Humanities and specialization

The last few days I’ve been checking out job postings in a couple of potential grad school locations. It seems me that basically anything above entry level requires a degree in a particular field. My major was humanities, which means I didn’t train for some particular job — I trained for all of them. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like many employers see it that way.

My suspicion is that I could do just about any of the jobs I’ve looked at. There might be a slight learning curve as I became acquainted with the jargon of a particular profession. Nonetheless, my liberal education would probably give me an immediate advantage over everyone who didn’t major in the field, and a long-term advantage over many who did.

Several of the jobs I looked at were for teaching in public schools. Though I understand the advantages of having certified teachers, certification, like most other screening processes, has its flaws. It can allow in people who aren’t really capable, and bar some who really are. Basically, in order to be certified, you have to have taken certain classes. It doesn’t matter much whether you can actually do the stuff they teach in those classes — you have to take them. As I was lamenting this fact earlier, Lincoln helpfully shared something he had told a friend with a similar problem: Look for a job teaching gym; then you can teach whatever you want. Ha.

I could go on about my ideas on education, but maybe I’ll save them for a later post. I guess the lament of this post is that our world seems to have no place for the generalist. The liberal arts are confined to a small corner of academia. Classic ideas have no currency in our society. Does anyone else think this is a problem?