Exploring the English Major
Many courses taken during our time at UNE may not be necessary for life and success in a certain field. However, it is still important to learn how the products of that field affect the world and population as a whole. Researching class descriptions, learning objectives, and the compelling words of well-read authors give a peek into the potential that the subjects could provide. Through this, pieces of a cultivated education can be found, and, in turn, will lead to a better comprehension of the topics within each major. Furthermore, that concept of investigation will be presented in this essay through an examination of my major. The results written here show that the English major is enriched and vocational in the definition given by Ernest Boyer.
Looking at specific courses, “Who and what is an American?” is one of the two required American literature classes, and, to me, the more interesting of the two. It looks at literature from the time of the Civil War to the present day, seeming to primarily focus on the historical side, but Boyer’s three essential questions can still be used to see how and if this course fulfills the guidelines of an “enriched major”: “What is the history and tradition of the field to be examined? What are the social and economic implications to be understood? What are the ethical and moral issues to be confronted?” (Boyer 223). It’s already pretty obvious how the course is examined in a historical sense, but the social and economic implications are a bit trickier. For that, the description actually talks about some of the topics it will be exploring, such as “race, gender, and class relations.” These have always been very social issues, affecting many branches of life between slavery, segregation, and the descrimination still happening today. Morally, there has always been the fact that Americans descended more directly from Europeans and the government never treated others with much respect or fairness. There were the Japanese internment camps in WW2, the contradictive nature of the reservations for Native Americans, immigration, and, again, slavery. Looking at these issues and discussing them can help us investigate the moral dilemmas present in the history and literature of the time. Thus, requiring this class would partially satisfy Boyer’s theory.
Since a deeper perspective is necessary for an enriched education, a successful take on the concepts above could result in constructive critical thought. Problem solving is essential in any profession or field of study. Thus, it should be fair to say that an enriched education will also help students practice critical thinking. Scheuer gives an expanded definition for this thought process, which shows the extent it is used in our everyday lives as students:
“We form… generalizations, commute between the general and the particular, make distinctions and connections, draw analogies, employ various types of reasoning, hone definitions and meanings, and analyze words, ideas, and things to resolve and mitigate their ambiguity. These are precisely the skills that a liberal education cultivates. It heightens our abilities to speak, listen, write, and think, making us better learners, communicators, team members, and citizens.”
The first sentence of the quote seems to have almost a direct similarity to a part of the description for Eng. 206: Introduction to Literary Theory and Criticism: “explore literary ways of knowing by practicing different methods of literary analysis.” Both of these link with Boyer’s concept of the enriched major, in that learning more about English and the historical, social, and economical context will contribute heavily to effective critical thinking.
This constructive critical thought especially helps in the prospect of a career specialized around English. The topic of career readiness and preparation came up in an interview I had with Professor Susan McHugh, a faculty member in the English department and an accomplished author in her own right. When asked about how students are prepared for a future career, especially within the broad and constantly shifting context of the English field, she said that the main goal in her classes is to build good writing habits. Since writing skills are always in demand in every career, writing skills can amplify productivity in any career. Through this, Professor McHugh also recommended working with Zephyr, “the University of New England’s journal of creative expression.” She stressed the importance of hands-on experience; learning about actual publishing, what is published, how it got there, and why.
Within the enriched major concept, the Eng. 201 course, “Who and what is an American?” Reimagining US Literature, says in the description that “this course considers the vibrant and diverse body of texts that constitute literatures of the United States. We will read work that breaks rules and innovates new forms, exploring issues such as race, gender, and class relations…” As learning through the various works seem to bring students an in-depth view of the issues being studied, this description fits within the execution of expanding education in a major. Though the knowledge or method being learned may not be required to graduate or succeed, it gives more practice and leads to a deeper understanding associated with the major itself. This is backed up with a quote from Norman Cousins: “The lawyer who argues in court from a narrow legal base is no match for the lawyer who can connect legal precedents to historical experience and who employs wide-ranging intellectual resources” (qtd. in Boyer 224). Someone who only deals with the surface pieces will be less effective overall, while taking the next step and looking at the work with a more worldly eye will improve it that much more. Expanding your knowledge in the field being studied can enhance the products of that work, the steps taken to succeed in it, and further the field as a whole.
Something about the English major that truly elicits excitement and fascination is the sheer vastness of the major. The description of the English major on UNE’s website is only a small blurb. It gives a broad, but vague, explanation of what students should expect in their time here. It does not, and could not, include everything about what being an English major entails. This idea is actually related to one paragraph in Scheuer’s work: “One [usage of the conceptions of the liberal arts]… embraces the ideal of the integrated curriculum, encompassing virtually all nonprofessional higher learning, from the natural and social sciences to the humanities and the performing arts.” By Scheuer’s words, it becomes clear that English is too broad a subject to accurately simplify it in a paragraph on a website. By choosing to specialize in English, students still have tons of room to move around and decide different potential paths to take on this educational journey. It also makes sense in the number of learning outcomes for the major. Though most of the outcomes can be boiled down to reading comprehension and effective presentation, each one has a hand in the development of many aspects of the arts.
Finding the individual pieces of enrichment in the English major can be challenging, but there’s something rewarding about successfully working with tedious systems and people who know about your field of study(and even then you don’t always know the right questions to ask). As I’ve looked at the specifics of classes and the moral, social, and historical implications we’re supposed to learn in those classes, it is easy to say that I truly believe the English major is suitably enriched by the definition of Boyer. While I have a kind of contentment in where UNE has taken its literature courses, there is definitely more that can be done to broaden the subjects to become more worldly. Hopefully, we’ll see a bigger change in the future of English and the other majors as well.
Works Cited
Boyer, Ernest, “Specialization: The Enriched Major.” Boyer, Ernest.
Scheuer, Jeffery. “Critical Thinking and the Liberal Arts.” Critical Thinking and the Liberal Arts, 18 Nov. 2015, www.aaup.org/article/critical-thinking-and-liberal-arts#.YUppwbhKhPZ. “Zephyr: University of New England’s Journal of Creative Expression: Student Works: University of New England.” Site, https://dune.une.edu/zephyr/.
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The Major Exploration Project, tasked us with individually researching each of our majors. Using readings, specifically the reading authored by Ernest Boyer, we had to prove if our major was “enriched” or not. “Enriched” in this case means that Boyer’s three questions(“What is the history and tradition of the field to be examined? What are the social and economic implications to be understood? What are the ethical and moral issues to be confronted?” (Boyer 223)) can be answered proficiently using information from the major’s learning outcomes, the descriptions of required courses, and past readings. On the surface, researching your own major might not sound like a big deal. I certainly didn’t think so at the beginning of this assignment. However, the exploration can really help point to the significant aspects of the major and find what you’re really interested in. What really helped me was finding pieces of the English major that didn’t feel like it had reached its full potential. Focusing on the criminally small amount of required global literature courses soon brought me into the headspace I needed to investigate and critically analyze the other required courses. Noticing all this really pinpointed the ways that the English major was enriched, but, also, how it could be so much better. In all, looking at UNE’s programs and deciding if they would give us a better perspective was really the stepping stone we needed to decide if our majors could make sure we and future college students will be able to effectively contribute to the world and the lives of others.
