Ezra Solway
Entering this university enrolled as a letters and sciences major two years ago, the last major on my radar was English. My entire family majored in the humanities, but I was determined to buck the trend and pursue a lucrative career as a business major. Although a business major is noble in its own right, I gradually found myself gravitating toward English and humanities classes, unable to shake my family’s predilection and love for literature.
When I attended the homecoming comedy show headlined by Jim Gaffigan, I, along with most students at Cole Field House, had never heard of his opening act, comedian Julian McCullough. Although most students still remember Gaffigan’s diatribe against food, it was one of McCullough’s witty remarks that perfectly epitomized the stigma of majoring in English that sticks with me today.
An English major at Rutgers, McCullough reasoned that you could only pursue one of two things with an English degree: either teach English or act like a snob at parties. He went on to role-play someone at a party asking, “Who ate the guacamole?” with the English major’s response being, “I believe the correct question is ‘Whom ate the guacamole,’ ‘twas I.”
Although McCullough’s joke was just poking fun, it was successful at invoking the shifting sentiment of students’ attitudes toward humanities majors, English in particular. On the surface, English might seem like an antiquated craft that only serves to refine pretentious badinage. However, this common misconception neglects the very foundation of an English major: to develop sound writing skills and powerful analytical thinking to commune with all measures of the human experience.
In 2009, there were 792 undergraduates at the University of Maryland who majored in English, a number close to the amount of computer science majors. In 2014, the number of computer science majors had more than doubled to 1,730. In that year, the number of English majors dropped by 39 percent, down to 483 undergraduates, according to the Washington Post.
In a time when higher education plagues many students with seemingly insurmountable debt, there is a growing desire to choose one’s major based off an immediate financial reward. Parents add to this pressure by worrying an English major will inevitably place their child in the widening cesspool of post-graduate unemployment. While money and student loans should not be handled frivolously, students should consider intrinsic motivation for learning instead of just money. If anything, English can be the perfect springboard for success in all types of careers. Mitt Romney, Steven Spielberg and Conan O’Brien are only a few of the many notable former English majors who have come to experience great success.
One of the hardest parts to digest of majoring in English (or any humanities major for that matter) is that the long-term benefits are unquantifiable. English majors don’t have a clear-cut answer to the classic college question, “What are you going to do once you graduate?” because they go on to practice in a myriad of vocational fields and bring rational thought and clear concise language with them.
Putting a dollar sign on an English major is nearly impossible because it enables one to cultivate life-long relationships with literature and draw from those interpretations for future application. This is a precious gift that goes beyond a price tag and should be worthy of students’ attention.
