Does a Minor in English help with one's creative writing?
April 30, 2018 5:30 PM Subscribe
Hi. I'm finally about to finish my undergrad and do a graduate degree soon - but I also have the option of completing a Minor in English as well. Does a Minor in English benefit one's writing immensely? Is it worth the extra two semesters for the resume? I'm passionate about all things literary and artsy - but some people are telling me to simply focus on creative writing and not English Literature. I have a feeling I could benefit from it though. I can definitely see myself going the MA route if possible, but completing a Minor is a lot of work as well. Thoughts? Has your Major, Minor, Master's or Doctorate helped you with your creative writing exponentially?
Hell no. You can read the books for free at the library and save the money. It will not help you become a better creative writer because the focus of literature classes isn’t about the author’s creativity, or at least mine were not. My English literature classes were largely about analyzing the text for symbolism and cultural context, like “What led the author to write this text and what is he really saying?” And to be brutally honest, the analyses that my professors led us to conclude seemed to be basically made up out of their personal opinion and nothing particularly concrete or relevant to the author.
If that kind of class actually sounds like it’d be your jam, and you can comfortably afford the tuition, then sure, go nuts. But speaking from my personal experience, my literature classes did not expand my ability to think creatively and frame ideas in a new way, they did the opposite. If I were you, I’d just read the books that analyze authors’ works and save the tuition and class time. If it’s beneficial to your process, you’ll figure that out pretty quickly.
If you want to improve your writing, I’d suggest taking a different type of writing class—like technical writing or screenwriting. Something that makes you frame your writing for a different audience or format.
posted by Autumnheart at 5:54 PM on April 30, 2018 [5 favorites]
If that kind of class actually sounds like it’d be your jam, and you can comfortably afford the tuition, then sure, go nuts. But speaking from my personal experience, my literature classes did not expand my ability to think creatively and frame ideas in a new way, they did the opposite. If I were you, I’d just read the books that analyze authors’ works and save the tuition and class time. If it’s beneficial to your process, you’ll figure that out pretty quickly.
If you want to improve your writing, I’d suggest taking a different type of writing class—like technical writing or screenwriting. Something that makes you frame your writing for a different audience or format.
posted by Autumnheart at 5:54 PM on April 30, 2018 [5 favorites]
I’m confused. Are you wondering about the benefit for your writing or your resume? If your resume, it’s not worth it. If your writing, it might help. But it’s hard to say without understanding your goals. Are you envisioning a creative writing job? If so, can you be more specific? The only jobs I can think of in that category would be in advertising and that’s a field I don’t know anything about.
Undergrad literature coursework didn’t help me think about writing that much. Graduate coursework was more useful. Teaching writing while I was in graduate school helped me learn a lot about writing.
You can theoretically learn a lot for free, as Autumnheart says, but most people aren’t that great at the discipline and self direction you need. I learned more from good teachers than I could have learned on my own, but it was very expensive.
posted by FencingGal at 6:01 PM on April 30, 2018 [2 favorites]
Undergrad literature coursework didn’t help me think about writing that much. Graduate coursework was more useful. Teaching writing while I was in graduate school helped me learn a lot about writing.
You can theoretically learn a lot for free, as Autumnheart says, but most people aren’t that great at the discipline and self direction you need. I learned more from good teachers than I could have learned on my own, but it was very expensive.
posted by FencingGal at 6:01 PM on April 30, 2018 [2 favorites]
You don't need coursework to make you a writer. Especially not if your are going into debt for it-- you didn't say. All you need to be a writer is the passion to write. If anyone can talk you out of being a writer, then that means you aren't one. Graduate, get a job, and start writing for real-- very few courses are going to help you for that. Read Stephen King's On Writing, sell some of your work, get it out there. Then in a few years you might take one of the only things that actually helps writers-- a workshop like Clarion or other equivalent.
posted by seasparrow at 6:06 PM on April 30, 2018
posted by seasparrow at 6:06 PM on April 30, 2018
I found my English literature degree to be really helpful for my creative writing because of the way it made me aware of the context/traditions I'm operating in as a writer. But I don't think I'd spend two extra semesters in school for that benefit alone. You can establish the kind of critical reading habit that'll help inform your writing that way on your own. Assuming your degree is in creative writing, maybe ask some of your professors for help putting together a reading list.
posted by Gymnopedist at 6:13 PM on April 30, 2018 [6 favorites]
posted by Gymnopedist at 6:13 PM on April 30, 2018 [6 favorites]
Is this in Canada? One of your previous questions was about Queen's. I also notice that you had scholarships and bursaries covering most of your expenses. That might change the calculus from "hell no" to "probably not, but maybe?" if you're not spending much out of pocket for the extra year.
posted by quaking fajita at 6:13 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by quaking fajita at 6:13 PM on April 30, 2018 [1 favorite]
I will clarify my answer to underline that my literature classes were about how to read literature, not how to write it. And the quality of the class was highly dependent on the instructor. Most of my instructors had a pretty set idea about the conclusions we were intended to draw from the lectures, and any input like, “I really felt like it was more about this,” was shut down pretty early. So in essence I paid $1000/class to think only one way about an author’s story.
I did have one excellent class with a gifted instructor who was also an author, actually, and he was much more about nurturing people’s interests in the subject matter, and in connecting students to more material that shared the elements they liked. He was great. But out of the 9 or so literature classes, I had one that I felt was worth a damn. I also had a Shakespeare instructor who was a perv and focused much of each class on the naughtier subtexts in the material, which was sort of entertaining, but I didn’t need to sit through a whole semester for that either.
In sum, it’s a crapshoot whether you get a good instructor who wants you to think about the material, or someone who just wants to give their lecture and grade your paper and go home. I think you can find the same level of discussion in communities devoted to the topic. If the point of taking a literature class isn’t specifically to exegete the text (I had to take theology classes too) then I would not recommend spending the money.
posted by Autumnheart at 6:14 PM on April 30, 2018 [2 favorites]
I did have one excellent class with a gifted instructor who was also an author, actually, and he was much more about nurturing people’s interests in the subject matter, and in connecting students to more material that shared the elements they liked. He was great. But out of the 9 or so literature classes, I had one that I felt was worth a damn. I also had a Shakespeare instructor who was a perv and focused much of each class on the naughtier subtexts in the material, which was sort of entertaining, but I didn’t need to sit through a whole semester for that either.
In sum, it’s a crapshoot whether you get a good instructor who wants you to think about the material, or someone who just wants to give their lecture and grade your paper and go home. I think you can find the same level of discussion in communities devoted to the topic. If the point of taking a literature class isn’t specifically to exegete the text (I had to take theology classes too) then I would not recommend spending the money.
posted by Autumnheart at 6:14 PM on April 30, 2018 [2 favorites]
If anyone can talk you out of being a writer, that means you aren’t one.
This is one of those romanticized things people say a lot, but it’s not true. You can be insecure enough to give up and still have the underlying ability to become a writer. Being a writer isn’t some magical gift of the gods only bestowed on those who can conquer self doubt. It’s a skill, like being a swimmer. Nobody says you’re not a real swimmer if someone can talk you out of swimming.
I agree with gymnopedist about the usefulness of understanding context and traditions that you can learn through the formal study of literature. The professor who turned out to be a great playwriting mentor to me wouldn’t accept me as a writing student until I took a year of his theater history classes. In retrospect, I feel he was absolutely right about that.
posted by FencingGal at 6:24 PM on April 30, 2018 [16 favorites]
This is one of those romanticized things people say a lot, but it’s not true. You can be insecure enough to give up and still have the underlying ability to become a writer. Being a writer isn’t some magical gift of the gods only bestowed on those who can conquer self doubt. It’s a skill, like being a swimmer. Nobody says you’re not a real swimmer if someone can talk you out of swimming.
I agree with gymnopedist about the usefulness of understanding context and traditions that you can learn through the formal study of literature. The professor who turned out to be a great playwriting mentor to me wouldn’t accept me as a writing student until I took a year of his theater history classes. In retrospect, I feel he was absolutely right about that.
posted by FencingGal at 6:24 PM on April 30, 2018 [16 favorites]
Different field, but I had a weird situation where I was accepted to great university for a psychology program. They took back my acceptance because I didn't have an undergrad degree in psychology. So I started to work on my undergrad and an professor at another school told me I was wasting my time and just focus on a masters somewhere else. Which I'm almost done with. My vote is for you to focus on a grad program.
posted by Che boludo! at 9:08 PM on April 30, 2018
posted by Che boludo! at 9:08 PM on April 30, 2018
Is a minor worth it? Maybe, if...
• It's a weightier science minor than your science degree (e.g. a minor in computer science might mean something if your undergrad was in IT).
• The minor is in a completely different industry than your degree—and for some reason you really want to major in the one but obtain skills in the other. Some of my colleagues have a B.S. or M.S. coupled with a really artsy minor. The minor wasn't used as a resume line item but to obtain skills they wanted for a hybrid career.
As far as line items on resumes go, though, a minor in English is below worthless. No one looks at an English minor (or major!) and assumes you are an excellent writer. If you want to be recognized as a writer then build up a portfolio of writing. Just like the arts, writing is judged by your portfolio, not your education. Get published before you graduate, or failing that, have samples of your writing readily available.
posted by ticktickatick at 9:42 PM on April 30, 2018
• It's a weightier science minor than your science degree (e.g. a minor in computer science might mean something if your undergrad was in IT).
• The minor is in a completely different industry than your degree—and for some reason you really want to major in the one but obtain skills in the other. Some of my colleagues have a B.S. or M.S. coupled with a really artsy minor. The minor wasn't used as a resume line item but to obtain skills they wanted for a hybrid career.
As far as line items on resumes go, though, a minor in English is below worthless. No one looks at an English minor (or major!) and assumes you are an excellent writer. If you want to be recognized as a writer then build up a portfolio of writing. Just like the arts, writing is judged by your portfolio, not your education. Get published before you graduate, or failing that, have samples of your writing readily available.
posted by ticktickatick at 9:42 PM on April 30, 2018
Hello! You have asked a lot of questions about what kind of schoolwork will make you a better writer. In the last one, a lot of people (including me) asked you what your ultimate goal is and you never clarified, but that's very important here too. Do you want to become a writer as a career? What is your goal? (If you don't HAVE a goal but kind of don't want to leave the warm and cozy arms of school and enter the real world and are trying to figure out the best way to do that, I profoundly sympathize with that but suggest you not prolong the inevitable.)
I am a professional writer (of a variety of things, but including novels) and I have a degree in English literature, not creative writing. I think my Lit degree has been really helpful to me as a writer (it's taught me a lot about structure, among other things, but it also exposed me to a lot of other writings and writers, and helped me think critically about how to tell a story, and that was incredibly valuable to me). Having said that, I tend to think that tacking all the classes to get an English minor at the tail end of your college career is not necessarily going to be that helpful. (Although you may enjoy it.) If you want to improve your writing, something you are going to have to do regardless is write A LOT and read A LOT and do it forever. You have to do almost all of the work yourself. Schooling is valuable and great, but two semester of Lit classes are not going to make an exponential change in anyone's writing, even if they do have that baseline inherent talent that nearly everyone who makes a living as a professional writer has. You have said before that you want to impress people in literary circles and have asked about getting published and I'm still not sure why -- do you actually want to be a writer? (There are lots of jobs that aren't Being a Writer which are still book-and-arts related, by the way.) If you do, do you write? Do you have a personal diary or a blog? (Even if literally no one else is meant to read them.) Have you written short stories or plays or novels -- even if they're terrible or unfinished? Do you write for the paper or the lit magazine? It's a cliche, but the best way to be a better writer is to write more. Getting an English minor is not going to help you be a writer the way that just writing and reading is going to help you be a writer -- or, at the very least, it cannot take the place of doing that work. That work has to happen no matter what classes you're taking.
But I don't even know if you want to even BE a writer. If you just want to put something on your resume or impress people, I don't know that I think a minor in anything is that helpful, beyond a few specific instances. No one is going to hire you to do anything just because you have an English minor and literally no one asks people what their minor was -- I have a history minor and while it was useful to me because I love history and I really enjoyed it, it hasn't done anything for me, career-wise. I literally don't even think anyone knows I have it but me. No one is impressed by a minor in anything. (I mean, maybe if you have an English degree with a minor in nuclear physics, but otherwise...)
posted by Countess Sandwich at 10:07 PM on April 30, 2018 [4 favorites]
I am a professional writer (of a variety of things, but including novels) and I have a degree in English literature, not creative writing. I think my Lit degree has been really helpful to me as a writer (it's taught me a lot about structure, among other things, but it also exposed me to a lot of other writings and writers, and helped me think critically about how to tell a story, and that was incredibly valuable to me). Having said that, I tend to think that tacking all the classes to get an English minor at the tail end of your college career is not necessarily going to be that helpful. (Although you may enjoy it.) If you want to improve your writing, something you are going to have to do regardless is write A LOT and read A LOT and do it forever. You have to do almost all of the work yourself. Schooling is valuable and great, but two semester of Lit classes are not going to make an exponential change in anyone's writing, even if they do have that baseline inherent talent that nearly everyone who makes a living as a professional writer has. You have said before that you want to impress people in literary circles and have asked about getting published and I'm still not sure why -- do you actually want to be a writer? (There are lots of jobs that aren't Being a Writer which are still book-and-arts related, by the way.) If you do, do you write? Do you have a personal diary or a blog? (Even if literally no one else is meant to read them.) Have you written short stories or plays or novels -- even if they're terrible or unfinished? Do you write for the paper or the lit magazine? It's a cliche, but the best way to be a better writer is to write more. Getting an English minor is not going to help you be a writer the way that just writing and reading is going to help you be a writer -- or, at the very least, it cannot take the place of doing that work. That work has to happen no matter what classes you're taking.
But I don't even know if you want to even BE a writer. If you just want to put something on your resume or impress people, I don't know that I think a minor in anything is that helpful, beyond a few specific instances. No one is going to hire you to do anything just because you have an English minor and literally no one asks people what their minor was -- I have a history minor and while it was useful to me because I love history and I really enjoyed it, it hasn't done anything for me, career-wise. I literally don't even think anyone knows I have it but me. No one is impressed by a minor in anything. (I mean, maybe if you have an English degree with a minor in nuclear physics, but otherwise...)
posted by Countess Sandwich at 10:07 PM on April 30, 2018 [4 favorites]
It did not at all. The only thing that will help your writing at this point is actually writing.
posted by frantumaglia at 12:00 AM on May 1, 2018
posted by frantumaglia at 12:00 AM on May 1, 2018
Hi! I have a journalism degree, and I'm a translator, which is the most writerly thing you can be without actually being a professional writer. I've also, over the past fifteen years, gone from okay to pretty damn good at writing.
Things that have helped me become a better writer, ascending order of importance:
1) taking AP English in high school, not because of the literature aspect (all that did was leave me with the lingering desire to set Thomas Hardy on fire) but because I had to go from writing one-paragraph answers to 400-word analytical essays, which really stretched my writing muscles. As did having a brilliant teacher, but that's not always a guarantee. In fact, of my two AP English teachers, only one was amazing; the other couldn't teach her way out of a paper bag.
2) Reading practically everything I could get my hands on, in my genre and others. I didn't have to study literature; I just had to read extensively, and watch TV and movies, which gave my brain fodder for creativity. I still mostly read history and non-fiction, and I don't think my writing has suffered; in fact I think it's benefited me more than having someone tell me how important a bunch of dead white guys are ever would.
3) The Writing Excuses podcast. Fifteen minutes long, by some very smart working writers, full of practical advice and food for thought. And it's free and I can listen to it on my commute.
3) most importantly, WRITING. Specifically, fanfiction. I got involved in fandom at university, and wound up writing a LOT for it. One of my fandoms had a weekly drabble prompt thing happening, and let me tell you, there's very little better for sharpening your skills than trying to tell a story in 100-word segments. I eventually started to write longer works, but the principle is still the same; you get better by doing, period.
tl;dr: you don't need an english minor, you just need to get off your ass and write.
posted by Tamanna at 12:51 AM on May 1, 2018 [5 favorites]
Things that have helped me become a better writer, ascending order of importance:
1) taking AP English in high school, not because of the literature aspect (all that did was leave me with the lingering desire to set Thomas Hardy on fire) but because I had to go from writing one-paragraph answers to 400-word analytical essays, which really stretched my writing muscles. As did having a brilliant teacher, but that's not always a guarantee. In fact, of my two AP English teachers, only one was amazing; the other couldn't teach her way out of a paper bag.
2) Reading practically everything I could get my hands on, in my genre and others. I didn't have to study literature; I just had to read extensively, and watch TV and movies, which gave my brain fodder for creativity. I still mostly read history and non-fiction, and I don't think my writing has suffered; in fact I think it's benefited me more than having someone tell me how important a bunch of dead white guys are ever would.
3) The Writing Excuses podcast. Fifteen minutes long, by some very smart working writers, full of practical advice and food for thought. And it's free and I can listen to it on my commute.
3) most importantly, WRITING. Specifically, fanfiction. I got involved in fandom at university, and wound up writing a LOT for it. One of my fandoms had a weekly drabble prompt thing happening, and let me tell you, there's very little better for sharpening your skills than trying to tell a story in 100-word segments. I eventually started to write longer works, but the principle is still the same; you get better by doing, period.
tl;dr: you don't need an english minor, you just need to get off your ass and write.
posted by Tamanna at 12:51 AM on May 1, 2018 [5 favorites]
Yeah, my minor was English Philology (so literature and linguistics) and I don't think it helped my writing at all. (Big caveat: I'm not a native speaker of English, and this was a program in Germany, but completely in English.) As others already stated, it was mostly talking about author X and why he did thing Y - do you think analyzing Shakespear's sonnets will make you a better writer? I didn't.
What did help me was read a lot and write a lot. As someone above stated, fanfiction is good for this because you can upload and get feedback immediately. (Well, it also means that you cannot go back and change chapters you already wrote, which book authors obviously can. But not for the previous book in a series, so it's still a good thing to factor in.)
posted by LoonyLovegood at 1:09 AM on May 1, 2018
What did help me was read a lot and write a lot. As someone above stated, fanfiction is good for this because you can upload and get feedback immediately. (Well, it also means that you cannot go back and change chapters you already wrote, which book authors obviously can. But not for the previous book in a series, so it's still a good thing to factor in.)
posted by LoonyLovegood at 1:09 AM on May 1, 2018
Other posters (especially Countess Sandwich and Tamanna) said nearly everything I would say, so I won't repeat them. I'll just endorse their answers, and add my own personal experience:
I majored in English and minored in Creative Writing. I'm now a working writer. But with hindsight, I wouldn't have bothered with the English major. Getting an English degree to help you become a writer is like acquiring frequent flyer miles to help you become an aeronautical engineer. It's focusing on the wrong end of the process.
posted by yankeefog at 3:06 AM on May 1, 2018 [2 favorites]
I majored in English and minored in Creative Writing. I'm now a working writer. But with hindsight, I wouldn't have bothered with the English major. Getting an English degree to help you become a writer is like acquiring frequent flyer miles to help you become an aeronautical engineer. It's focusing on the wrong end of the process.
posted by yankeefog at 3:06 AM on May 1, 2018 [2 favorites]
I have an English degree and while I did have a single creative writing class the bulk of my studies focused on reading and analyzing literature, academic writing, grammar/linguistics, etc. My creative writing teacher encouraged us all to read and read a lot, but you don't have to be enrolled in a class to do that. Depending on your location you can probably take creative writing classes through continuing ed programs if you want.
My actual minor, while I got quite a lot out of it, does nothing for my resume.
posted by bunderful at 5:20 AM on May 1, 2018
My actual minor, while I got quite a lot out of it, does nothing for my resume.
posted by bunderful at 5:20 AM on May 1, 2018
Hi, undergrad History major with English and Library Science minors here.
For me, the Library Science minor was a good choice (even though I had to take some summer classes to graduate on time) because it provided a useful foundation of knowledge that helped me learn a little more about what being a librarian would entail if I decided to go for my MLIS one day. (And I did. I'm doing it now. Yay Library Science minor!) Having "Library Science" on my resume has even gotten me into a job or two because of its specificity.
The English minor, on the other hand, mostly just provided a structured way for me to read more books, write about them, and hear what others had to say about them. Which was fine! I like structured learning and I enjoyed my professors. But I already knew I liked English and writing, so I didn't have any revelations there. And English is kind of a general enough field of study that it's unlikely to catch the eye of any job recruiters.
I was able to fit an English minor in with my other major requirements, and I certainly enjoyed the classes I took, but if I had been faced with the decision to either finish my English minor or graduate on time and stop spending money on classes, I'd have picked the latter.
If your goal here is to make your CV look better for hiring managers and/or grad school applications, you'd be much better off to just start writing and submitting to publications and/or keeping up a blog. "Written for Prestigious Magazine A, Well-Regarded Literary Journal B, and/or Short Story Anthology C" is way more impressive than "Minored in English" on an application.
posted by helloimjennsco at 6:40 AM on May 1, 2018
For me, the Library Science minor was a good choice (even though I had to take some summer classes to graduate on time) because it provided a useful foundation of knowledge that helped me learn a little more about what being a librarian would entail if I decided to go for my MLIS one day. (And I did. I'm doing it now. Yay Library Science minor!) Having "Library Science" on my resume has even gotten me into a job or two because of its specificity.
The English minor, on the other hand, mostly just provided a structured way for me to read more books, write about them, and hear what others had to say about them. Which was fine! I like structured learning and I enjoyed my professors. But I already knew I liked English and writing, so I didn't have any revelations there. And English is kind of a general enough field of study that it's unlikely to catch the eye of any job recruiters.
I was able to fit an English minor in with my other major requirements, and I certainly enjoyed the classes I took, but if I had been faced with the decision to either finish my English minor or graduate on time and stop spending money on classes, I'd have picked the latter.
If your goal here is to make your CV look better for hiring managers and/or grad school applications, you'd be much better off to just start writing and submitting to publications and/or keeping up a blog. "Written for Prestigious Magazine A, Well-Regarded Literary Journal B, and/or Short Story Anthology C" is way more impressive than "Minored in English" on an application.
posted by helloimjennsco at 6:40 AM on May 1, 2018
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For a minor? Even if the minor was nuclear physics, it wouldn't be worth it.
posted by DoubleLune at 5:38 PM on April 30, 2018 [13 favorites]