As an English major I am frequently asked a number of almost offensive, definitely personal questions and even more awful assumptions about who I am as a person because of my choice of major. I would really love to see this come to a stop. I would also like the endless supply of jokes about how I spent my college years slacking off or doing nothing. I work hard just like any other major works hard, and that means something.
The first question I get after telling someone I am getting an English degree with a writing concentration is usually "Oh, are you going to be a teacher?" No. Never. No. I do not want to be a teacher. While many people gain English degrees to become a teacher these people usually have a specific type of English degree that allows them to teach. I have a specific thing too. It is my WRITING concentration. You can't just get a literature degree or writing degree and become a teacher. It takes specific types of training.
The next question is usually then "Well what are you going to do?" Well, I don't know. What I do know is that most corporations, businesses and governments need good writers; and that I am a very good writer. Why is it assumed that someone with, I don't know, an accounting degree will be accounting for the rest of their life, but when I say I have a writing degree, no one believes that I want to write for the rest of my life. I mean dear god.
In addition to the last paragraph, do other majors just never learn how to write well? I mean seriously, most of you are still using first person in most of your papers and even confusing there, their and they're. Did they just skip over how to write like a functioning human in your major because you all need help.
Next comes the very annoying questionnaire about what books I have read. "Have you read (insert book here)?" Nope. "WHAT?! I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT YOU HAVEN'T READ THIS. EVERYONE HAS READ THIS!" No. I'm sorry but I do not have an infinite amount of time to read every book ever written. I also can read whatever I want to. This includes trashy romance novels, or children's books, or even comic books. Yes, I love to read, yes reading is a HUGE part of my education, but this doesn't mean that I have read everything on every bookshelf on the planet. Also reading these novels that some have determined to be bad or not reading "Moby Dick" doesn't make me less of an English major. I am still qualified as shit. So get off my back.
Then comes my favorite part of this relationship. The favors. "Oh yeah, I don't think that you major will be worth anything, but can you go through and edit my paper?" No. Definitely not. I do not want to go through your paper to find errors, I have enough papers that I wrote to do that too. I am not a giant spell checking machine that you can just use whenever you please, and to assume so is really offensive. Also by asking me this, you are proving that my major is not worthless.
Why is it that a bio major or business major never get berated with questions about their life when they tell others their major. Why is it that an English major is considered worse than every other major out there? Stop it. I work hard every day, and that is worth something. When I graduate, I will be qualified for a whole bunch of jobs because I have great writing skills. Something that not many people have. Trust me I have edited many papers by other majors, and the world is going to need some good writers.
