By Usman Aliyu
The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Benin, Prof. Edoba Omoregie, SAN, has called for stronger interdisciplinary collaboration among faculties in the university.
Omoregie made the call on Tuesday in Benin during the second edition of the institution’s Faculty Public Lecture Series hosted by the Faculty of Arts.
The lecture series was themed, ”Expressing the Universal Qualities of Being Human”.
The vice-chancellor in his opening remarks noted that the humanities remain central to shaping human values, critical thinking and national development.
He said that the initiative was part of the administration’s broader vision to showcase the university’s academic strengths and expose staff and students to opportunities across disciplines.
”This initiative is at the core of this administration’s desire to project the various opportunities in the university.
”We are doing this to showcase the strengths of our various faculties and programmes, while exposing staff and students to the vast possibilities in their disciplines,” he said.
Omoregie explained that the lecture series also served as a bridge between the university and the larger society, helping to connect academic knowledge with real-life human experiences.
He urged faculties and departments to work more closely together, describing interdisciplinary engagement as critical to achieving the university’s vision of relevance and excellence.
”As change agents, let us remain committed to the idea of bettering our society and being the best in all that we do,” he said.
Delivering the lecture, Prof. Osarhieme Osadolor, Dean, Faculty of Arts, said that the humanities remained the foundation for understanding what it truly meant to be human.
According to him, the arts are not merely academic disciplines but essential tools for shaping society, preserving culture and building human consciousness.
”When we use the term arts, we are referring to branches of knowledge that share a concern with humans and their culture.
”It is the recognition of the common nobility that binds us together. Our instincts, attributes and experiences that uniquely make us human,” he said.
Osadolor explained that qualities such as empathy, creativity, resilience, love, memory, belonging and purpose define humanity and were best expressed through disciplines in the humanities.
”For this reason, teaching, learning and research in the Faculty of Arts enable us to define our humanity, shape our relations and actions, and impact the world,” he added.
He revealed that the Faculty of Arts had, for over 50 years, served as a beacon of scholarship, creativity and cultural preservation, producing thinkers, diplomats, artists, journalists, philosophers and other professionals contributing meaningfully to Nigeria and the world.
The dean also defended the relevance of humanities in the digital age, noting that disciplines such as linguistics were now deeply connected to artificial intelligence, natural language processing and machine translation.
”The humanities are not outdated. Many of our departments are already involved in digital humanities and artificial intelligence applications.
”In linguistics, for example, we are engaged in partnerships on AI, machine translation and the preservation of indigenous African languages,” he said.
He said that countries that neglected the humanities often struggled with civic consciousness and ethical responsibility.
”If you step outside this country and study places like Germany, you will see that the arts have a special place in academic programmes.
”They teach philosophy, ethics and critical thinking because they understand what it means to be human and what it means to build order in society,” he said.
He added that education in humanities help students organise their thoughts, understand society and develop the conscience needed for responsible citizenship.
”It is only through the humanities that we are able to understand ourselves, our government and the future of the world,” he said.(NAN)
Edited by Deborah Coker
