Karolyne Ridgill
How Does Your Internship Relate to Your Major?
By Karolyne Ridgill
Summer 2014
“What do you do with an English degree?” These words have been uttered so frequently to undergrads pursuing a B.A. in English, the question is the title of a song in a popular Broadway musical. While a sincere question on the surface, most English majors have learned that “What do you want to do with an English degree?” translates roughly to “What job do you think you can get with such a useless degree?” I know, of course, that English is far from a useless degree. On the contrary, English is so useful it can be applied to jobs and careers in nearly every field; the world will always need excellent writers and analyzers. This, you see, is my problem. With so many career options, I don’t know what I will “do with my English degree.” My decision to come to Washington was made, in part, to see if the city could offer any ideas as to what I want to do after graduation.
I’m working as an intern at a federal agency called the National Endowment for the Humanities, or NEH for short. The Humanities is an academic discipline that studies human culture through the study of classics, history, languages, law, literature, and philosophy. Most obviously, this internship relates to my major because English literature falls very comfortably under the humanities umbrella. The agency basically gives out grants to people who want to create projects that will help share or preserve some aspect of the humanities. The interesting part about my job is even though my personal interest in literature isn’t particularly relevant, the skills I’ve learned relating to writing and analyzing are.
Me with fellow NEH interns in front of the White House
To be an effective worker at the NEH, one doesn’t need to love the humanities, yet one does need the skills acquired when learning a humanities subject. Every day I find myself tasked with assignments that relate to what I’ve learned in my English classes at BU. The most obvious correlation is I have to write a lot. Every day I’m tasked to write memos, one pagers, and reports. In order to do these well, you need to be precise with detail yet concise with length. You also have to meticulously proofread. The people who are receiving your documents want all the nitty-gritty information but they also want to get it quickly with minimum reading. One common perception about English majors is we ‘BS’ our way through papers. I will admit, this will work to a certain extent. However, as you go on to more advanced writing classes, one thing professors want is for you to write a paper that is focused, concise and empty of flowery, filler language used to increase the word count. Government bureaucrats and congressional members want the same thing.
Another important aspect of my internship is collaboration. I spend a lot of time brainstorming and bouncing off ideas with the other interns. Again, my major has helped me with these collaborations because being an English major is often about discussion. Most professors dedicate a lot of class time inviting students to share their ideas and get into group discussions. Just as it is not to your advantage to never speak in an English discussion, it is also not to your advantage to never speak when others are coming up with ideas.
Finally, our agency is not surprisingly picky about the use of proper grammar. I feel a bit more reassured after all the nights I’ve spent proofreading papers over and over again – it has come in handy!
Even though I felt a bit out of place coming to DC amidst all the Political Science majors, I’ve since learned that this city definitely has room for confused English majors. Who knows? The next time someone asks “What do you do with an English degree?” I’ll answer “Work in Washington and use my impeccable grammar to control the country.”
Karolyne Ridgill is an English major working at the NEH.
