Students: Undergraduate Information

Why Study English?

A Matter of Degree

Every quarter, the Department of English features on its website the experiences of a soon-to-graduate Ohio State University English Major. Our Winter Quarter 2009 interviewee is Kathleen Whatmore.

Why did you choose your major?

I chose to study in a department that enabled me to deepen my understanding of literature. Since I am pursuing a subject that aligns with my interests, I feel that my degree will be my proudest personal accomplishment. The knowledge I have acquired while working on my B.A. in English are applicable to so many fields, and after graduation, I can pursue any number of careers.

What have been some obstacles?

The obstacles I have faced were financial. I knew when I enrolled at Ohio State that I would not have financial assistance from my family. I have paid for my education strictly on my own, while still supporting myself. This made earning my degree difficult, but I opted for non-traditional approaches to scheduling and money handling to make it work.

What courses stand out as memorable?

My professors are positively amazing, and I am deeply appreciative of every one of them. Twentieth century British fiction with Thomas Davis was one of the most intellectually stimulating--and yet entertaining--classes. Ryan Friedman's film classes provided me an opportunity to apply my English skills to another field, and I learned how to think critically about film. Luke Wilson's class on John Milton was incredibly challenging, and stands out as the best class of my academic career.

What advice would you share with other English majors?

First, choose classes that appeal to you, not just any class that meets the requirement. Doing so will ensure that you are motivated to study hard and perform well. Second, if you are interested in graduate studies, start preparing early. Your professors can offer a wealth of information about this educational process, so take advantage of their knowledge. Lastly, ask your professors for recommended reading lists. I began this tactic a few years ago, and the best pieces I have read were not required reading.

Take a look at stories from previous graduates.

Fenner Undergraduate Research Award Recipient

Thanks in part to a Fenner Undergraduate Research Award this spring, Clayton Caroon, a senior English major at Ohio State-Newark, will be returning to Vietnam to continue his research on culturally appropriate English-language pedagogical methods. Caroon will conduct research on-site in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City to study contemporary educational methods and ideologies applied within its public schools, universities, and private English language institutes and academies.

The $500 Fenner grant is just one of several awards Clay has won for this project. The Ohio State-Newark campus has twice supported his work with $1000 Undergraduate Student Research Grants—the first time for an exploratory trip to the region in 2006, and again this spring in support of his upcoming return stay in Vietnam, where he will use his contacts, including teachers in the public education system and professors at the National University of Vietnam and the private language institution ILA, to conduct ethnographic classroom research.

"Clay is on fire," said Dr. Elizabeth Weiser, Caroon's faculty advisor for the Fenner award. "His research interests cross a great many academic boundaries, and he has managed to attract the attention of scholars from around the university."

During his 2006 Ohio State-Newark-funded research trip, Clay learned that the English language study offered in Vietnam applied imported English language teaching materials developed in England, Australia, Canada, and America. "However," he noted, "many of the language educators I met with said that differences between Vietnamese and 'Western' educational ideologies were a barrier to their students' language acquisition. I believe we can work together to begin to develop a means for greater ideological synergy between East and West. Ultimately, I want to help design better, more appropriate ways of teaching English that combine knowledge from the host countries with Western techniques and ideologies."

Clay readily admits that this is a long-term goal. "This field study is just the beginning of what I hope to do with this project," he said. Although he will be presenting specifically on Vietnamese pedagogy at the Denman Student Research Forum, another aspect of his work, which he presented at the Newark Forum, involves connections between Writing Center and English as a Second Language methodologies for improving writing. A peer writing consultant in the Newark campus's Writing Lab, Clay recently won the East Central Writing Centers Association's Outstanding Leader of the Year Award.

"From my perspective," Weiser noted, "Clay's research is far-reaching. He pushes forward the discussions in rhetoric and composition of what constitutes 'good' communication beyond the Western canon. He not only theorizes the intersection of language acquisition and deep-rooted cultural ideologies, but he also does so in Vietnam, a country overlooked by scholars that has a burgeoning ELT infrastructure and has sent large numbers of English-language learners to the United States. As he continues the work he'll begin with these awards, he really has the potential to someday impact the whole global phenomenon of English-language instruction."

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