I English Major

I don’t know if you noticed, but about two weeks ago I wrote a very short blog on Brett Favre’s retirement. In the title of that blog I misspelled mourns.

Immediately after writing, I moved to the couch to do some reading and as I sat down a horrific thought popped into my head. Shoot, did I put an ‘e’ in mourns? Did I misspell a word in the title of a blog? I refused to believe, but I kept on getting flashes of “mournes” in my head. That’s impossible. I read on and didn’t get up for a while.

An hour later I went back to the computer and checked the title just to make sure I didn’t misspell mourns. I did. I had “Wisconsin Mournes” as the title of the blog. I was really scared and I changed it immediately, hoping there weren’t already emails in the inbox that pointed out the typo to the English Major.

There was one comment left on that blog while the typo was still up, but that person (Erik) was too kind to not say anything about it or maybe he just didn’t notice. I was lucky, lucky because as soon as I declared English as my major I entered into this mystical realm of literature, language, grammar, spelling, and punctuation. This is not a realm English Majors put themselves into. This is a realm that all others put us into. One could say English Majors get typecasted. Some, but not all traits of our typecast character include the following:

…is a perfect speller. I’m not perfect, but I can hold my own. This one has never really bothered me.

…has read everything. This one is by far the most annoying myth to confront. The canonical works that English Majors are required to read can be different from college to college, but rarely is the canon the same from decade to decade. Some books that may have been in the canon in the 70s may not have been in the canon in the 90s. You get the point. So, when I had a conversation with a co-worker a few weeks ago that went something like this…

Me: What are you reading right now?
Barista: Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. It’s one of my favorites.
Me: Cool.
Barista: Have you read it?
Me: Nope.
Barista: C’mon, English Major. How could you have not read that? It’s so relevant.

…I got a little fired up and that is when I first thought of writing this blog. Something this co-worker (and many more people!) needs to understand is that just because a book has been declared a Penguin Classic doesn’t mean it is in the canon. From what I know about On the Road, it is a relevant book, especially to Kerouac's generation, but as relevant to English literature as The Miller’s Tale, A Dictionary of the English Language, or Hamlet? Please.

…does not make errors in punctuation. I am almost positive I have made an error in this blog. That’s sort of okay with me because this is a blog. However, I do try to keep the punctuation errors to a minimum. My punctuation could be better, but I’m not trying to write the next edition of The Elements of Style. I think I’m okay.

…is not going to misspeak. This one drives me crazy. I misspeak all the time. I get my words in a jumble. My writing vocabulary is extraordinarily large compared to my speaking vocabulary. Making minor errors with verb conjugation, possessives, and the like, is a common habit for everyone else, why can’t it be the same for English Majors?

Don’t hate because I like reading Bill Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words during my down time.