<p>I’m getting a “page not found” error message on that link…</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/23/opinion/sunday/the-decline-and-fall-of-the-english-major.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/23/opinion/sunday/the-decline-and-fall-of-the-english-major.html</a></p>
<p>This might be it but it isn’t recent. I have an English Major at home.I agree with the writer but it doesn’t curtail the many questions some people ask.</p>
<p>Former English majors worried (with good reason) about their employability, can now get a “communications” degree which segues to entry positions in PR. </p>
<p>As to the concept of “death of humanities.” Sigh. People have been bemoaning the decline of the humanities for the last hundred years. As if in the past, every college grad could recite Shakespeare and quote Greek philosophers (in the original, no doubt.)</p>
<p>The notion of the humanities - and the notion of what it is to be an educated person - changes over time. There was a time when you’d be considered a rube if you didn’t know Latin. Or at least French. These days, you know Latin and/or French? Good for you! Now how are you going to make a living in the 21st century?</p>
<p>Help, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up…</p>
<p>Sorry, that’s a little former-English-major humor there …</p>
<p>Here’s a permalink to the story: <a href=“Opinion | The Decline and Fall of the English Major - The New York Times”>Opinion | The Decline and Fall of the English Major - The New York Times;
<p>Hopefully it will work. Posting the full story is actually copyright infringement, and I wouldn’t be surprised if a moderator comes along and edits it. </p>
<p>But, yeah, English majors have been greeted with skepticism since, well, forever. But there will always be a demand for those who can think and write clearly. Just don’t think that those skills alone will lead to gainful employment. Not in this job market. And don’t go into heavy debt to fund an English degree because, in all likelihood, you will need to take some unpaid internships or head to grad school after you graduate.</p>
<p>Great post CUPKSDAD. You really covered it.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I don’t know about the Latin scholars, but French speakers have a skill that I suspect will be increasingly valuable as multinationals pursue emerging growth markets in Africa. I think there could be some really exciting opportunities in francophone Africa during our kids’ careers.</p>
<p>Interesting topic. Personally I found the flowery writing style to be unnecessarily awkward in some parts. That seemed ironic.</p>
<p>This thread reminds me of P.O.E.M. - Garrison Keillor’s Professional Organization of English Majors. Here’s a funny bit about the difference between business majors and English majors during a job interview: [POEM</a> | May 12, 2012 | A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor | American Public Media](<a href=“Past Shows | A Prairie Home Companion”>Past Shows | A Prairie Home Companion)</p>
<p>I am a former English major. I have never taught English, nor been employed as a writer. I do use the skills I learned every day in my job - but it’s not a well-paying job. I think we will always need some English and other humanities majors. And I sometimes muse about: if the people who would love to be English/humanities majors should choose more practical majors for today’s job market, how good will they be at those jobs? And how happy? Because I don’t think we can really turn every English major into an engineer, or vice versa. I know no one has suggested that here - but we’ve got some CC posters who think that every major should be STEM.</p>
<p>My oldest might have got it right - English and Business double major. Employed and not living in our basement.</p>
<p>The times article talks of a shifting canon in English Departments. I feel once great English Departments have been destroyed and hijacked by the PC police. Instead of the cornerstones of English literature (Shakespeare, Chaucer, Milton) we have requirements in Gender, Race, Ethnicity, Disability, and Sexuality Studies. Genre and Imperial, Transnational and Postcolonial Studies and course after course on oppression politics.</p>
<p>In a generation English Departments through narcissism, victimhood and identity politics have stopped educating students who need to be educated and the tuition bill runs at double the rate of inflation for 30 plus years. </p>
<p>Any parent looking at many premier college English Depatment offerings simply throw up…their hands and say Economics and Math make sense.</p>
<p>Back in the dark ages, I obtained a B.A. in Philosphy – which I think of as akin to English, employability-wise. But, school was cheap back then, so I got a Law degree too. And a B.Sc. in Comp. Sci. 
Became employable in there somewhere … .</p>
<p>kinsale- Shouldn’t today’s students be reading, thinking, and writing about today’s problems and issues? You really want them just focused on a literary canon that is certainly dated? Issues about race, gender, ethnicity, disability and sexuality make much more sense to me than Economics and Math. </p>
<p>We’re pretending that English majors have a tougher time finding a job than the Biology major. I may venture that the English major who is good at communicating, and possibly has picked up extra skills in things such as web design, may be more employable than their basic science counterparts. DS is a copywriter and is well employed. His sister, is a Biology major and doesn’t know what to do with it. Admittedly, DS was not an English major but studied advertising in the school of Journalism, but he could have majored in English, and got a minor in advertising to pick up the copy writing skills. Certainly the English classes would have been way more useful than the required Journalism class hoops he needed to jump through.</p>
<p>GTalum,
You’re totally correct. An English degree in itself is no different than many less-than-practical majors. Biology, history, art history, etc. But an English degree combined with another, more professionally oriented field, can be a great door opener.(As I suppose with those other majors, too.) </p>
<p>SomeOldGuy, it’s a nice thought about French, but unfortunately it’s another one of those undergraduate degrees that, by itself, doesn’t lead anywhere. Even trying to use it professionally in Europe is hard due to difficulties Americans have getting work visas, and competition from other French-speaking Europeans.</p>
<p>And American companies doing international business also have limited need for the language: most of the foreigners who work for/with them, speak excellent English.</p>
<p>My nephew was an English major, and even got his masters in English. He wound up teaching at the university level, but when Katrina hit, he ended up managing a family restaurant for years. But he made his way back to teaching, and after a few years teaching in inner city schools, is now teaching English at the best high school in the city, which so happens to also be his alma mater. But he is also an accomplished musician and songwriter, has an active band that performs in the evenings, tours during school holidays, and I think his English degree has been put to good use that way. Many of the high school teachers at his alma mater are published authors, not money makers, but they have been encouraged to pursue their passion of writing while shaping young minds.</p>
<p>GT Alum - My D majored in Advertising in the school of media and did a minor in English. She did not have any problems finding a job and is also gainfully employed in Advertising. I would guess that the communication skills are what got our kids their jobs rather than the ir English major/minor.</p>
<p>The English major has not fallen (like the Roman Empire) but it’s dramatically reduced. It’s in similar straits as many humanistic majors without immediate market applications. The English major is no worse off than history, art history, philosophy, languages (classics or modern) etc. </p>
<p>I do think the pendulum is swinging more toward a new formalism and away from some of the theoretical excesses of the past. The problem is that few college-going students are actually prepared to study Shakespeare, Milton etc. because they just cannot read well enough. My students (majors) have problems reading anything at all written before 1945. They have problems reading David Foster Wallace or Thomas Pynchon. Our culture does not value or cultivate high-level literacy. Our schools certainly don’t teach it. Even kids at highly-ranked colleges are generally average readers at best. Their vocabulary and sense of style and idiom are impoverished.</p>
<p>If you look at letters and diaries written by ordinary people in the 19th and early 20th century, you will be amazed at their elegance and facility. These were not academics, but ordinary people. Those days are gone.</p>
<p>I have to agree with kinsale49 on this - catering to pc erodes the course of study. And, GTalum, who says those literary greats are “dead?” Listening to leftist propaganda is getting old.</p>
<p>ucanthrograd - the majority of the authors in the literary canon are indeed “dead.” Yes, their writing is still relevant. But that doesn’t mean that those authors who write about such things as racial and gender issues is not as relevant, and is probably more relevant in today’s world. Issues you say is catering to pc, I say are relevant and it is necessary to develop academic perspective and no less a rigorous study. Listening to those who have just narrow and limited perspective is getting old.</p>
<p>NJSue, that’s a shame. My English/Business double major devoured Pynchon although he favors British authors - something that started in 3rd grade when he read straight through everything by Roald Dahl. I think his English major has enhanced him, both as a fairly literate adult, but also with communication and writing skills. College kids not reading Pynchon surprises me as the themes should resonate with that age group and the writing is akin to the gonzo journalism of Hunter Thompson and Ken Kesey which kids that age tend to like (at least mine do/did).</p>