/lit/ - Literature

>>4881130
Philosophy. Philosopher students generally score higher on writing tests than do English students, the work is more rigorous, and, if you ever wanted to write fiction, it's more important to have read a lot of non-fiction, especially philosophy, than it is to have read a lot of fiction (which, as a philosophy major, you could still obviously do in your spare time). Or you could major in both, which is what I'm doing, much to the chagrin of my parents and friends (it's not practical enough for them).

>>4881130
>>4881142
Why not do what you are already doing

>>4881130
>1984
try Plebian Studies

(cont)

Here's the issue:

I agree with Plato. In an ideal society, literature is not present. I can't come to see it as anything but... entertainment.

If anyone has studies Virgil or Ovid, or the bible, you'll see that there is a dialectic of the evolutionary ideal: Technology and science brings people together (and that is ideal) or ignorance keeps people from destroying themselves (and that is ideal)

Look what literature has done. Look at what it does to the populus. I'm talking about the bible. Literature is an imitation of the real world, meant to define emotion or feeling or desire - - it is inductive entertainment. BUT AVERAGE people don't know this and will always attempt to project it onto the world.

Philosophy solves problems. This is obvious. From epistemology comes Science, from ethics comes sociology, political science, etc.

Anyway I'm going off track here and getting sloppy with my writing. The point is, what is the best medium to use, philosophy or literature, to educate people on the horrors of literature?

>>4881154
>what is the best medium to use, philosophy or literature, to educate people on the horrors of literature?

Modern philosophy is very difficult to approach for people to be educated about a horror of something

Literature is better suited to force through this gap but in a hypocritical way

Ultimately your continued education will give you the answer you seek

>>4881130
I see you have a kobo touch. Is it good?

Please don't major in philosophy: we don't need someone like you in a philosophy department.

>>4881473
>a
The irony is that someone who fits the profile for a philosophy major is the last thing the philosophy department needs

>>4881154
This ground isn't new in philosophy. But literature is printed (In the publisher's ideal) to reach as much of its public as possible. So then, if the literature you write resonates well with this intent to its potential public, it should obviously be the medium.

If you're speaking of rarefied forums -- such as philosophy, the humanities, etc. -- then obviously this ground, in isolation, has already been spoken about quite at length. You would need to understand your own intentions more, in order to create broader ones to reach those types of audiences; it would be the only way for your writings to matter on those stages.

>Visible bookmarks in Ulysses, Mason & Dixom, No Country For Old Men and Infinite Jest

Topkek

>>4881130
Honestly, I think the best bet is to major in a foreign language. Utilize your knowledge of Latin to learn French or Italian--you will be able to access literature more directly, and you will be able to go into translating if you ever want a job in the private sector.

I wish I had just studied Italian in (or any other "blanket" field) in college, that way I could have joined an Italian department. Instead, I am the black sheep of my uni's history department

Source: MA student

You should get a computer science/electrical engineering degree. Chemical engineering would be good too.

>>4882726
you should post on the right boards, you insufferable autist.

>>4882732
Not the guy you replied to, but so should OP

>>>/adv/

>>4881150

>>4881130
can you elaborate more on the oil industry? I'm working at fort mac for the summer on a work visa from the states and have no idea what i'm getting into.

I know the pay is very good but not exactly educated on the labor side of things

Isn't this something you have to decide for yourself? Be a man you fucking bitch.

both are good choices for what it sounds like you're into. That being said, it seems to me like you are already philosophizing about literature. If you take philosophy courses, you'll learn better how to think, and many of the pieces you would be reading will be tougher than what you'd get in the ;iterature courses, so that, when you turn your focus again toward literature, the reading will go by like a breeze.

In short, if you study philosophy, that will help you later in your studies of literature. I'm not sure it would work the other way around.

>>4881150
why i lol

>I am to choose my major tomorrow, and I can't decide between English or Philosophy.

Why not both? Or why not choose one as a minor?

>>4881130
Lets give you an example. In High-school the teachers which were the most incompetent were English teachers, because the often had only studied English, they were morons who knew nothing. The most competent teachers were History teachers, because they needed to have good English to survive in their field and they also knew about a subject.

Why not Classical Studies? It's far more interesting than what you'll get with a phil or eng degree and equally as unemployable.

Seriously, English degrees are nonsense. They don't teach you to be a better writer, and you don't need a professor to tell you what to read. Phil is slightly better, but you have to tolerate being grouped together with 90% pseudointellectual dipshits who finally found a field where their sloppy opinions have to be taken seriously because muh subjectivity. In addition, obtaining either of these degrees is going to force you to interact with some of the dreadful social justice warriors you usually only hear about on the internet. These people actually get jobs as lecturers and full time professors.

With Classical Studies, at least you stand to gain historical knowledge as well as being able to read some of the greatest works ever written in their original language (assuming you're not a dilettante and actually learn Latin and Ancient Greek).

>>4882804

>Classical Studies

Queers, weirdos and queers.

>>4883766
That's pretty much the opposite of classical studies

>>4881130
>>4881154
You're a retard, it doesn't matter which irrelevant subject you chose.

>>4882801
>survive in their field
If they had 'survived in their field', they wouldn't be fucking high school teachers...

>>4883766

I'm pretty sure "Classics" refers to the major that requires a reading knowledge of both Greek and Latin. "Classical studies" deals mainly with the history, sociology, and 'cultural' aspects of the ancient and does not require any knowledge of Greek or Latin.

>>4883797
>look a university studies
>interested in reading fuck yeah awesome classics
>look up latin programme at uni
>half of two semsters fully devoted to women in ancient literature

Why is my country so fucked up

>>4883816
bawww why do they want me to read up on an important topic of ancient literature. fuken feminists

>>4881130

English.

That will open more roads to you than philosophy. Studying philosophy is something you can do on your own by reading books, while literature has more of a practical approach and will enable you to get better jobs.

That said, why not both?

>>4883833

You can't study english on your own by reading books?

>>4883833
Most nonsense post of the day, congratulations.

Purely economically, which is better, philosophy or English?

>>4881154
Plato was a retard. Art is necessary because of perspectivism. Read Heideggers' essays on art

Read BNW and realise that escapism is in fact the best thing you can offer people.

Wow I don't relate to you all

I recommend you go the way of your compatriot Toaster Steve

By the sounds of it, you oughta take English.

>>4882691
Not OP, but I usually leave my old bookmarks in books, even the ones I've finished. It doesn't bother me enough to clean them out.
I found an old Magic: The Gathering card the other day in The Divine Comedy.

>>4886957
You dishonest piece of filth.

Hey neat, I'm 24 and started university at 23. DIdn't even go to high school. Classics/History. I worked labour before that, family was poor, etc. Hence the mature student. GPA is basically exactly yours. Lotta similarities, man. Just finishing up my BA now.

Where'd you get that damn scholarship? No one would pay attention to me because I'm an old fuck. Had to pay for it.

>>4887029
Being honest to people would only go to show that their lives are not worth living, yet they can't overcome their instinctive tendency to live on. It would be making them aware of a problem they couldn't solve. It's mere cruelty. It would be better just to create a world for them where suffering is at least minimised.

>>4886984

>you oughta take English

Swing and a miss, kid.

>>4887071
I notice you use the term 'people'. Those things inhabiting that perfect fantasy aren't people; that was the point BNW was trying to make.

>>4887095
Please elaborate on your essentialist notion of what constitutes a human. I don't see why they aren't people. Also, even if they aren't people, what's wrong with not being people?

>>4887101
All of humanity's suffering and struggles which inspire its art or religion or philosophy is eradicated. They were reduced to beings capable of experiencing sensations but not deeper thinking; they were incredibly intelligent animals, in other words. No characteristic human qualities.

>>4887116
So you consider them less than human because they don't suffer enough? "Deeper thinking" has no inherent value.

>>4887116
are you talking about current western life m8?

>>4881130

OP, I just want to say that you really put yourself out there with this post.

Don't let facile opinions govern your life.

As far as whether you ought to major in English literature or Philosophy (or both?), only you know the answer. Also consider a Classics degree.

Good luck.

I can't choose between philosophy and theology

>>4887240

choose aquinas and have both

>>4887196
No, about Brave New World. >>4886957 brought it up. Although he/she sounds like that form of society would be a good thing.

>>4887171
No, I consider them less than human because they lacked the human experience, not because they didn't suffer. Certain things like religion and philosophy were 'created' partly for us to cope, understand, make sense etc. And art is partly inspired by all the kinds of struggle we experience. Without this need to cope and understand, and without all this 'suffering', people basically ceased to resemble what they were once before. They were mostly concerned with the satisfying of physical and shallow desires; deeper contemplation ceased. I mean the lower castes of society were intentionally made stupid.

Pick the major which is impossible to learn in your own with only a library card to assist.

Oh wait.

>>4887255
What you're saying goes for every change in terms of living though. You lack the human experience of a medieval peasant, and a Congolese rubber harvester lacks the human experience of your life. Does that make any of you three less human? By your logic, you are the least human of the three because you probably struggle the least.

Also, most people are already and have always been mostly concerned with the satisfying of physical and shallow desires; deeper contemplation has never been a large part of the 'human experience' in the first place. The lower castes has always been intentionally kept stupid and for the most part have voluntarily remained stupid. Brave New World offers the same structures already in place, only in a more refined way.

I think it's power is that it shows the inevitable made blatant and transparent for the reader.

>>4887316
I lack the experience of a medieval peasant, but I have my own experience; the Congolese rubber harvester lacks my experience but has his own. And each of those three experiences, no matter how different, nonetheless share something universal, the relatively same sort of things that make one contemplate existence, pain, pleasure etc. But how do you define the experiences of the people in BNW? In what way can myself, the peasant and the harvester relate to these people in any significant manner? They are alien to us because they have experienced almost none of the significant universal things the human species up till now has.

> By your logic, you are the least human of the three because you probably struggle the least.
Like I explained in >>4887255, it is not suffering alone that defines humans (and thus becomes inherently desirable), but the full range of experiences, joys, and trials, according to BNW. Myself, the peasant, the rubber harvester, no matter how different our experiences may be, we all encounter reasons for joys, trials, and contemplation. The people in the novel don't, only base pleasure.

As for deeper contemplation never being a large part of the 'human experience' in the first place, what do you think religion, art, philosophy are about? Most people might be concerned with immediate, short term desires of some kind, but unless they'e robots or maybe psychopaths, they will encounter at some point in their lives some need for deeper consideration.

And while the lower castes have traditionally remained less aware than their masters as you say, there is nothing in BNW to distinguish the stupid lower castes from anything; the upper castes can relate more to the lower than to you or me. Both upper and lower castes are simple compared to the main character and the savage.

>>4887297
Hellz yeah, STEMbros unite

/brofist

>>4887021

Why the fuck haven't I been using Pokemon and yugioh cards as bookmarks?

>>4887371
But your definition of what it means to be human is completely arbitrary. People from the past may very well say that you don't know what it means to be human because you haven't experienced war or hunger or poverty. You have experienced almost none of the significant universal things the human species up until now has. Modern western life would probably be just as alien, sheltered and vapid for someone from the middle ages as BNW seems to you. There is no clear break here, BNW is just a further degree of safety, security, peace and science and technology. That doesn't mean they have a lesser range of experience though. Someone from the middle ages might know more about warfare and starvation and also about truly believing in something and deep religious experiences, but he misses the range of experiences that you have. In the same way, the people in BNW have access to experiences that you don't. Thing of soma and the feelies and the orgies and such. Things that not only consist of base desire but also satisfy the need for ecstasy, for oneness, a sort of Dionysian dissolution of the self.

What is problematic about differing between 'the human experience' and 'those unhuman vapid guys' is where you draw the line, if the line should be drawn at all, and if your side of the line is preferable. I'd say the human experience you treasure is a luxury. Most people genuinely acquainted with its full range would gladly exchange those deep feelings for safety, food and shelter.

>>4881130
philosophy
don't need to explain why as others have done it here before me

>>4881130
Philosophers think more than Englishmen.
People who think are unhappy.
Therefore it's wise to be a good chap.

>>4881154
>Look what literature has done. Look at what it does to the populus. I'm talking about the bible. Literature is an imitation of the real world, meant to define emotion or feeling or desire - - it is inductive entertainment.

? different than music, dance, painting or cinema?

> Philosophy solves problems.
Not really, you were talking from a utilitarianism perspective and now you say this?

>>4887648
>BNW is just a further degree of safety, security, peace and science and technology.
You do understand that BNW was a warning against that level of safety, security, peace, science and technology, right? That Huxley did not want our species to reach that stage? *That* is where the line lies. Soma and feelies not only don't compare to or compensate for what a person up til no has had the ability to experience, but humans have had the equivalents of those things since forever. They don't represent some more advanced stage.

>Most people genuinely acquainted with its full range would gladly exchange those deep feelings for safety, food and shelter.
that is irrelevant to the point.

It's funny that you point to deep religious experiences as something someone from the middle ages may count as a meaningful experience, when that is precisely something that is no longer possible in BNW. My point has been that what goes into forming something like a relgious experience, all the things a person must think and feel, are no longer possible in BNW, exactly because they live the most sheltered, sterile, stripped-down, base lives, with absolutely no room whatsoever to ever come into contact with the kind of experiences that would produce something meaningful like faith or philosophical contemplation or strong, complex emotions.

>>4888760
>You do understand that BNW was a warning against that level of safety, security, peace, science and technology, right? That Huxley did not want our species to reach that stage? *That* is where the line lies.
I don't care what Huxley thinks.

>Soma and feelies not only don't compare to or compensate for what a person up til no has had the ability to experience, but humans have had the equivalents of those things since forever. They don't represent some more advanced stage.
They are more advanced in the sense of being more refined and regulated. I didn't mean superior.

>It's funny that you point to deep religious experiences as something someone from the middle ages may count as a meaningful experience, when that is precisely something that is no longer possible in BNW.
Not meaningful, merely a different type of experience.

>My point has been that what goes into forming something like a relgious experience, all the things a person must think and feel, are no longer possible in BNW, exactly because they live the most sheltered, sterile, stripped-down, base lives, with absolutely no room whatsoever to ever come into contact with the kind of experiences that would produce something meaningful like faith or philosophical contemplation or strong, complex emotions.
And my point is that there are no proper standards by which to judge meaningful and meaningless human experiences and that there is no proper way to judge the BNW human experience as inferior that doesn't rely on arbitrary preference. It's perceived inferiority on your account is solely a matter of taste.

>>4881130
Why do you have two copies of the brothers karamazov?

>>4888824
Ah yes, good ol' moral relativism.

>>4888840
Because I have two eyes

>>4888906
What the shit does what that guy said have to do with morals?

>>4888906
That's a whole lot less silly than having a fixed standard by which to rate meaningfulness and determine only a certain meaningfulness rate to be deserving of True Human Beings™.

>>4888973
He meant relativism in general but he doesn't know it.

>>4888973
It has a lot to do with the book in discussion. There was little in the way of basic personal morality (everyone was a whore), let alone a deeper consideration for humanity as a whole, where it stood, what it meant to be good or bad etc. I mean some of the cornerstones of morality we know of (religion, philosophy etc) were impossible in that society; there was an absence of moral contemplation. And this anon continues to defend it because 'arbitrary standards of meaningfulness', which in this case at least is nonsense, since the author so clearly envisaged a regression of the society he saw around him.

>>4889045
>it's not arbitrary because Huxley said so

>>4888824
>They are more advanced in the sense of being more refined and regulated.
Being regulated is definitely not synonymous with advancement. And how can they be more refined if:

1. We have always possessed those exact same form of pleasures, and

2. There is practically nothing else available to those people, nothing else which occupies there attention, reflection, moral and creative powers?