On the Prospect of ‘History of English’ as a Course in Liberal Arts Education

This paper aims to review and report on the educational practice of ‘History of English’, a liberal arts subject in Wakayama University, which the author has been in charge of for the past 10 years or more. The author describes details of the subject and tries to record its achievements and reflections, thus contributing to the future development of the university’s liberal arts education. The paper deals with the practice of teaching the history of English to students from all faculties and grades of the university as an independent subject in the framework of liberal arts education, not as part of a specialized education course. The author gives a brief summary of an attempt to convey the joy of learning the history of English to a wide range of members by devising its contents and educational methods. Judging from the students’ comments, fortunately, ‘History of English’ as a liberal arts subject was able to obtain positive reactions from the students that exceeded the level initially expected. This gives rise to a positive prospect for the further development of the subject. Some suggestions for the future development of English education in general are added.