An English Major: Post Graduation

The advantage to being an English Major is that you are able to spend your college years taking courses on fascinating subjects. While your friends are signing up for Fixed Income Securities 4320 and Investigating Critical and Contemporary Issues in Education 2110, you are awarded the excuse to learn about all kinds of atypical topics. Aside from the standards, such as Shakespeare, Critical Theory, or Brit Lit (which are all good), you can fill your schedule with things like Blues in American History, The 19^th Century Horror Novel, or Film Studies. The drawback to being an English Major is… what the hell are you supposed to do after you graduate?

 Despite your inexperience and relative inconsequentiality, at this time in your life you are a terribly fascinating person.  Whether you run into a friend of your parents or are introduced to distant relatives of your friend at a Christmas party, you are assaulted with interrogations about your future.  It becomes a little discouraging when each time one of these acquaintances asks you what your major was, the following dialogue ensues:

               "I majored in English."
               "Oh...So, you're going to be a teacher?" or "English education?"


Of course, you smile understandingly and explain that you would like to explore your options before you go back to school for your inevitable education degree. But what you really want to say is, “No, dammit. I’m not going to be a teacher. English isn’t taught just so it can continue to be taught. There are other ways to use it.” Then again, you can’t list those ways because, although you believe in their existence, you haven’t been able to figure out what they are. And it’s not that you have anything against the idea of teaching. It’s a noble profession that carries with it a great responsibility. It’s also a profession that is overrun with floaters who couldn’t think of what else to do and neither have the desire nor the ability to teach children. In short, a prospective teacher should have a calling for the field, and perhaps you do not possess this calling. And so the conversation continues:
              
               "Really? What else can you do with it?"

So the real problem with having an English degree is that once you have it, you have to continue to decide what you want to do. And having so many options can be very restricting.

In between unrelated rants, I’ll let you know what’s going on. Do not expect an inspirational story of how I used my proficiency for grammar and word usage to work my way into the ideal literary position. The truth is that I'm terrified and practically (not completely) directionless. But luckily, I'm far from finished.