english.boisestate.edu/ema/skill.htm
Anything else?
What other skills do English teachers have that are marketable?
It would be a bit of a stretch if an English teacher were to claim that he/she had an “ability to conduct and clearly explain research results”, for example, simply because he/she was an English teacher.
That list is for English majors who want to do something other than teaching.
English majors have plenty of skills:
Ability to describe ordinary parts of speech with fancy language, such as past pluperfect subjunctive.
Ability to spice up conversations with latin and greek words and phrases, such as Aeschylus, Sophocles and deus ex machina.
Ability to distinguish between plot and theme.
Ability to compare and contrast Lawrence’s “Odour of Chrysanthemums” and Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily.”
Ability to write a sonnet.
And for the advanced students, ability to use really big words like post-structuralism and deconstructionism.
For a long time, being an English major had some sort of positive value in looking for TEFL jobs. I never could understand this. I have been taught Chinese by Chinese literature majors and I can assure you that they have no more insight into teaching Chinese than the accounting major or computer programmer which whom I have had language exchange. On the otherhand, being an English major is no more a disadvantage than being a sociology or history major. And it certainly won’t make any difference to most bushiban operators when you ask them for a job.
I have an English degree and cor speke big werds
Hey MT, I
One thing I’ve noticed since I started surfing internet forums are the atrocious writing skills of most people. So that’s one advantage an English major such as myself has: the ability to compose coherent, well-written sentences and paragraphs swiftly & efficiently with a minimal amount of grammatical & spelling mistakes (give or take a typo here and there). And no, I don’t spend much time composing my posts - it took me perhaps three minutes to write this one. So my education may not have been wasted, after all.
I like the job options for English majors: self-employment, poet, non-profit organizations…it was hard to control my laughter as I read the list…of course the list for a linguist is probably much shorter so I shouldn’t laugh too hard.
What is it my philosophy teacher used to say? I think it was, “A philosophy major can do anything anyone wlse can. They can wash dishes, drive cabs…” I don’t see any reason why English is less marketable than philosophy. I think the list forgot a few careers. I didn’t see Presidential speech writer or Minister of Culture.
Greetings tinman,
Hey, looks like you’re a new member as well. Maybe it’s just me, but I couldn’t tell from your post whether or not you are being deliberately insulting to English majors or if it was just unintentional.
If it’s unintentional, then the results are rather hilarious (you know comparing English majors with philosophy majors…). On the other hand, it’s deliberate, then here’s some advice: LET IT RIP!!! DON’T HOLD ANYTHING BACK!!!
Here follow my lead:
Your philosophy major is a truly enlightened individual. It takes guts to be so brutally honest.
Believe it or not it isn’t. I’d actually argue that philosophy is one of the few majors that is even less marketable than English. Seriously, next time you fill out any forms that require you to list a profession, write in “Philosopher”, hand it back, and see what kind of response you get. You’re almost better off writing in “Unemployed”, or even “Unemployable”. Then again, it’s not saying much comparing two, more or less, equally unemployable majors. It’s like me asking you, which do you think tastes better: horse dung or dog poop?
Holy crap, you’re right! Here let me help you list a few more, which your professor briefly hinted at: dish washer, taxi driver, …
Lich
Just what the hell is your problem, Lich?
No one looks good arrogantly sneering at their “inferiors”. Just a tip.
At risk of fanning any flames and an inability to resist temptation…
[quote=“Lich”]Note: Don’t you people find it fascinating how we find the locals fake and pretentious when they start dropping English words/phases in a Chinese conversation, because we know their command for the English language is, at best, suspect; yet SOMEHOW when foreigners start dropping Latin clich
God, your retorts are sooooo predictable, ImaniOU.
Noticed that I’ve already prepared for such a rebuttal in the exact same post where you quoted me.
Quoting myself here:
[quote] I guess
Lich, don’t you know what sarcasm is ? Surely with your education you could have spotted it in Sandman’s post (elsewhere) and MT’s above ? That’s at least one thing English graduates can do and you can’t.
Lich is a #$@#$ troll. He could be the biggest MORON to hit forumosa since Jason Linn. Actually, he makes Jason Linn look intelligent.
Lich is a #$@#$ troll. He could be the biggest MORON to hit forumosa since Jason Linn. Actually, he makes Jason Linn look intelligent.[/quote]
It amazes me that Lick still posts here. He must be one insecure mutha-fuka to keep coming back here ridiculing those he knows in his heart are superior to him. I wouldn’t even give him “troll” status…maybe he can be a TIT (Troll in Training) for now.
Or maybe he can just go away.
I’ve recently been working for an English major - with a few years teaching experience too - who is now the ‘academic director’ or some such for an education company.
He couldn’t write good English, his teaching materials were full of basic errors, he couldn’t analyse or construct an argument, his organisational skills were appalling, in fact he couldn’t do any of the things listed in the link at the start of this thread.
He was a pretty good teacher though, but that’s down to personality rather than education. An English Degree doesn’t seem to qualify you to do anything that Joe Ordinary couldn’t.
I think organization skills rather than being something that can be taught actually is very dependent on personality. You can read all the self-help books and buy all the post-it notes and organizing gadgets your heart desires. Some people are just bad when it comes to getting organized. Or maybe it’s just me.
I also think the same could almost be said about teaching. It’s very beneficial to learn how to become organized and to learn how to teach, but if you don’t have the personality to teach, you’re going to burn out in no time. I don’t see how being an English major, though, makes someone a better-organized person.
This is the big question. What do qualifications mean? You read all sorts of things on the net about the poor teaching ability and lack of knowledge found amoung highly qualified teachers. We all know this to be true, but the real question gets left unanswered; what standard should be used by those who do the hiring? There is a well-established method for training English and TESOL teachers, if employers don’t use that standard what should they use?
I majored in History and if a company ever needed someone to conduct military operations on the Russian steppe, I’m their guy.