For this question of what assessments or discussions are being raised about the English major within the humanities, I looked to an article “The Lifelong Benefits of English Class” from The New York Times. From the title, I also feel it raises an important point of relevance to what is being said about the value of humanities majors like English in our society right now and how things like transferable, interdisciplinary skills are so needed. The framework of this article is actually a collection of responses readers had to a previous column by Pamala Paul “How to Get Kids to Hate English” which was a critique of the ill effects common core English courses have. I found this to be really insightful because you get this more professional, academic mindset of the writers at the NYTs but then hear from what the masses think about English majors. From middle school English teachers, young students, and Professors, to the President of Hamilton College, their responses all in some capacity had to do with cross-disciplinary skills and the recognition that the skills English majors amass are desperately needed in the workforce. I also found it nice to see that people can distinguish the different things reading does. It can be someone who has “enjoyed these books as great stories” with their children before even attempting formal “English” education as a writer and former teacher Nancy Lubarsky says and it can be a means of opening up vital knowledge and knowhow such as “cultivat[ing] intellectual curiosity, critical thinking, aesthetic appreciation, civic literacy and a host of other attributes that money can’t buy.” There is also a sense of debate within what Paul’s article perhaps appears too traditional or academic in her emphasis on canonical literature – the classics. I get what some of the respondents are saying in that she is stripping away the meaning kids find in more contemporary fiction but I would agree to an extent that the historical significance of reading certain classics is what allows those discussions and analyses of politics of the time, why people wrote the things they did, and how we got to now is essential too. In thinking about citizenship and what a humanities major like English does for a person I think there is something to be said about how all these people feel a reaction strong enough to write in to counter someone else’s observations

“The Lifelong Benefits of English Class.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 25 Mar. 2023, www.nytimes.com/2023/03/25/opinion/letters/english-courses.html