Is it low brow to criticize humanities majors?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why stop at Humanities? We (CS/EE majors) made fun of the Math and Physics majors on our floor - we kept joking what are you qualified to do? We'd probably go after biology as well but only had one.

One math grad joked after getting his first job that UPS truck drivers were making slightly more - this was in the 90s just before the Internet explosion.

Working at NASA - Physics/Math majors looked down on everyone else. Think Sheldon and Wolowitz. They ran the place. They even listed on open positions "hard science" they didn't care which one. That was for something that required hard coding.

The Business majors keep telling use we're the "smart guys" while significantly making more than us. Off course they only hired Humanities as they moved up. One even told me Humanities start low and finish high. Tech start high and level off. Yes. I understand the comp plan for FANG and the ludicrous salaries are not the norm.

Your school sounds unpleasant.

[Anonymous]

OP they are not necessarily poor, or living in a trailer, but their brain is definitely in the freezer.

[Anonymous]

It’s just stupid. I’m a biochem/molecular biologist and my husband is CS/IT. Both of our kids excel equally in humanities/English, arts, languages as they do in science and math. 5s in all subject areas- straight As in all APs no matter the difficulty or subject.

They are leaning into non-STEM areas.

I see this the most from parents who were not STEM themselves and utterly surprised their kid can do calc/physics/engineering so they think they are Einstein.

The smartest people can do it all.

[Anonymous]

^ agree. They can carry a conversation with anyone on any topic. They are well read/bred.

They aren’t the dolts at functions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You can only major in these sorts of things if you are at at "good" school...bc the career services/alumni/name help with that consulting/PR/comms/advisory job.....

- T10 humanities major who makes a healthy 7 figures a year

Agree. We are full pay at the Ivies for my kids. If they were stem we would have just done a state school. To get into an Ivy- you also excelled in AP calc/physics/chem, etc in addition to AP foreign language/histories/eng lang lit. You have to have it all to get in anyways.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:From my experience, the people who criticize humanities majors, saying things like “have fun working at Starbucks” and “that’s a waste of time,” are from lower social classes and are overall less polished. On the other hand, those who are accepting of humanities majors tent to be more educated, wealthy, and well spoken.

I mean, those people are just projecting their insecurities. The joke’s on them because humanities majors are best positioned to thrive in an AI-disrupted economy. Human creativity is going to command a premium in the workplace. It is already true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s just stupid. I’m a biochem/molecular biologist and my husband is CS/IT. Both of our kids excel equally in humanities/English, arts, languages as they do in science and math. 5s in all subject areas- straight As in all APs no matter the difficulty or subject.

They are leaning into non-STEM areas.

I see this the most from parents who were not STEM themselves and utterly surprised their kid can do calc/physics/engineering so they think they are Einstein.

The smartest people can do it all.

+1
Parent of a humanities major who took the hardest stem classes in his, just graduated from an ivy and she and all her humanities friends have great jobs or are off to grad/law school, and parent of a stem major at a different ivy who writes extremely well and got humanities as well as stem accolades in hs.

[Anonymous]

I’m wondering if criticizing humanities majors is a more cultural thing. I’m an immigrant, and humanities majors are definitely looked down upon as there aren’t much career prospects in my home country for them as there would be for an engineer or a doctor for instance.
Also, as a high school student in my home country, it’s almost unheard of to go into a humanities major if you’re good at Math/ STEM.
It’s awesome to see kids in the US who are good at STEM, deliberately choose humanities majors and thrive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s a luxury to be able to study whatever you are passionate about for learnings sake without having to care about employment outcomes.

My daughter is in NYC with thousands of kids studying dance, acting, musical theatre at places like NYU, Juilliard, Fordham with Alvin Ailey, all the schools at the top ballet companies. That’s just a few of the schools.

It’s not that unusual for these kids to study something without knowing what kind on income they might have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m wondering if criticizing humanities majors is a more cultural thing. I’m an immigrant, and humanities majors are definitely looked down upon as there aren’t much career prospects in my home country for them as there would be for an engineer or a doctor for instance.
Also, as a high school student in my home country, it’s almost unheard of to go into a humanities major if you’re good at Math/ STEM.
It’s awesome to see kids in the US who are good at STEM, deliberately choose humanities majors and thrive.

I think that’s only immigrants from Asian countries. How could everybody be an engineer or doctor? That would be weird.

[Anonymous]

So what are these great jobs the ivy humanities majors are doing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So what are these great jobs the ivy humanities majors are doing?

Well my DH earns nearly $1 million/yr working in TV & filim
so there's that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m wondering if criticizing humanities majors is a more cultural thing. I’m an immigrant, and humanities majors are definitely looked down upon as there aren’t much career prospects in my home country for them as there would be for an engineer or a doctor for instance.
Also, as a high school student in my home country, it’s almost unheard of to go into a humanities major if you’re good at Math/ STEM.
It’s awesome to see kids in the US who are good at STEM, deliberately choose humanities majors and thrive.

I think that’s only immigrants from Asian countries. How could everybody be an engineer or doctor? That would be weird.

I would include highly educated immigrants from any country. Maybe include business, accounting and finance too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m wondering if criticizing humanities majors is a more cultural thing. I’m an immigrant, and humanities majors are definitely looked down upon as there aren’t much career prospects in my home country for them as there would be for an engineer or a doctor for instance.
Also, as a high school student in my home country, it’s almost unheard of to go into a humanities major if you’re good at Math/ STEM.
It’s awesome to see kids in the US who are good at STEM, deliberately choose humanities majors and thrive.

I'm an immigrant.

Lots of immigrants become lawyers, and major in humanities. But, yes, not as many major in humanities other than to be lawyers because most immigrants who come here don't have family wealth or connections, and they need to get a good paying job after college. That's usually something in STEM, business, or law.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So what are these great jobs the ivy humanities majors are doing?

Well my DH earns nearly $1 million/yr working in TV & filim
so there's that.

what did he major in? Does he have a graduate degree? You realize your DH is an outlier, right? Most humanities majors with just an undergrad don't make that much.