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The Department of English

Ouachita Baptist University

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Better go down upon your marrow-bones
And scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones
Like an old pauper, in all kinds of weather;
For to articulate sweet sounds together
Is to work harder than all these, and yet
Be thought an idler by the noisy set
Of bankers, schoolmasters, and clergymen
The martyrs call the world. . . .
(William Butler Yeats, from "Adam's Curse")

Professor and Chair: Dr. Douglas Sonheim

Professors: Dr. Jay Curlin, Dr. Raoulf Halaby,

Dr. Stan Poole, Dr. John Howard Wink
Associate Professor: Dr. Amy Sonheim

Visiting Assistant Professor: Dr. Mary Beth Long
Instructors: Rosemary Flora, Beverly Slavens

Professor Emeriti: Ms. Betty McCommas, Dr. Herman P. Sandford,

Dr. Susan Wade Wink
Arkadelphia, Arkansas 71998
(870) 245-5553

The Department of English exists primarily to acquaint students with the masterpieces of literature in English and with the relations of this literature to the whole of Western culture. Secondary purposes are to develop language skills beyond the elementary objectives of the communication course and to indicate historical and geographical relationships of English to other languages.

What Can I Do

with a B.A. in English?

While some of our English majors become high school or college teachers, many others have gone on to fill, successfully and happily, the following roles:

● lawyers

● inner-city ministers

● preachers

● journalists

● playwrights

● insurance agents

● parents

● school administrators

● military officers

● librarians

● accountants

● dance teachers

● resource managers

● businessmen

● counselors

● poets

● government workers

● investment managers

● salespersons

● coaches

● photographers

● social workers

● museum curators

● pharmaceutical representatives

Some well-known persons who majored in English include these:

● Dave Barry: humorist, writer

● Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: television writer/producer

● Carol Browner: Head of the Environmental Protection Agency

● Chevy Chase: comedian, actor, writer

● Tom Clancy, novelist

● Mario Cuomo: Governor of New York

● Michael Eisner: Walt Disney CEO

● Jodie Foster: actor, filmmaker

● Kathryn Fuller: World Wildlife Fund CEO

● Cathy Guisewite: cartoonist (“Cathy”)

● Tommy Lee Jones: actor

● Steven King: novelist

● Michael Lynne: Co-Chairman and Co-CEO of New Line Cinema

● Paul Newman: actor, entrepreneur

● Joe Paterno: football coach (Penn State)

● Sally Ride: astronaut

● Joan Rivers: comedienne

● Diane Sawyer: broadcast journalist

● Herb Scannell: President, Nickelodeon Networks, MTV Networks

● Paul Simon: songwriter, singer

● Steven Spielberg: filmmaker

● Marty Schottenheimer: NFL Coach

● Christopher Reeve: late actor, activist for the disabled

● Amy Tan: writer

● Clarence Thomas: U.S. Supreme Court Justice

● Emma Thompson: actor

● Grant Tinker: TV Executive

● Harold Varmus: Nobel laureate, Director of National Institutes of Health

● Barbara Walters: broadcast journalist

● Sigourney Weaver: actor

● Pete Wilson: Governor of California

● Bob Woodward: journalist, author of All the President's Men

(source: http://www.msstate.edu/dept/English/EnCelebs.html)

These two lengthy lists should more than adequately answer the question “What can I do with a B.A. in English?” A shorter answer to that question would be “Almost anything.” But why should this be so? As you weigh your academic options at Ouachita, you should take some time to ask the following questions.

● Why do English majors succeed in such a wide variety of areas?

● What happens to English majors during the course of their study?

● What attitudes and skills do they acquire during their studies?

These questions assume that your education at Ouachita is—or should be—about much more than getting a job upon graduation. In other words, such questions assume what we know from Arthur Holmes’s The Idea of a Christian University: That the purpose of the liberal arts is to educate the whole person. These questions, then, deserve our attention. Here, in brief, is how we respond to them.

► English majors are critical readers.

Throughout your professional career you will encounter, many thousand times over, texts that you must read and interpret. How best to prepare for this? Study poetry. George Gopen in “Rhyme and Reason: Why the Study of Poetry Is the Best Preparation for the Study of Law” says that the close study of poetry is far and away the best training for reading and interpreting texts. No other discipline concentrates your attention on words, their possible ambiguities, and their contexts. As his title suggests, Gopen (who earned his law degree and a PhD from Harvard) focuses on law, but his claim applies to many other areas.

The English major suits the ‘pre-Law’ student best . . . because the English departments tend to care about reading and writing skills more than any other departments, but also . . . because some of the methods they use in teaching literature, most particularly poetry, are directly applicable to the study of law.

► English majors are creative communicators.

English majors know how to think deeply and creatively about form and content. Steve Holcomb, President and CEO of Mangan and Holcomb (a marketing, advertising, and public relations firm in Little Rock, Arkansas) writes that

during my 38-year career, I have seen that liberal arts majors, particularly those who study English literature and writing, make outstanding copy editors and creative concept developers because of their ability to read and understand a wide range of materials and to coalesce such content into meaningful and compelling communication.

► English majors can go global.

Because English is the international language, English majors have opportunities to take what they learn with them anywhere in the world. There is a high demand to teach English abroad, and a B.A. in English will be extremely attractive and marketable, opening doors to numerous cross-cultural adventures.

► English majors are passionate learners.

We find that most of our English majors want to develop as readers and writers for the intrinsic value of these activities. Our English majors are passionate about their studies in ways that students who are in more vocationally oriented majors are not. Many English majors seem to have a strong internal motivation, something bound to be attractive to employers.

► English majors are students of humanity.

English majors read—and are shaped by—the greatest thinkers and writers in human history, artists who have given shape to our deepest hopes and fears. English majors understand what it means to be a human being, having encountered in fiction, poetry, and drama the depths and heights of the human imagination. The study of literature (if we are open) educates the heart.

► English majors make good friends.

Ashley (née Burgamy) Eaton, a 2007 OBU English major, wrote to tell us how as an English major she found deep fellowship among her colleagues.

The work was hard, but it was good, so good. And I was in great company. I had the tremendous privilege of being among superb classmates – people who, like me, had found English to be a noble and wonderful study. What started out as mere schoolwork became the topic of passionate discussion during free time. Friendships were formed over talks of literature and poetry.

► English majors have fun

Staffed by the likes of Mary Poppins on Speed, Dr. Thunderlizard, Pickwick, Railwoman, Cicera, Crustulum, and the Emperor of Ice Cream, the English Department is an interesting place. Walk through the English Department suite, aka The Bugtruck, and you’ll see what we mean. You never know what you might learn. And you might even get a nickname.

So, Are You An English Major?

● Do you like to read?

● Are you interested in words and ideas?

● Are you comfortable with writing, and do you have creative flair?

● Do you like to play Balderdash or Scrabble?

● Do you enjoy stories?

If so, we’d love to talk with you. Come see us in the Bugtruck.

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Why Study English Language and Literature at Ouachita?

The English faculty at Ouachita believes that through your diligent study of the English language and literature, you will gain practical skills. You will learn to read carefully and analytically, looking for ways the parts relate to the whole. You will wrestle with complex ideas, ambiguity and multiple interpretations. You will learn more words, and you will learn more about words--their histories, complexities and mysteries. In short, you will learn to read complex texts and you will learn to write more clearly. Whether your future holds law school, Sunday school, high school, or homeschool, your diligent studies in English will enrich your work for God's kingdom.

To these very useful skills of analysis, synthesis, and verbal expression, studying English will increase your appreciation for beauty and design. You will study the forms of literature in a way that will allow you to move beyond impulsive reactions to works of art; you will gain an appreciation for whatever is truly lovely, and you will discriminate between the tawdry and the genuine, the false and the true, the mediocre and the excellent.

Because literature by its very nature explores what it means to be a human being, it confronts the questions that humans have always faced, questions about fate and free will, about our place in the cosmos, about our relationships with each other. Literature does not merely tell us about these questions; rather, literature presents human experiences in a concrete form. Thus, if we as readers will submit ourselves momentarily to the premises and demands of the work before us, then we can safely encounter a limitless number of human stories. We agree with C.S. Lewis, who describes the expansive effects of reading by saying “I become a thousand men and yet remain myself.”

Above all, while there are many skills we gain from studying language and literature, we believe that such study changes us; we study literature not merely for what it will do for us, but for the great good it does to us.

On behalf of the English Department faculty, I hope you will be enriched and challenged by your studies in English. God be with you.

Dr. Doug Sonheim

Professor of English

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Student-Learning Outcomes

Students completing the baccalaureate program in English will

have a knowledge of English syntax and the works, genres, and periods of English and American literature that compares favorably with that of English majors graduating from other American institutions,
be capable of writing an essay on a literary topic that is knowledgeable, mechanically correct, and rhetorically effective,
be capable of reading works of English or American literature with mature understanding,
be able to conduct research in the field of English and American literature, and
be able to combine the four areas outlined above in documented essays that show a knowledge of literature, an ability to convey that knowledge through effective writing skills, an ability to read a literary work with mature understanding, and an ability to support their conclusions with what they have discovered in their research.