Unlike the Daily Beast's rankings earlier this year, Forbes is explicit about what it means by
"worst." It's all about the unemployment rates and expected earnings
for recent grads.
If you want to see the
depressing statistics, you can check out the Forbes article online.
But really, what's the point
Forbes?
It's hardly news that an archaeology
major is no ticket to financial superfluity. The Ohio Historical Society's
first curator of archaeology understood that in 1897 and nothing much has
changed in the past century.
I was told by my high school guidance counselor in 1974 that archaeology was a terrible career choice -- "There
are no jobs and even if you find a job in the field it won't pay very
well."
Well, actually, there are jobs though he was right that most of them don't pay all that well -- or at least the strictly monetary rewards aren't all that spectacular.
So how many readers of
Forbes were even thinking about a career in archaeology anyway?
Probably not very many; but
if any of them had considered the possibility, they know better now -- or think they
do.
The value of archaeology has
been a topic I've considered before in this blog, so I won't repeat the
arguments here. It's sad, but revealing when magazines like Forbes presume to
judge the value of college majors merely by how much money you can make with the diploma.
In "Life without principle," Henry David Thoreau wrote that "the aim of the laborer should be, not to get his living, to get 'a good job,' but to perform well a certain work..." not for money merely, but for the love of it.
I think that's good advice, but you won't find it in Forbes.
Brad
Lepper
Posts
2 comments:
Well said. As usual, Brad Lepper is an uncommonly articulate spokesman for archaeology.
Given the current state of education in this country, it's no surprise that most of us have no real frame of reference within which to develop an interest in archaeology, and are only casually intrigued on occasion, or have no interest at all ("Who cares about all that old dead stuff? What does it have to do with me and my car?"). But some of us are apparently just innately drawn to it. For us ("nerds?") there are few thrills greater than that of discovering and holding a tool or figurative object made by someone thousands of years ago, on or in the ground and unnoticed until this moment. And a careful consideration of these artifacts gives us some insight into the concerns and priorities of those long gone, so removed from us by time and cultural change, yet very much like us - a closer understanding of the human condition in general. (And in North America it's not just the popularly recognized "arrowheads" - those people had a lot on their minds besides simple survival.)
If you are one of us to whom archaeology is of inherent value and a source of fascination, go for it! But by all means hedge your bets. Money is quite useful, and unless we are born wealthy, we must offer something that people are willing to pay for. Also learn a profession to fall back on when things aren't going well, ideally something that can also be directly applied to archaeology, like, for example, geology or geographic information sciences. Bottom line, remember the philosopher Joseph Campbell's "Follow your bliss". (And if you don't have a passion for what you're doing, you probably won't be very good at it anyway.)
AMEN!!
Post a Comment