Studying the Humanities at Stanford: Lorena, Tristan, and Lina

What inspires Stanford undergraduates to study the humanities and arts? Meet three students who are pursuing their passions by studying philosophy, art, classics, and more.

--Lorena Diosdado (Art Practice major, Education minor)
--Tristan Wagner (Philosophy major, Creative Writing and Political Science minor)
--Lina Wang (Classics major, Art History minor)

Video by Todd Holland; Photographs by Harrison Truong.

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Lina Wang: I study Greek and Latin, and all the things that I get to access through these languages, you know, literature, history, culture of the ancient Mediterranean. What really inspires me about the classics is that we're still asking the same questions 2,000, 3,000 years later.

Tristan Wagner: Philosophy tends to be really big picture in a really cool way. Starts with these massive questions and then works its way down really systematically towards actionable small kind of chunks and items where you can work your way back up. I think philosophy as a discipline, it was the best thing I could have done because it is so big picture and it's given me so much of a perspective on the other parts of my life.

Lorena Diosdado: When I thought of art, I thought of a museum with a canvas this big that shows some rich person doing something. I really did everything in my power to not do art practice. I think a lot of that has to do with this urgent pressure that a lot of low-income first-gen students have to be practical. When it came down to it, the classes that I enjoyed myself, that I could spend hours doing and feel fulfilled but also challenged, were my art classes.

Lina: When people ask me, "Why do you study classics?" Their next question is usually, "How do your parents feel about that?" I think the thesis statement to their parenting guidebook has always been, "I just want you to be happy." And I think happiness can come in a lot of ways. But, they have always wanted me to find something that I could devote my life to and to excel in that, and they have accepted that that is classics.

Tristan: I think the one thing in common that holds all the humanities together is a certain way of approaching problems. Thinking through questions over a longer period of time, you're always keeping in mind the things you don't know or the things that you don't have under your control. And just learning how to sit with that is really, really important.

Lorena: Because I'm Latinx, low-income and first-gen, I think a lot about those intersecting identities. Humanities and the social sciences tend to look at the different experiences people have and how do you then go and put that into practice. I think what I've most enjoyed is the ability to think critically. The courses I've taken here have let me find my voice.

Lina: I think that we need to keep encouraging very bright people from all different backgrounds to go into the humanities because that way, we can leave something for future generations and to open up past generations to the current generation.

Tristan: My name is Tristan Wagner, and I'm majoring in philosophy and minoring in creative writing and political science.

Lina: Meum nomen est Lina Wang et studeo lingua Latina et Graeca. [Translation: My name is Lina Wang and I study Latin and Greek].

Lorena: My name is Lorena Diosdado. I'm studying art practice and minoring in education.

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