Graduation Thoughts From a Literary Mama to her English-Major Daughter
In 1995, I heard the question over and over, like a wave crashing down every time a breath is needed: “What will you do with an English degree?” The prospect of life beyond the safety of school was scary enough without the incessant questioning.
I purchased a t-shirt for myself that summed up how I felt and wore it to my commencement. A burgundy box on the front showcased the phrase “Liberal arts graduate: Will think for food.” I have it to this day, although it has become a paint shirt with splotches and stains from the last three decades.
And now my daughter has her document in hand, an English degree. And the questions raining down on her are the same and also worse: “Are you worried that AI will make you unemployable?”
When I was a teenager, we were bent on funneling everyone to college whether they wanted to be there or not, whether it was a good fit for them or not, whether they could afford it or whether it would strangle them with debt for years into the future. College was the only way to survive; it was the only steadying ballast.
The tides come in and they recede, but with varying force and with different flotsam.
Now it is a liberal arts degree that is an anchor, hung up on a deep rocky outcrop and preventing forward movement. To be able to think, provide context, offer a different perspective, write concisely, write with flourishes, grapple with dilemmas . . . these are of no value, I guess, just as building stairs or fixing appliances or laying bricks or installing roofs wasn’t in the 1990s. Won’t AI do all of our writing and thinking for us, but better?
It is frightening to stand on shore and peer out at the expanse of blue. It goes on further than you can see, deeper than you know. To launch out into it seems impossible with that tide coming in and going out. How will you ever break past that?
It won’t be easy, but you can with effort.
Or you can choose something else.
Walk further down the beach to sit.
Stay in the dunes.
Turn back and climb the cliffs.
Float in the bay.
Find a sheltering pier.
Write a new way of moving toward your future.