Finding Little Joys: Romanticizing Your Education at Cornell

Seeing the good in an 8 or 9 a.m. class is hard. Sometimes, it’s hard to haul myself out of bed for mine. My mattress is too comfortable; I’m too warm and cozy beneath the covers … but I still get up. Why? For starters, it helps that despite it being so early in the morning compared to any of my other classes this semester, I do genuinely enjoy my 8:40 a.m. Greek class. That certainly adds incentive. Otherwise, it comes down to the fact that I’ve found it easier to stay on top of things for the rest of the day by going to my first classes, no matter how early they are. 

DO | On Studying the Humanities 

As of sometime last week, I am officially a humanities major. My switch to English from Human Biology, Health and Society was a move that 2020 Noah would never have expected, given my high school background in math and science. Before this column, writing was never a hobby of mine, let alone something I’d be willing to commit my college education to. 

I have to admit that as a pre-med, I am only really taking on half the burden of a humanities track. My worries about employability are at least temporarily assuaged by the comparably hand-holdy structure of applying for medical school (granted, the extreme levels of competition makes that process scary in its own right). The skeptical confusion that people get when I tell them my major at least turns into mildly doubtful fascination when they learn I’m still on the pre-med track. 

Even if I’m sort of two-timing the liberal arts crew, I still feel I am uniquely qualified to comment on the division that seems to exist between sciences and humanities.

Renowned English Prof. Jonathan Culler to Retire After More Than 50 Years

Since coming to Cornell, Culler has written and edited a total of 16 books; over 200 articles, essays, and translations. He has also been awarded multiple fellowships and was elected a fellow at renowned humanities research institutes such as the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. One of this books, “Literary Theory: A Very Short Introduction”, has been translated into 27 languages worldwide.