Humanities Fellows Welcomed Into The Royal Society

Humanities Fellows Welcomed Into The Royal Society Of New Zealand

Fellows from Te Whainga Aronui Council for the Humanities were formally welcomed into the Fellowship of the Royal Society of New Zealand at a function held last night in Auckland. A similar function in Dunedin next week will welcome those in the South Island.

From 1 January this year the Royal Society, which promotes science and technology, has officially included the humanities as part of its scope with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding.

This means disciplines such as English, history, languages, religion, philosophy, literature and law now also come under the Royal Society of New Zealand banner.

Royal Society of New Zealand President Dr Garth Carnaby said this is the beginning of a new chapter in the history of the Royal Society of New Zealand.

“For the first time there will be an organisation in New Zealand that promotes excellence in research and scholarship across all the disciplines and areas of knowledge. We are now a true academy of scholars.”

He said it was important that in New Zealand, scientists and technologists confronted new moral and philosophical questions arm in arm with humanities colleagues, rather than from “the narrow perspective of a deterministic scientific world view”.

“The contemporary issues of science are no less staggering in their impact on every aspect of what it means to be human.

“Without the intervention of chemistry we could not feed the world. Without genetic engineering we may not be able to feed the next generation. The enormous success of our industries promises to change our own climate and the systems we rely on to actually support life.”

“We believe the way forward for both science and our academic communities is to reflect the merging and cross-fertilisation of thoughts, ideas and research cultures, as is happening globally,” said Dr Carnaby.

Fellows from the Humanities Council have been elected to join the ranks of the Academy of the Royal Society of New Zealand, boosting the total number of Fellows to 372.

Countries like Scotland, Canada and Ireland also have academies of scholars across a range of disciplines.

The Royal Society of New Zealand has been operating as the national academy of scientists and technologists since 1867.

ENDS

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