/lit/ - Literature

[Undecided No.2208595]

This is the turning point in my life. I want to major in English after I graduate, but my family wants me to go into Finance. I'm pretty much alright with both. What should I do?

Can an English major get a job in California? Perhaps in education?

[Anonymous No.2208602]

go for the finance

[Anonymous No.2208598]

can an english major get a job? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Thankyou for making me laugh today

[Anonymous No.2208604]

I think you should go with Finance and read novels at night.

[Anonymous No.2208603]

>English Major

>job

pffffffthahahahahahahahahaha

Get a library card, it will serve you better than a college lit course.

[Anonymous No.2208616]

>>2208595
Go to med school.

[Undecided No.2208622]

Could I double major then?

[Anonymous No.2208625]

>>2208622
I think you could make technical writing/finance work. Talk to your advisor.

[Anonymous No.2208633]

>>2208622

Nothing wrong with that.

Worst case scenario it shows prospective employers that you're well-read and know how to construct a sentence.

[Anonymous No.2208636]

Graduate from high school, but stay out of higher education -- particularly in the event that you're not blue-blooded. Taking on a shitload of debt is not a good idea. Instead go to North Dakota, work hard for a few years and save up hundreds of thousands of dollars (dat oil money). Then, live on the cheap for the rest of your life watching rich people's houses, drawing lightly on your funds for food and other necessaries, doing more English -- and at your leisure -- than you would have done in college.

[Anonymous No.2208643]

Be a history major and do a ton of lit classes as electives and then go to law school. that's how all the history majors i went to school with got rich but your results may very depending on intelligence, drive and family connections.

[Anonymous No.2208652]

Sup guys, not OP here, but have a related question.

I don't mind living on a college professor's salary, and I know the debt will be devastating. How feasible is it that after I get a PhD I could scurry off to Japan and live there for a while? I'm a dirty weeaboo and I would love to visit the country if not live there for some years, even if it means temporarily teaching English to high school kids and essentially doing work I'm over qualified for.

[Anonymous No.2208962]

>>2208652

The Japanese are racist as hell. Prepared to be heckled if you:

A) don't look Japanese
B) are not living in a tourist-impacted area

GLHF. I used to live in Nagasaki. It sucked. And I'm Japanese. (Okay, halfie -- so I looked white.)

[Anonymous No.2208963]

>going to college
Go to a trade school OP, it doesn't matter what you go into in all likely hood you're going to have a hard time getting a job no matter what.

Though I will point out that Education is the most employable thing right now.

[Anonymous No.2208964]

Studying English at University is truly the worst sort of academic hell.

[Anonymous No.2208967]

Finance is like one of like three guaranteed job right after school majors. The others are accounting and engineering. You should study what you like, so honestly OP if you don't mind finance its a no brainer.

[Anonymous No.2208968]

>>2208963
> it doesn't matter what you go into

You must be a pretty miserable fuck not to give a shit what you do for a living.

[Anonymous No.2208977]

I'm about a month away from graduating and getting my B.A in English and

-Everyday I regret picking English as a major.

-I have come to terms that most likely my B.A has only made me successful in accumulating debt.
-Now I have to get at least a masters to do ANYTHING, thus succumbing to more debt as mentioned above

Getting a degree in english is only useful for crushing any dream you ever had that you might get a job that pays decent in a field you enjoy.

[Anonymous No.2208989]

>>2208977

You knew what you were getting into. Going into English for the pay is retarded.

[Anonymous No.2208999]

>>2208989

You're right.

I dropped out just before earning my English associate's upon coming to this realization, and then got a job in public service doing something that actually benefits the community.

[Anonymous No.2208997]

>>2208989
I didn't get into english to make money. I was disillusioned perhaps that i could make ends meet. Or get a job, any job really.
y'know McDonalds won't even hire me.

[Anonymous No.2209006]

>>2208997

Oh please. Get teaching certification and go to work.

[Anonymous No.2209010]

>>2209006
it'd be another two to three years of school. If I'm going into debt, I'm doing it right with a masters, not the tcp program.

[Anonymous No.2209043]

>>2208997

My situation also. The reasoning was always, well, that amazing first from a top uni will get you some kind of work above minimum wage at least, regardless of the degree you're doing; now I can't even get minimum wage work and it's been nigh on 6 months. But then you know things are really fucked up when even my friends who got firsts in maths are in the same situation...

The absurd bullshit that we just need to 'get a job' when, every year since the start of the industrial revolution, there have been consistent technological innovations radically diminishing the amount of human labour actually needed by the economy (not helped by the influx of women post-70s basically doubling the amount of people in the work force without any concomittant increase in demand). Capitalism only works for everyone if everyone has jobs, and that's never going to happen, especially not now (I think of my mother, working a temp job unfolding letters which had already been opened by a machine which could easily be tweaked to do her task, pissing away her life just to make enough money that we could still barely afford to two meals a day).

It's important to remember as well that whenever these technological innovations first broke they were often pitched as game-changers which would revolutionise society and render human toil a thing of the past... but a system like capitalism never allows such a thing. It feeds off precisely that human toil in order to perpetuate it's own impersonal merry-go-round of pointless 'growth', while any opportunity for real human growth is negated. Whole swathes of our generation locked into eternal adolescence/obsolescence, denying us any kind of chance at life within this society, and then people wondering why we're starting to seek 'a different use of life', the re-establishment of community in occupations, the negation of all this...

[Undecided No.2209200]

OP here. Decided I'll just double major. At any rate, I can still switch majors before the first semester is over.

Thanks, /lit/.

[Anonymous No.2209208]

>>2208963

This. People saying that if you go into the higher sciences or finance or whatever you'll get a job are just plain wrong. The job market is saturated for everyone. I know so many people that took that advice and still can't find jobs.

Trade school is your best bet if you actually want to make money.

[Anonymous No.2209210]

>>2209010

Wow, what? Teaching certification here only takes a few months. All you really have to do is pass a test. Sucks for you.

[Anonymous No.2209213]

Why would you ask a literature board for this? Isn't it obvious we would choose the English major?

[Anonymous No.2209216]

>>2208652

Visit Japan. Don't live there.

[Anonymous No.2209215]

>>2209210
where are you located, por favor

[Anonymous No.2209217]

OP, it doesn't matter what you major in, get some sweet as internships and you're set. Even with a woman studies degree.

PROTIP: It isn't what degree you get, it's about the job experience you land, the people you know, and the school you go to. I've had friends with Engineering and Science degrees who were fucked finding a job because they didn't get internships.

[Anonymous No.2209225]

In here people go for Physics and then specialize in the shit they really like: literature, finances, language...
If you major Physics you can pretty much be everything you want and have any job since you show you are not an ignorant cunt.

Go for finance.

Captcha: smirds physical <---signal

[Anonymous No.2209236]

>mfw I majored in English Lit and have already worked as an editor and now a private teacher ($60/hour)

>mfw I'm now in law school and STILL banking cash from my English degree (teaching rich kids how to read and write)

Teach. Not many people find literature easy or exciting. If you can get your students excited in course material and teach them how to write persuasively and concisely, you can make so much money.

[Anonymous No.2209245]

>>2209236
>now in law school
Wow, that really worked out for then didn't it? Enjoy your pyramid scheme- even law grads from top 8 schools are having trouble finding jobs. Now you have a 250k debt on top of being unemployed.

[Anonymous No.2209251]

>>2209245
>mfw I'm in a top-tier law school in Vancouver, BC, where we have no legal glut like AMERIKKKA
>mfw BC bud half/ounces for 50 dollars and delicious moderate winters and summers
>mfw studying for law school at a top-tier dim-sum joint and then rolling up a J and strolling along the sea wall
>mfw rioting when my hockey team loses

stay salty usa

[Anonymous No.2209279]

I've worked with english majors in firms that do very well for themselves, the ability to write and communicate well is important. Taking English as a major is not the most effective job making major but it is definitely not the death sentence lots of people make it out to be

[Anonymous No.2209296]

>>2209251

Sounds good but how does this have to do with finding a job after uni?

[Anonymous No.2209317]

>>2209251
your so mad, you wrote that huge green text response

[Anonymous No.2209350]

I got some good advice on this recently from somebody with a PhD on a tenure-track job after a long haul. You're going to have to move around a lot and be very flexible with your leases as you accept teaching jobs that will normally only last a year or two, but if you keep up with things outside of the classroom like conferences, doing presentations, doing out of class lectures and lecture series (basically do "extracurricular" activities, but for a teacher), you'll make a bit of a name for yourself which will eventually help land you a tenure track job. That'd be if you wanted a PhD route.

The way I've been seeing things really, there's no jobs anywhere for anything. So do what you'd prefer. It seems like you'd prefer English. It can be a horrible existence to just go into what your parents want you to. It'll please them sure, but they're going to die eventually, and then you're just kind of left with a career that you didn't want. But you say you're alright with finance, so I guess it just depends on the reasons why you're okay with it. Double majoring is a good idea. I did that and it definitely helped when I made a decision because I had dipped my feet into both subjects.

>>2209236
Your face is the tip of the iceberg to a mind harboring massive depression that will eventually force you to suicide?