A Chinese university’s decision last year to close an arts and humanities major due to the impact of AI sparked heated debate on social media this week.
The discussion was sparked by remarks by Liao Xiangzhong, a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and a top official at the China Propagation University in Beijing, during the annual bi-party political conference that concluded on Thursday.
Liao said the university has abolished undergraduate departments such as photography and cartooning because the future will be an era of “human-machine cooperation.” A video clip of this remark later ranked in the top five trending topics list on China’s microblogging platform Weibo.
China Propaganda University, considered one of China’s top universities for media and art, has canceled five art majors in 2025: photography, cartooning, visual communication design, new media art, and fashion design. Meanwhile, the university introduced three new undergraduate programs: “Intelligent Visual Arts”, “Intelligent Audiovisual Engineering”, and “Intelligent Engineering and Creative Design”.
Some online observers have criticized the move as “abrupt”, while others argue that AI will eventually wipe out most academic disciplines.
On March 10, Liao revealed to domestic media that the major had not been completely discontinued, but had been integrated into a broader field as part of the university’s eight-year academic restructuring campaign.
As an example, he said, “the traditional photography major can no longer exist as an independent discipline” because “everyone today can be a creator and recorder of their own media.” This major has been merged into “Film and Television Photography and Production.”
The university also closed three humanities majors, including translation, six economics and business administration majors, and two science and engineering programs. Liao said translation “has already been largely replaced by AI” and that “creating a four-year translation major in a specific language is a huge waste of national resources.” The university added that it has introduced regulations to prevent student performance from being degraded due to overreliance on AI, but did not specify the content of those regulations.
Jilin University in northeast China, East China Normal University in east China, and Nanchang University also recently announced the closure of arts majors such as theater and film literature, broadcasting, directing, and animation.
The trend comes amid a three-year university reform plan launched in 2025 to expand artificial intelligence, science and data-related programs, and amid growing controversy over the latest AI tools demonstrating potential to replace human artists.
A student at China Propaganda University whose major was affected by the cancellations told Sixth Tone that the adjustment was “not completely unexpected” as teachers had been implementing AI tools in classes since at least 2022.
“We all breathed a sigh of relief when we heard this news, but there were no strong emotions,” said an undergraduate photography student who requested anonymity for privacy reasons. “For me, using AI is simply switching to another creative medium or tool. More importantly, it’s my own way of thinking.”
Many arts universities in China are integrating AI into their programs. In 2024, Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts established China’s first artificial intelligence art school. In 2025, the China Academy of Art launched a specialized doctoral program in artificial intelligence and digital art design.
“As technology develops, academic disciplines must also inevitably evolve,” the China Propaganda University Visual Communication Design graduate told Sixth Tone. “But the problems posed by new technologies should be addressed within the field, rather than simply cutting it off completely.”
Editor: Marianne Gunnarson.
(Header image: Shijue Focus/VCG)
