Terry Eagleton, literary theorist, attributes the existence of English, as an academic study of Literature, to a number of criteria including class insurrection, revolutionaries, and the "failure of religion."

Adam Gopnik, writer for the New Yorker, on the other hand proposes that the academic discipline of English exists because of an inherent desire to learn, and an interest in the humanities, found in the human race.

Eagleton explains that academic English first started to gain traction while 17^th century England recovered from a civil war that “set the social classes at each other’s throats.” To stabilize the country, an assimilation between classes needed to take place. And to allow for a smooth incorporation of the middle class into the aristocracy, literature gained a new importance as a medium, which diffused “polite social manners” and “‘correct’ taste”, among other things.

Later, revolutionary events again set social classes against each other. “In America and France the old colonialist or feudalistic regimes are overthrown by middle-class insurrection.” At this same time, Eagleton continues, “England achieves its point of economic “take-off” . . . to become the world’s first industrial capitalist nation.”

In the years that followed, the industrial revolution urbanized England, causing a collapse of the individualist cottage industry in the countryside. Cities were filled and the countryside was left empty; England focused on becoming economically powerful at the cost of nature and beauty. The “human creativity,” which Eagleton writes about, drove Romantics like Wordsworth to write about what was diminishing and diminishing in interest: the rustic and simple life of nature and those who still lived and loved nature.

The Romantic period offered a counter to the industrialization of the country, not only restoring an appreciation of the countryside, but also adding to the discussion and development of English as an academic pursuit. In the 19^th century, the Romantics revolutionized the definition of what was “literature” or “literary.” They conveyed that literature and poetry “signify a concept of human creativity, which is radically at odds with the utilitarian ideology of early industrial capitalist England.”

English has become more and more popular throughout last 400 years. Popular to write, read and analyze, according to Eagleton, mostly as a result of social and political change.

Adam Gopnik argues something different. He begins in his article, by mentioning a quote from Christina Paxson. She says, “There are real, tangible benefits to the humanistic disciplines—to the study of history, literature, art, theater, music and languages,” in other words, the aesthetic. While there are tangible benefits, one can assume there will be people trying to squeeze those benefits out to the advancement of humanity. Therefore, English as an academic subject may arise from a human desire to learn, to study and find something new we haven’t seen or thought of or discovered before. Gopnik writes from the point of view of Paxson, now defending the existence of English, “We need the humanities because they may end up giving us other stuff we actually like. We do not always know the future benefits of what we study and therefore should not rush to reject some forms of research as less deserving than others.”

The crux of Gopnik’s argument is that the English department would have risen regardless of political or social change. In fact, he writes, “So why have English majors? Well, because many people like books. We like to talk about them too, sometimes a lot. And there are others who enjoy listening to people talk about books." He continues by saying “One might call [our interest] a natural or inevitable consequence of literacy. And it’s this living, irresistible, permanent interest in reading that supports English departments.”

Gopnik finally notes that in addition to English being of inherent interest of humanity, English is also the cornerstone of civilization. “No civilization we think worth studying . . . existed without what amounts to an English department—texts that mattered . . .” He finishes on the strongly emphasized point that “the reason we need the humanities is because we’re human.”