Yes, I Am an English Major
Hey again
Long time no write. Well, comparitive to other absences of mine I suppose this one is pretty minor. But I wanted to write this time before April threatens to delete her link to my blog.
It is a question that is commonly posed to university and even highschool-aged students: What are you (going to be) studying? And, closely following that, what will you do once you're done school? I myself hate both of those questions with the burning passion of 1000 suns, and I know at least two others who feel the same way. Now, some degrees pretty much lead you directly to one or a select few number of occupations. If I take computer science or engineering, it's pretty obvious what my career goals are. However, if I was to take environmental studies or even English Literature, the career paths aren't nearly as clear. I'm the first to admit that I do not know what I want to pursue as a career after I graduate. All I know for sure is I want to pay off all my student debt as soon as possible. There are some things within the realm of English that I think I might enjoy such as editing and teaching English. However, I don't actually know for sure, and I'm not 100% sold on either of those. And actually, what does it matter? I have possibly 4 more years of post-secondary education before I even have to think about such things. Besides, going to university in many ways is about getting a degree and the experience that it provides. When it comes right down to it, I don't have a stellar reason for choosing English. I always enjoyed reading and writing, and usually enjoyed English classes. zit also turned out that English was one of only a few arts subjects that had a co-op stream. I don't pretend to have exceptional taste in literature, nor perfect grammar, nor an award-winning essay writing skills. But it's something I enjoy studying, and for right now, that's enough for me.
posted by Amy at 12:30 a.m.
2 Comments:
Is one of those people me?
After my five-ish years, I think I can safely tell you that the goal of an university education, at least one outside of specific discipline like bio-chemistry or mechanical engineering, is to teach you how to think for yourself. If you master that, the rest doesn't matter as much as the people asking you those silly quetions thinks.
You are in fact one of those people. I think you're right; one of my profs was telling me that a liberal arts degree should teach you how to think, not what to think. Which I suppose is true. People ask me what I'm going to do with my English degree, and I suppose in their minds the only logical answer is "teach." And I do think that I might enjoy teaching, but ... I don't know. Whatever. I'll worry about that once I am done my degree.
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