# Gender Studies Major...what's it good for? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 24, 2019, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578 "2019-07-24T23:42:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2019, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/61 "2019-07-30T19:15:26Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > Probably because the average person would have a hard time imagining even peripheral benefit to it. Let’s say I go in for a role for a coder. I have a interpersonal communications degree. Being a good communicator is generally applicable to any job. Let’s say I’m an English major, I’ll probably produce good documentation. I’m a gender studies major. I’ll… what? What is the average person think I’m going to bring to the table there? You’ll be able to come up with program features which the half of humanity that doesn’t exist on the internet finds attractive and user-friendly. You may realize that “the stronger my armor, the less skin it seems to cover” is unlikely to be a positive with that nonexistent half before they scream it in your face, or come up with a maps app which gives directions in ways that the nonexistent half tends to find easier to understand than the taken-for-granted half. You may have the bright idea to offer both male and female voices for your maps app, or for your ATM program, and to have voices that sound business-like rather than as if they’re about to break into giggles. That’s off the top of my head. ---
**Author:** ![Ashtura](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ashtura/32/2963_2.png) [@Ashtura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashtura)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/62 "2019-07-31T04:44:51Z")
The coding position was a hypothetical obviously. I’m absolutely certain there are positions out there that place a strong emphasis on how different genders will respond to their product. I also think the high school grad’s resume is likelier to get thrown in the trash than the gender studies major, at least when you’re getting filtered out by algorithms and low level decision makers. This is before the interview process, of course. Will the higher ups trash a gender studies major’s resume over an English major’s, everything else being equal? That will, of course come down to the actual job and the individual decision makers, who will have their own impression as to which degrees elicit excitement, indifference, or disdain. Note that my only criteria for success here is what gets you through the door. Once you hit the interview process all bets are off. Interviewing is it’s own artform ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/63 "2019-07-31T05:26:02Z")
Your hypothetical does involve gender issues. You seem to have decided that gender (and therefore gender studies) is irrelevant and to ignore any examples given of situations where they are, in fact, relevant. Have fun in your own world, but it’s not the world the rest of us live in. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Crap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.crap/32/3131_2.png) [@Dr.Crap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Crap)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/64 "2019-07-31T06:20:18Z")
I teach robots how to identify penises and vaginas. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/65 "2019-07-31T13:33:10Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > I also think the high school grad’s resume is likelier to get thrown in the trash than the gender studies major, at least when you’re getting filtered out by algorithms and low level decision makers. This is before the interview process, of course. Will the higher ups trash a gender studies major’s resume over an English major’s, everything else being equal? That will, of course come down to the actual job and the individual decision makers, who will have their own impression as to which degrees elicit excitement, indifference, or disdain. > > Note that my only criteria for success here is what gets you through the door. Once you hit the interview process all bets are off. Interviewing is it’s own artform The gender studies major from a LAC will quite possibly never send a resume into a slush pile. You misunderstand how this works for a lot of the population. Generally speaking, gender studies majors don’t graduate from college and go looking for an entry level job in corporate America. Many of them apply straight to grad school, be it med school, law school, an MBA program. They may well be specializing in subfields that make gender studies relevant, or they may not. Others go straight into jobs that grow out of internships. So while they were studying gender studies and learning to write and think, they were also working for Facebook or Google or an NGO or a start-up or something, and they have a job there when they get out. Still others go to jobs they secured through the career placement office. The one they aim at management consulting firms–BCG or Bain or whatever. Others get those entry-level corporate jobs you are thinking of, but they get the interview because the LAC career placement office sends them over, not because they sent their resume in cold. Here’s an example from Williams, the prototypical LAC. Look at this [infographic](https://web.williams.edu/Mathematics/devadoss/careerpath.html). The stuff on the left is majors; the stuff on the right is careers. If you mouse over “culture studies”, you can see that graduates literally go everywhere–because where they go will be shaped by all the other things they are doing. This [linked page](https://admission.williams.edu/life-after-williams/) asserts that **75%** of Williams graduates go to graduate school within 5 years of graduating. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/66 "2019-07-31T13:45:29Z")
Of course, that raises the question of whether grad school is functioning as a necessary step on their professional journey or a as a postponing of their career until they figure out exactly what they want to do. Regardless, what problems there are are less about the major and more about the plan the student had going into it. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/67 "2019-07-31T14:28:25Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > Of course, that raises the question of whether grad school is functioning as a necessary step on their professional journey or a as a postponing of their career until they figure out exactly what they want to do. > > Regardless, what problems there are are less about the major and more about the plan the student had going into it. When you look at a traditional LAC, like Williams, I think it’s highly likely that grad school was always the plan; more kids go from William to grad school than from a typical high school go to college. The institution is about grad school prep. This is a lot less true at Regional State College of YourTown, and a gender studies from a school like that arguably lacks the utility that a CS degree would be. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/68 "2019-07-31T14:46:55Z")
I’m sure that’s true. The majority of genders studies graduates aren’t coming from William, though. If you want to argue that one should only bother getting a liberal arts degree from colleges above a certain cachet, that’s fine, but then we’re back to the issue in the OP since that means the majority of genders studies degrees _are_ a waste of time to get. ---
**Author:** ![Ashtura](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ashtura/32/2963_2.png) [@Ashtura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashtura)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/69 "2019-07-31T15:22:02Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Your hypothetical does involve gender issues. You seem to have decided that gender (and therefore gender studies) is irrelevant and to ignore any examples given of situations where they are, in fact, relevant. Have fun in your own world, but it’s not the world the rest of us live in. No I didn’t. I specifically said in my very last post there certainly exist jobs out there where somebody will be looking for that perspective. And there are many who won’t. That’s not to say the skillset isn’t useful _once you get the job_, I’m talking about getting the job in the first place. I also acknowledge that not everybody who gets a degree is particularly interested in how attractive it’s going to look on a resume. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/70 "2019-07-31T15:23:11Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > I’m sure that’s true. The majority of genders studies graduates aren’t coming from William, though. If you want to argue that one should only bother getting a liberal arts degree from colleges above a certain cachet, that’s fine, but then we’re back to the issue in the OP since that means the majority of genders studies degrees _are_ a waste of time to get. Well, the OP specified “Gender studies degree from a LAC”. In any case, in [2017](https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d18/tables/dt18_322.10.asp)there were fewer than 9,000 degrees in “Area, ethnic, cultural, gender, and group studies” out of almost 2 million undergraduate degrees. I suspect, but can’t prove, that fairly selective LACs are over-represented in that 9,000 degrees, because it’s what they are known for. But yeah, honestly, if my kid really wanted to study gender studies and go on to work in international development, I’d push them a lot harder to attend a highly selective than if they wanted to study CS or EE. ---
**Author:** ![ZonexandScout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zonexandscout/32/544_2.png) [@ZonexandScout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZonexandScout)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/71 "2019-07-31T15:53:31Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > If you _really_ want to challenge “the patriarchy”, then major in engineering. One of the ways that “the patriarchy” manifests itself is by men ending up in all of the high-paying jobs. Engineering is one of the higher-paying jobs, and it overwhelmingly skews male. True, but definitely changing. The hurdles are not what they used to be. I have five nieces who have earned degrees in the past 15 years and three of them were in engineering (two from VT and one from NCSU). All three were immediately employed and two of them have advanced very quickly in their employment. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/72 "2019-07-31T15:58:39Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > Just being generally educated is a good thing. A local airline pilots’ school\* requires a degree – BA or BS – before considering your application. They care not one whit what the major was, just that you had the smarts and stick-to-it-ive-ness to get the degree. \*One of the ones that taught a 9/11 pilot, unfortunately. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2019, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578/73 "2019-07-31T18:44:36Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > No I didn’t. I specifically said in my very last post there certainly exist jobs out there where somebody will be looking for that perspective. And there are many who won’t. That’s not to say the skillset isn’t useful _once you get the job_, I’m talking about getting the job in the first place. I also acknowledge that not everybody who gets a degree is particularly interested in how attractive it’s going to look on a resume. I know several software companies which specifically choose to hire “non-evident” people precisely because of the non-coder perspectives they bring; to name one that’s not a start-up, in Cognizant Spain I met both biologists and business-degree women learning to code alongside people who already knew how to code but didn’t know that specific language. Such companies would definitely be interested in someone with a degree in gender studies, both as a general “diversity in points of view” policy and specifically if they’re conscious of things such as the negative reactions of many women to Google Maps’ Aerobics Teacher, chainmail bikinis et al. So, even for coding, yes, gender studies can help you get the job. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gender-studies-major-whats-it-good-for/837578.md?page=3)