<p>I have been accepted to UC Berkeley for the fall 2010 to the College of Letters & Science. I applied under the Rhetoric major. I was hoping to do Communication studies and since UCB does not offer this, I thought Rhetoric was the next best thing. Is this true? I have learned that UCB also offers Media Studies? Is it possible to change majors once you transfer? Or is it unlikely for this to happen?</p>
<p>Unfortunately, I haven’t heard many nice things about the rhetoric major. First, as it is a relatively new major, I’ve heard students complain about the lack of resources for this dept. Second, as rhetoric is pretty vague in and of itself, students have told me that the courses are difficult because it’s often unclear what the professors want/expect from students.</p>
<p>As far as switching into Media Studies, I would assume this would be hard to do since it’s an impacted major. I’m sure you wouldn’t have any trouble switching into any non-impacted L&S major.</p>
<p>Good luck and congrats on the acceptance!</p>
<p>yeah switching into Media Studies will prove to be difficult becuase it’s what UCB calls a “capped” major.</p>
<p>I don’t think rhetoric is hard at all. In fact, the only reason I applied to Berkeley was because Daniel Coffeen was teaching the intro to rhetoric at the time, now of course, there are other reasons and Coffeen, unfortunately, is not teaching there anymore. In any case I’m going to minor in rhetoric for sure. I don’t understand how you can think there are a lack of resources for rhetoric? Simply read Plato’s Socratic dialogs, Aristotle’s work, Neitzsche’s early works, any classical take on morality and ethics, politics, philosophy, literature…etc. It’s untrue, whoever said there are no sources for rhetoric, in fact, rhetoric is everywhere, rhetoric is what I’m doing now, rhetoric is what you do everyday. It is the “art of oratory,” or the art of speech. lol What more do you need?</p>
<p>^just going off opinions of a couple rhet majors</p>
<p>ill prolly be minoring in rhetoric too, sounds fun and useful</p>
<p>Thanks for your help, everyone.
I’m extremely interested in rhetoric but it just seems so difficult at Cal. Originally, I was interested in communication studies but since UCB doesn’t offer it, I though that rhetoric would be the next best thing. At this point, I’m not too sure if I want to take the risk of attending UCB just to try rhetoric out or just to try to get into the media studies major.</p>
<p>i would think that english would kinda relate to media studies, u can always try for that if u dont get media studies and/or dont like rhetoric, and berk has a crazy good english dept.</p>
<p>Are the chances of changing majors as a transfer student (junior) likely?</p>
<p>Yea. I found this <a href=“http://ls-advise.berkeley.edu/fp/08Declare_Maj.pdf[/url]”>http://ls-advise.berkeley.edu/fp/08Declare_Maj.pdf</a></p>
<p>Is specifically for L and S major switches from people already in the college of L and S, whether you are new or returning. </p>
<p>There is another form for people who want to petition to switch colleges. I don’t know the link though.</p>
<p>I got in as a Rhetoric major too! You get to focus in one of the three different areas of study: History and Theory of Rhetoric, Public Discourse, and Narrative Image.
Check out…[Rhetoric</a> Department](<a href=“http://rhetoric.berkeley.edu/rhetoric_major.html]Rhetoric”>http://rhetoric.berkeley.edu/rhetoric_major.html)</p>
<p>Any other Rhetoricians?</p>
<p>hey there, did you rhetoric majors transfer from 4 year or 2 year institutions, and what were your gpas? did you have any adversity on your transcripts? (w’s, f’s you had to make up, etc…)</p>
<p>I know this thread is almost 4 years old but I am posting in case someone falls upon it during a google search. I’m not quite sure why you’re saying it’s a new major. This major existed at Berkeley when I was there in the late 1970s. My friend majored in it. It had a lot of resources. It’s hard to imagine it being sparse now.</p>