Just for fun - which majors are high-brow vs. low-brow?
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Anonymous
Exactly, and top PP is correct. Engineers work hard for their degrees but aren't educated, that's low-brow. Hi-brow + technical prowess would be math or physics--most engineers couldn't hack it those disciplines. |
Anonymous
Yes, you'd get respect, but not as much as obtaining a PhD. |
Anonymous
A PhD in Biology, that is, not in education. |
Anonymous
I'm the top PP above and I don't discount the difficulty of the engineering major. I helped my younger sister sweat through differential equations for hers. My own undergraduate degree is in Chemistry, but completed at a SLAC where I had rigorous requirements in humanities and social sciences outside my major that I feel significantly contributed to my sense of having a more rounded education. I even think my own Chemistry major has more of a middle-brow feel to it more than say physics, math or biology because though challenging technically, in classes and in practice it often becomes quite narrow and applied rather than having a rich theoretical tradition. Similarly, I think engineering and chem majors majors have in many ways harder work than art history or sociology (though not necessarily as complex), those fields are higher brow because they are more broadly intellectual rather than narrowly applied. But I also think the whole discussion is also a bit arbitrary and dumb and based on some dated conceptions and boundaries of knowledge. |
Anonymous
Historically, not the sharpest tools in the tool box become teachers. Thus education majors are extremely easy. |
Anonymous
As a nurse 2nd career hardest degree I obtained (English BA prior to BSN) |
Anonymous
Yes architecture is an undergrad degree. |
Anonymous
Architecture did because it’s very creative and not very highly paid. Engineering and computer science did not. |
Anonymous
This reminds me of the line (I think it was from the Preppy Handbook) that carpentry is an acceptable profession, but you must have a PhD in Philosophy. |
Anonymous
Environmental, industrial engineering are then No Brow. |
Anonymous
Low brow. Nursing is a trade. |
Anonymous
| This thread is low brow |
Anonymous
This is incorrect. Many if not most teachers don't major solely in education--they major in their discipline and take a program in undergraduate or post-bac to get a teaching license or a Master's degree that gives advanced coursework in a specialty (e.g. literacy, assessment, science education). In Virginia for instance, it is only as of the last year or 2 that there even IS an undergraduate education major --it's been brought in to address the teacher shortage and universities are scrambling to create it. The reason "education majors" look like low-scorers in summaries of undergraduates is that it's a subset of teachers--often those who want to teach PreK-3 who just major in education--who are often the weakest academically (though they may be very well-suited temperamentally/in "soft skills" for the earlier childhood years). Also, the states with the weakest educational systems--preK-higher ed that are more likely to grant undergraduate education majors as the primary teaching license. Stronger states have stricter requirements. The strong elementary school teachers may major in developmental or educational psychology, or in a content area (English, Biology, Math) which are far more challenging. But the summary stats feeds the narrative that "teachers are dumb" in the US. (Note: I'm not a teacher). |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
Difficulty has nothing to do with whether something is highbrow or lowbrow. |