The Death of the English Degree, Brought on by Critical Analysis

[Igel]

12. Got my degree in literature.

Not English. When I got my degree the field was changing. You could have a wide variety of approaches when I started my MA. But already at some schools there were approved approaches to critical analysis and all others need not apply. You'd get through the basics of close reading and inferencing, of how to assemble an argument and critical thinking. Then a lot of doors were closed, paneled over, and wallpapered over--long forgotten and inaccessible. The licit approaches are really fairly self-centered. And all too often the analysis exists as a kind of Platonic ideal just waiting for some content to be centered on--the conclusions are the same, you just have to find the evidence to show that you're right. (Sort of the opposite of trying to falsify your hypothesis.)

Most of the approved approaches are useless for the business world. Your boss doesn't want you to undermine internal literature or have fancy, esoteric campaigns that target 1% of the community. You have an audience. Talk to it on their terms. (This is, to a large extent, what rendered "belles lettres" elitist, and made "fine arts music" alien to a wider audience. "I write for myself ... if others eavesdrop, I can't be bothered.&quot


Once you get past the basics--up through critical thinking--there has to be a variety of options. Some might be creative writing, where if you write and have no audience you made the choice to have no income and be self-unemployed. But it should also focus on for-profit writing, where the writer is also a businessman and needs to bring in money for room and board. Another would be technical and informational writing. How to produce a good, crisp, clean narrative. How to present information in a way friendly to a specific audience or to a range of audiences. And how to sculpt your prose (etc.) for specific media--Twitter campaigns, Web pages, voice media, tv, etc.

High-school English is making baby-steps in this now. "Okay, you read The Great Gatsby. Discuss ______. Your audience is ...." a group of English teachers. Or perhaps "your parents." Or "your 6-year-old sister." "A group of students about to start reading the novel." "A group of inmates in prison." "A group of inner-city youth more interested in their gang than some dead white guy's take on the socio-cultural milieu from 85 years ago." "A group of bored suburban women at a library reading circle." "A group of teen girls." Yeah, there's stereotyping--but the goal isn't the stereotype, but linguistic and perspective flexibility on the part of the writer and speaker.