Why study literature at university when all of the material is available on the internet for free?

the boy wishes to be a machine instead of a man. pathetic, isn't it?

What is the difference between man and machine? Nothing meaningful really

I really wish I had. I studied a STEM undergrad and a professional degree after that. I was surrounded by idiots. I'm sure that 99% of literature majors are also idiots but there would at least be a few that I could enjoy having real conversations with. Also, I'm pretty lazy so being forced to learn other languages would have been very useful.

>it is a subjective experience through and through
What did you mean by this?

STEM/English double major here.

You didn't miss much.

True that there are a few genuine gems of people who study literature.

But for every real conversation you have, you will have a hundred bad, pretentious readings tortured out of texts by clueless english teachers in the making.

The main thing I learned from the experience was that the first gulp from the glass of english literature will open your mind, but at the bottom of the glass politics is waiting for you.

Comperative Lit student here, can confirm op is a brainlet.
In theory you could study everything on your own, doesn't mean you will be competent by the end of it.
When you study it, you can't just cherry pick approaches you like and it introduces you to stuff, you never would have found otherwise. Most Veeky Forumsizens have a ridiculously narrow horizon, because they just self study.
You also need some teachers to keep you in check and tell you, when you up your own ass on something.

"Why study literature at university when all of the material is available on the internet for free?"

this is 100% wrong tho

Why not? Why study alone, isolated inside an echo chamber, when you can literally go to a place meant to foster knowledge where you'll constantly be tested and forced to surpass yourself? You can also interact with like minded people, join clubs, etc. It's not like you can't keep self studying.

The study of ‘literature’ shouldn’t just be reading and subjective interpretation, even if it is presented that way in first and second year survey classes. Since a lot of academic programs require a basic lit&comp survey course, emphasizing critical reading and basic writing skills, such classes are low on discipine-specific skills and are made to appeal broadly. Most English departments are perpetually in the red and have to attract as many people into the junior level classes as possible just to remain financially afloat. If, in the upper-year classes, the students are not being taught about the history of literary criticism and the history of the development of the discipline, they are being suckered. Literary study and scholarship is an academic discipline and success in it should require the student to learn how to engage a text according to the standards of the discipline.

I’m all for people putting effort and discipline into the study of literature on an individual basis, but few people have the will to be an autodidact. The product of such study will be knowledge, access to history, enjoyment of reading, perhaps improved ability to read and communicate... and that’s all wonderful, but it’s fundamentally different than working your way into the academic study of literature. The end result is different.

So, as I chomp on OP’s bait like a slut, I suggest that he fundamentally misunderstands what the study of literature is really about.

Because scam artists, or English professors, whatever you'd prefer them to be called, need money too

Everything a professor can teach is available elsewhere, and the results don't have to be different at all. At this point lit classes are for people who want to teach lit or for people who just want to minor in it for the experience

this is more or less true for many people but not everybody

>the only reason I study is so I can gloat and feel superior to others
You've never had a girlfriend and you have no friends. Admit it.

Every board on this site has a loud group of people vehemently against university, which isn't super surprising given the kinda people around here. I'm in my third year of uni now and I enjoy it, but I'm in science, not english. English was my second choice behind the major I ended up in but I'm glad I ended up doing this.

fuck you pseud

Because I was an idiot. Now I’ll be poor the rest of my life, but at least I’m trying to bear it stoically.

credentialist faggot