A liberal arts college or liberal arts institution of higher education is a college with an emphasis on undergraduate study in liberal arts and general sciences. Such colleges aim to impart a broad general knowledge and develop general intellectual capacities, in contrast to a professional or vocational curriculum. Students in a liberal arts college generally major in a particular discipline while receiving exposure to a wide range of academic subjects, including general sciences as well as the traditional humanities subjects taught as liberal arts. Although it draws on European antecedents, the liberal arts college is strongly associated with American higher education, and most liberal arts colleges around the world draw explicitly on the American model.
Pomona College in Claremont, California
Ashesi University in Accra, Ghana
Discussion class at Shimer College in Chicago (c. 1998 to 2006)
Mount Allison has been ranked the top undergraduate school in Canada more times than any other university
Liberal arts education is the traditional academic course in Western higher education. Liberal arts takes the term art in the sense of a learned skill rather than specifically the fine arts. Liberal arts education can refer to studies in a liberal arts degree course or to a university education more generally. Such a course of study contrasts with those that are principally vocational, professional, or technical, as well as religiously based courses.
Philosophia et septem artes liberales, "philosophy and the seven liberal arts." From the Hortus deliciarum of Herrad of Landsberg (12th century)
Allegory of the seven liberal arts, The Phoebus Foundation
Page, with illustration of Music, from Marriage of Mercury and Philology
Thompson Library at Vassar College in New York