Being an English major has its challenges, for sure. In a collegiate sphere mostly dominated by STEM career-building opportunities, it can be extremely difficult to find a place for a bookworm like the English major. Even worse is having to explain your major decision to those who picked more “practical” tracks.
1. “So, you’re going to be an English teacher?”
Contrary to popular belief, teaching is not the only thing the mighty English major can do. We can write, communicate orally and by written means better than possibly any other major, we understand people and their motivations, we can analyze documents, and we have a worldview shaped by the best authors known to history. So yeah, we can do a bit more than teach high school English. (But if we were going to teach high school English, we'd be as amazing as Mr. Keating.)
2. “Oh my gosh, I LOVE The Great Gatsby!”
Good for you. Believe it or not, there is a whole literary world outside of our old chap Fitzgerald’s cynical criticism of Jazz Age America. We can show you, if you’d like.
3. “Can you proofread my essay?”
Do you want to pay me for my time and expertise?
4. “So what do you really want to major in?”
Umm, English. I picked English for a reason, just like how you picked Biomedical Engineering for a reason. I understand that endlessly analyzing the political subtext in the works of Russian revolutionary novelists may not be your cup of tea, but we English majors find that stuff fascinating. We all have our passions, can you please respect mine?
5. “Is all you do read books?”
Well, more like read, research historical context, analyze text using whatever critical assertions we can find, proceed to argue with those famous critics, write endlessly, synthesize authors’ themes and assertions, try to read the minds of poets who have been dead for three hundred years, and read whatever we just read about ten more times for understanding.
6. “Are you like a grammar Nazi or something?”
Only if provoked.
7. “English isn’t a real major.”
Sure, English may not be as concrete and fact-based as your hard sciences and maths, but the levels of interpretation and critical insight an English major is capable of are truly astounding. We can interpret the past, and we imagine the future. Our ideas are just as publishable as a brilliant scientist’s, they’re just found on different shelves.
Being an English major is not without its troubles and annoyances, but any one of us can attest that we absolutely chose the right major. We hang out with the likes of Twain, Faulkner, Plath, Milton, Chaucer, Tolstoy, Chekov, Woolf, Angelou, Byron, Dickenson, and many more. Who do you hang out with?
