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COLLEGE OF LIBERAL ARTS AND SCIENCES

DEPARTMENT OF HUMANITIES

Three students talking on a bench on campus

Founded in 2003, Villanova University’s Department of Humanities studies the questions that matter most for living a good and deeply human life.

Our popular interdisciplinary classes enlist the best minds of the ancient, medieval and modern worlds to help us to contemplate the great questions—about God, the natural world, society and the human person. As a major or minor, you’ll read the great books that speak best to these perennial questions, drawing on Villanova’s Catholic and Augustinian legacy and seeking answers that accord with faith and reason.

Award-winning faculty from the liberal arts and social sciences craft complementary classes that equip students to debate, analyze and discern what it means to be fully alive. Our alumni prove the versatility of our curriculum, as they thrive in diverse professions, including teaching, law, medicine, business, and journalism.

Why Humanities

Why Humanities

Our Curriculum

Our Curriculum

Department of Humanities

St. Augustine Center Room 304
Villanova University 
800 Lancaster Avenue
Villanova, PA 19085

Chairperson: Dr. Michael Tomko

Administrative Assistant: Laura Klee

NEWS & EVENTS

SPRING 2025 HUMANITIES CLASSES

The Humanities Major offers interdisciplinary courses that get at the heart of what it means to live a deeply human life. Check out our Humanities course offerings for Spring 2025. MORE...

FALL 2024 HUMANITIES LECTURE

Each semester the Department of Humanities hosts a lecture that speaks from the heart of our commitment to the intellectual life at Villanova University. For our 2024 Fall Lecture, we welcome Anna B. Moreland and Thomas W. Smith, authors of the new book The Young Adult Playbook: Living Like It Matters (CUA Press 2024). Please join us on October 23, 2024. MORE...

TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY HUMANITIES LECTURE

The 2024 Spring Humanities Lecture--a celebration of the department's twentieth anniversary--featured Department of Humanities Chair and Professor of Literature Dr. Michael Tomko, speaking on the lifelong value of a liberal arts education. Watch the livestream of the lecture here MORE...

CONVIVIUM 2024

In honor of our department's twentieth anniversary, nearly 100 Humanities alumni gathered for a retreat weekend in September 2023 for seminars, conviviality, and a celebratory dinner. Click here to see more about our first Convivium alumni weekend MORE...

AUGUSTINIAN PILGRIMS

For Spring Break 2024, Humanities faculty Drs. Veronica Ogle, Paul Camacho, and Terence Sweeney joined the Augustinian Pilgrimage in Italy to learn more about the life of St. Augustine. Read more about the Pellegrinaggio Agostiniano in Italia here MORE...

EDUCATION WITH IMPACT

 

AN EDUCATION IN THE LIBERAL ARTS AND SCIENCES promotes intellectual curiosity and rigor; instills the fundamentals of critical insight, mature judgment and independent thinking; and strengthens students’ sense of their moral responsibility for others and for the betterment of society.