# College major misinterpretations **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 12, 2004, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392 "2004-12-12T02:42:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/1 "2004-12-12T02:42:20Z")
I was an English major in college. The number of people who think that an English major sits around and studies grammar and spelling is remarkably high (there’s even a post claiming it in GD right now). I had a dual major in History. It’s better than English, but the number of people who think this means I’m an expert in all areas of history is nearly as high. I try to explain that I really couldn’t learn everything about everything that happened in recorded history within the three years of my major, but often meet baffled stares. Given the number of misunderstandings I’ve encountered, I’ve begun wondering how many majors I don’t understand either. So, what was your major and what did you study? More importantly, what didn’t you study? ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/2 "2004-12-12T02:54:42Z")
I’m undeclared. Surprisingly few people understand that this means that most of my studying involves first-hand research in psychoactive chemicals. I’m thinking of majoring in psychology. Now, this does not mean that I am a psychologist. Not only am I not a psychologist, I have not even declared myself a psychology major. Once again: _I am not a psychology major. I do not study psychology._ I just think that I might enjoy doing such in the near future. However, everyone expects me to be an incredibly skilled psychoanalyst. :rolleyes: “You’re a psychology major, right? What does it mean that he did such-and-such?” First off, I probably wouldn’t know [yet] even if I _were_ a psychology major. Second–and this should be crystal clear by that time–_I’m not a psychology major. I do not study psychology. I am not a psychologist._ ---
**Author:** ![PigBoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/97f17d/32.png) [@PigBoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PigBoy)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/3 "2004-12-12T03:01:46Z")
I am a Geography major. This does not mean I have spent the last four years identifying countries and capitals on maps. Unfortunately I have a hard time describing just what Geography is. Basically my study has involved phyiscal geography, cartography/GIS, and cultural geography. I’ll just paste a catalog description of a class I am in now, a basic (but upper-level) cultural/urban geography course: > [@](#): > > Examination and analysis of processes and mechanisms leading to the recent and current changes in the spatial and historical organization of natural, regional, and local cultural landscapes of the U.S. Emphasis is on current land use and development problems facing America, especially in urban areas. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/4 "2004-12-12T03:02:11Z")
I was technically a psychology major too although it was really as self-designed course of study in neuroscience/psychopharmacology that was based in the psychology department. I had the same problems as **fetus.** People want you to psychoanalyze them and want to tell you all about Freud and some ink blot test they took out of a book. Most people in psychology do not do that stuff and Freud and psychoanalysis are only covered as a historical curiousity in Psysh 101. Psychology is a massive field that can align directly with disciplines as diverse as Philosophy, Business, and Neurobiology. Don’t assume that every psych major wants to end up talking to patients on the couch. ---
**Author:** ![Kythereia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e8c25b/32.png) [@Kythereia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kythereia)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/5 "2004-12-12T03:02:53Z")
Some people think Linguistic majors are automatically fluent in every spoken language on Earth. Um, no. Studying English and Linguistics, still don’t regret it (even after a really frelling hard first-year Ling course). 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Gotterfunken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/58956e/32.png) [@Gotterfunken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gotterfunken)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/6 "2004-12-12T03:08:39Z")
This happens to me all the time. My degree is in art history. When people hear this, they typically ask me what kinds of stuff I paint, draw, or sculpt. They’re always disappointed when I tell them I don’t really _make_ art (except as a hobby), I just _talk_ about it. Which makes me sound really useless. **PigBoy** , I have a friend who recently graduated with her masters in geography. I _love_ to tease her by mischaracterizing her field as map-studying. I think I do this primarily because it irks her so (she’ll correct me by offering a definition similar to the one you quote, but I’ll pretend to ignore that). ---
**Author:** ![Gotterfunken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/58956e/32.png) [@Gotterfunken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gotterfunken)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/7 "2004-12-12T03:19:37Z")
Upon re-reading the OP, I realize I didn’t offer a decent explanation of what I do as an art historian. In addition to talking about art, I study the process by which artists and their audiences create meaning in art. This involves studying a lot of cultural and social history, in addition to artistic technique. Sometimes, people think of art history primarily in terms of connoisseurship–learning how to recognize the style or characteristic traits (the “look”) of particular artists. That _is_ an important subfield within art history, and it is one that I certainly engage in from time to time (a fun game for me to do in an art museum is to walk into a room and, without looking at the labels, to start attributing artworks to specific artists). However, I spend far more of my time analyzing the theoretical implications of style, especially in relation to cultural currents. Some art historians go further than I do, and talk almost entirely about the theory of art with nary a reference to any particular artworks. Personally, I prefer a balance between the extremes of connoisseurship and art theory. But, in any case, there are a lot of different kinds of art historians, and very few of them only talk about connoisseurship issues. ---
**Author:** ![kellner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c2a13f/32.png) [@kellner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kellner)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/8 "2004-12-12T03:20:37Z")
I study computational linguistics. Hardly anybody knows what that is. It is an interdisciplinary field in linguistics which deals with automatic processing of natural language. > [@jsgoddess](#): > > The number of people who think that an English major sits around and studies grammar and spelling is remarkably high Same here, even if those people usually mean linguists in general. > [@Kythereia](#): > > Some people think Linguistic majors are automatically fluent in every spoken language on Earth. Um, no. Again, we hear the same thing. Our only lecture on any specific language is a Japanese course. It impresses people far more than it should. Some people think we work on programming languages. We don’t. However we use them when working with natural languages. Many people think the subject is a branch of computer science. That’s wrong, even if many computer scientists work in the field. Oh, and of course the current research will lead nowhere because everyone can see that [Babelfish](http://world.altavista.com/) is so crappy. ---
**Author:** ![ErinPuff](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dbc845/32.png) [@ErinPuff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ErinPuff)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/9 "2004-12-12T03:36:52Z")
I’m a music major, and a lot of non-music people have no idea how much work we do. We end up taking way more classes than anyone else (because a lot of them are half credit, but that doesn’t mean they’re half the workload of a full credit course), and we have ensembles and lessons and practicing like hell. And what do we get for it at the end? No job! Yay! ---
**Author:** ![The\_27th\_Evil](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ebca7d/32.png) [@The\_27th\_Evil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_27th_Evil)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/10 "2004-12-12T03:39:22Z")
Erin, after seeing my jazz performance major brother’s workload, I for one have huge amount of respect for you guys. ---
**Author:** ![chaoticbear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f07891/32.png) [@chaoticbear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chaoticbear)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/11 "2004-12-12T04:37:30Z")
I am a chemistry and biology major. I can describe simple organic reactions. I cannot tell you what would happen if you filled your shoe with sugar, doused it in gasoline and lit it on fire. I could, when I was studying about them, place SOME animals in their correct class, and MOST in the correct phylum, provided they were Kingdom Animalia. I don’t know what is growing on the bread, and I can’t diagnose the dog, considering I haven’t taken a comparative anatomy class, and know nothing about veterinary practices. Furthermore, I DO know how to make things blow up. That I could do before organic chemistry. Go put some gas in something and light it on fire, idiot. Oh, and my pet peeve: I know that in high school chemistry, you MAY have learned to name straight chain alkanes up to octane. Trust me, we were past that the first day of class. Not all of o-chem is being able to draw a structure for _Z_-(2_R_,3_S_)-3-_t_-butyl-2,3-dichloro-3-iodo-5-hepten-1-ol. Stop making fun of me for having to study for a class a lot. Why don’t you do something about the fact that you’re f-ing failing intermediate algebra? (Mmm, that was ventalicious. ) ---
**Author:** ![AwSnappity](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a3d4f5/32.png) [@AwSnappity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AwSnappity)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/12 "2004-12-12T05:16:17Z")
For a long while, I considered majoring in French and psychology. “So you’re going to be a psychologist in France?” **NO.** I got so sick of hearing that. Usually from people who thought they were being clever. Right now I’m leaning towards majoring only in French. What does a French major do? Well, this one will go to law school. ---
**Author:** ![Melandry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@Melandry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melandry)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/13 "2004-12-12T05:19:44Z")
Try being a Classics major. “Oh, you study classical music!” or “I just love Dickens, I bet you read a lot of him!” The field does have a confusing name, however; just because 100 years ago when you said ‘the classics’ everyone knew you meant Greece and Rome, doesn’t mean anyone has a clue now. Classics (or Classical Studies) majors study the language, history, literature and culture of Ancient Greece and of Rome. Most folks will have a preference towards either the Greek or the Roman side, but studying both languages and cultures is standard. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/14 "2004-12-12T05:23:07Z")
I was a computer science major. I studied lots of math, algorithms, data structures, and a little bit of electrical engineering and whatnot. No, I don’t know how to fix your AOL or get the virus off your Windows machine. I don’t know how to fix the monitor on your iBook. Leave me alone. I just write the code. :o ---
**Author:** ![TroubleAgain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e480ec/32.png) [@TroubleAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroubleAgain)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/15 "2004-12-12T06:51:07Z")
Hey, friedo, I’m getting all these pop-ups… j/k. I work in data center operations, and people still expect me to be able to help with desktop problems. Some I can, some I can’t. Depends on what it is, since I haven’t worked desktop support in years. ---
**Author:** ![WCOT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e5b9ba/32.png) [@WCOT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WCOT)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/16 "2004-12-12T09:08:30Z")
another CS major signing in here… just because i study computers doesnt mean i can fix yours or recommend a replacement. and no i cant make your internet go faster. ---
**Author:** ![Hostile\_Dialect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e495f1/32.png) [@Hostile\_Dialect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hostile_Dialect)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/17 "2004-12-12T09:12:45Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > I was technically a psychology major too although it was really as self-designed course of study in neuroscience/psychopharmacology that was based in the psychology department. How interesting! I would love to study something like this. Can you tell me a little about the process of it, and about where that degree/knowledge has taken you, and any advice you’d give relating to that? Please drop me an email if you wouldn’t mind. ---
**Author:** ![pepperlandgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pepperlandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pepperlandgirl)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/18 "2004-12-12T09:17:31Z")
Yeah, I have the same problem the OP does. People act like there is something wrong with me when I cannot explain the rules of grammar. Look, you want me to analyze a short story or a poem, I’m your woman. Copy editing your essay? Not so much. ---
**Author:** ![Freejooky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ba8739/32.png) [@Freejooky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freejooky)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 10:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/19 "2004-12-12T10:36:43Z")
The absolute king - or queen - of this dicussion was my original major, **Interior Design**. Everyone - _everyone_ - automatically assumes that interior design is “interior decorating.” The fact that many decoraters refer to themselves as “interior designers,” and the show _Designing Women_ was about a team of interior decorators only confound the issue. Interior Design should be called Interior Architecture. It involes everything from choosing interior construction materials and creating entire interior environments to placing and moving walls, windows, doors, and more. Interior Designers are responsible for everything that makes an impression on you in a building. They must know and design while keeping tons of zoning laws and standards in mind. There’s a lot of overlap with industrial design, construction, and contracting. It’s not decorating, period! ---
**Author:** ![Helen\_s\_Eidolon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Helen\_s\_Eidolon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helen_s_Eidolon)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2004, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392/20 "2004-12-12T16:23:41Z")
Melandry beat me to it. I’ve never gotten the music, but people always assume I mean ‘classic’ books. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-major-misinterpretations/279392.md?page=2)