Huffington Magazine Issue 66 | Page 51

HUFFINGTON 09.15.13 COURTESY OF TOM KAPLAN THE BIG QUESTIONS Recognizing a yearning for “intellectual community,” the National Endowment for the Humanities has given $2.2 million in grants since 2009 to fund college and university courses that tackle the “enduring questions.” Cherkasova will teach one next year at Suffolk University in Boston called, “What is the Meaning of Life” (its syllabus includes Ecclesiastes and Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse’s philosophical novel about a young Brahmin’s journey of selfdiscovery during the age of Gautama Buddha). Among dozens of courses that the NEH has funded are, “What Is The Meaning of Happiness,” taught at New Mexico State University, Las Cruces; an upper-level class at the College of St. Benedict in St. Joseph, Minn., titled, “What am I?,” and at Ursinus College in Collegeville, Penn., “What is Love?” To advocates, these courses are more than mere intellectual exercises [