Do English degrees get you anywhere?

Do English degrees get you anywhere?


Ive been writing all my life but never considered a career in it until recently...idc what i write I just like writing and being creative...also self taught japanese and could probably learn and easier language also if need be.

What shall i do?

I also love writing sonic fanfiction..

I have a BA and an MA in English. They are useless, but you will get to read a lot of good books. If you want to write you need to read and write A LOT. Read classics and modern lit, prose and poetry, novels and short stories. Anything you can find, especially books you wouldn't normally read

This is great advice. I'll add, OP, that you need to ignore the hundreds of people who will tell you to quit, or "write on the side" while working 40 hour weeks, and just do what you love. If you're decent at writing you'll find freelance work or even a steady writing gig, especially in a market where people are complete and utter degenerates with regard to writing ability.

You may also want to consider a Creative Writing degree.

DO
NOT
DO
IT

You can always minor or comajor in English

English major here, the only use I could find for it was as a high school teacher. Fortunately I like teaching almost as much as I love writing, so after a few years I plan to move on up to university teaching.

It depends on what tracks you choose to focus on. I focused mine on secondary education and now I teach middle school language arts and it's v fulfilling for me. Other options with jobs attached are technical writing and sometimes rhetoric and writing

Otherwise, in terms of job prospects, an ENGL degree is not great but if you're smart and sociable, it teaches you great communication, reading, writing, and critical thinking skills. I know an English major who is a project manager for a business related to compsci because he was versatile with the skills gained from his degree.

We tend to consider majors useful or useless only in one plane of value, that of the economic. We should consider how those skills learned in seemingly useless degrees might be transferable to entirely unrelated jobs.

>tfw born autist
>can't do social jobs because brain literally can not figure out what to say
>tfw don't want to he a fags engineer
> I want to be a lawyer
What are my chances lads? I got 5 years of Veeky Forums wisdom and debate experience under my belt

also wanted to add a lot of English majors end up moving on to law school. The close reading and interpreting skills you're taught are valuable there.

>can't do social jobs
work construction

Yeah but I don't wanna throw out my back

Wasn't the IT industry made for autists like you?

Yeah but I like people even though Veeky Forums is basically my social avenue. I want to find the truth and the law fascinates me as much as philosophy

Do some CBT for social anxiety with assertiveness training, then go become a fucking kick ass lawyer, user.

:)

It's me again reminding you that if you get an English degree without another worthwhile major or at least a solid career (meaning guaranteed) career path you will regret it and remember this post. This is the best advice in this thread

>useless
fuck off back to r*ddit, utilitarian

I quit my English degree to participate full-time in 9999999 gets!

...

Based

It hasn't been gotten yet newfag.

Er, if I was a "utilitarian" I wouldn't have done English, would I?

I know
Has now tho

You can wipe your ass with a liberal arts degree. Supposedly all jobs will be gone in 10 years due to automation, but that's still a while. It's probably better to find something that will actually get you a job.

Don't do it, OP. Yes, follow your passion and never stop reading and writing, but know also that literature isn't something that takes up the entire day, and that even the best writers didn't spend theit whole day just lounging around at home, especially modern writers. From what I've read, most good writers spent like 5 hours max writing, some even less (Mann only spent 3 hours a day writing), and then had the trouble of filling up the rest of their time doing fuck all. If you are a richboy like Proust or have a patron, like Joyce (which seems impossible these days), you can afford to do fuckall, but chances are you can't. I work in emergency medicine, 40 hours a week, (with night shifts) and you would be surprised how much time I have to write, and how much progress I can make in one day, a few hours, simply because I manage my time well. Maybe you won't have to go into something strenuous like medicine, but don't feel like literature is something you need to devote your entire life to. I think literature depends a lot more on innate talent and on life experience, or an innate ability to introspect and find meaning in life experience, than most other arts, and isn't as immediately technical. Maybe you can quit your job and write full time, after you get published, but before then, you need to work. TLDR: double major

...

Depends where you're doing it OP. Do an English degree at a good University and have relevant work experience alongside it, and you'll be fine. It can be a bit tough immediately after graduation, but you need to stick it out.

Don't waste your time studying English somewhere shit though. I'm in the UK and I'd only consider places like Oxbridge, UCL, Edinburgh, Warwick, St Andrews etc

I want to go into higher education.

Working on my bachelors in English and making as many connections as I can with my professors. Will I make it out alive? I'm pretty social

Based