority structures. The more authoritarian states become, the less tolerant they will be of humanities and social sciences.
Excerpted from:
Bose, Rakhi. “The Easy ‘A’.” Outlook, 11 Jul. 2023, pp. 46-50.

On the basis of your reading of the passage, match the items in List A with those in List B. Make sure that your choices match the usages in the passage.

Critical