I’m a 31-year-old composer with seven years’ worth of academic training in music composition, soon to start another four-year PhD program. At this point, like most people who have devoted their lives and academic careers to the arts, humanities, and social sciences, I’m happily resigned to the life I’ve chosen, income-ceiling-and-all. I don’t need the value of my degree to be measured in such limited fiscal terms. I can only look on a list like this with detached amusement.
But what I’m trying to figure out is why this article exists at all, and why it was titled the way it was. Why slur ten academic disciplines with the word “worst”? I can think of three possible reasons:
1. To warn teenagers against entering these fields
Pictured: teenager
College majors in the arts and humanities have come under fire this past decade, from the anti-intellectualism of the Bush years, to tirades from embittered recently-crowned PhDs, to your mother wondering why you can’t pursue a “real” career like your brother the doctor.
But speaking anecdotally, most of my colleagues and I knew full well what we were entering into. Few of us held or continue to hold illusions about what careers in our respective fields mean. To dissuade us from our passions by quoting lower-than-median income figures is laughable. Does Goudreau realize that to a poor music student, practicing her craft hours-upon-hours a day while also slogging through coursework and part-time jobs, only to come home to ramen noodles and canned beer, that a $28,000 income might actually seem like a windfall?
Me, after finding out I was hired to teach an adjunct course for $2000 a semester
Does she think her article is some enlightened bulwark standing against the hordes of parents, teachers, and guidance counselors telling teenagers they can make fortunes in the arts and humanities? Because those people don’t exist.
2. To further Forbes Magazine’s express mission as “The Capitalist Tool”
Like most big-business-centric publications, Forbes’ mission is to perpetuate conservative economic thinking. "The Capitalist Tool" is literally their motto. Goudreau subtextually states that because these majors don’t provide a direct, speedy return on the student’s investment of time and money, they are less “valuable” to society; they are the “worst” majors for sustaining a capitalist model. I would expect no less from a “Capitalist Tool.”
A Google Image search for “Capitalist Tool” didn’t turn up exactly what I predicted
But dear, dear Forbes: Capitalism? You’re doing it wrong. I won’t even argue the merits of capitalism itself; let’s say for the sake of argument that capitalism is the rosy, perfect model for a utopian planet full of happy rich superpeople. Even in that case, a capitalist society thrives on the students who enter these fields. These students are the creative class, the idea-makers, the thinkers driving innovation.
Effective economic thinking can’t be predicated on outcome numbers alone. Businesspeople have to factor in a wealth of intangible factors when making economic decisions. What is my business’s standing the community? What value does my business’s graphic design overhaul add? What does the color scheme of our lobby suggest to potential clients? Students who have studied the “soft” majors are remarkably well-equipped to wrap their brains around such abstract concepts.
Accountants even monetize some of these intangible aspects of business into an asset known as “goodwill,” which factors into the purchasing price of any company. To dismiss majors in the arts and humanities as “worst” reveals amateur, one-dimensional capitalist thinking at its worst.
That’s more like it
3. To be a “Capitalist Tool” in and of itself
If we’re honest (or maybe just cynical), the headline of this article was chosen as a deliberate provocation to get internet users to click on it. The more clicks into the article, the more ad revenue is generated for Forbes. And it worked. I clicked on the link to the article, multiple times. You did too, to see if your major was on the list (“There it is! Wait, I’m not invaluable...”). We did exactly what they wanted. Touché, Forbes.
There’s not much more to say about that fact, so here’s a video of a cat in a shark costume chasing a duck while riding a Roomba:
I was taken by your three points of justification for Forbes having run the article in the first place. Just wanted to add my two cents across those points.
ReplyDeleteThe first, "To warn teenagers against entering these fields," is in some way accurate. I mean, if recent graduates have already saturated the market with humanities, arts, and social science degrees (with no employment prospects), the author of the article is at the very least showing which fields (and students) are suffering the most. In this regard, high school students can try to make sense of the data in preparing for college. I say try because I realize the article is not only targeting this demographic. After all, what good is it for me, a college grad, to read the article if I have already acquired one of the mentioned degrees?
The second and third point made me come to a similar conclusion. The Capitalist Tool motto, with its immediate return on investment visions and whatnot, declares - in some way - instant gratification. It rewards taking a path that has been traveled before, repeating those who have succeeded in the past, and taking small risks that are by all means carefully determined.
With many arts, social science, and humanities degrees, this type of attitude is not typically present. Soft majors, in my opinion, need the right tools made available to them in order to showcase their talents, creativity, and knowledge of the broad world. The University of Michigan has come a long way in this sphere by offering, resources, workshops, and network opportunities to help wolverine "soft majors" make the most of their post-academic careers.
I agree with your point that the article’s title is a pretty shameless way to generate hits on the page. I read it with the hope that I didn’t see my major listed, but I have a feeling that some people clicked on the link for the opposite reason. In my experience people that participate in many of the majors listed are supremely confident in their choices, with the possible exception of liberal arts majors. Many of these majors include students who are pursuing a discipline that they are passionate about. A point that I believe you were making when talking about $28,000 feeling like a windfall to some.
ReplyDeleteThough it is perhaps not the one amazing "bulwark standing against the hordes of parents, teachers, and guidance counselors telling teenagers they can make fortunes in the arts and humanities," the article does tell its audience more than I was told before entering college all bright-eyed. Looking back, it seems like all my teachers and my parents were either unwilling to crush my naive optimism or they were naively optimistic as well about my dreams of being a creative writer. Few people tell high schoolers the harsh realities. They shelter them a little too much--and even seeking the information in an article like this would take at least the knowledge that not all degrees were equal. Anyways, my point is that I think those parents, teachers, and guidance councilors DO exist in that they keep quiet about harsh realities. And I think high school kids deserve to know more concretely the risks and benefits of the perspective paths through to a degree.
ReplyDelete