Why Smart People Hate English...Or Something Like That

You know, I've noticed something in the past couple years.  I go to an application-based school where acceptance is based on grades and teacher recommendations.  In other words, it's a school for smart, antisocial people.  BOCTAOE.  (But Of Course There Are Obvious Exceptions...it's a Scott Adams creation.)

But there's one weird thing that keeps popping up around me, and it doesn't seem to be isolated.  We have people that are gonna be doctors, rocket scientists, nuclear physicists, and everything in between.

But for some reason, the grand majority of them seem to absolutely loathe English class.

Okay, so I can understand that happening in a normal school.  In your average high school English class, all you get is badly explained Greek classics, vocab lists, and reading comp questions.  With a sub, you might get to see who can stick the most pencils in the ceiling tiles.  That's about it.

But here, it's not like that.  Here, English class is focused so much more on trying to get us to really understand and appreciate literature and creative writing.  All the focus is on us maturing into capable writers and members of a society built on, inspired by, and centered around the written word...and for someone that's as big of a reading and writing freak as me, that's perfect.  But for the longest time, I couldn't fathom why everyone else seemed to hate it so much.  And today, I think I finally figured it out.

What happened today was about a test we're having next week on Indian Literature.  One girl whom I shall call "Lisa" (obviously, not her real name) wanted to know what was on the test.  Now, my English teacher is not the type to give us a concrete list of what to study for a test.  She's a high-standing member of the "appreciate literature, don't memorize it" party.  Remember, I love this, and everyone else hates this.

So when asked this question, my teacher replied with a speech about thinking back to what we had read and the connections we'd made between other works and looking over that again.  Basically, she was just telling us to read what we'd already read and be ready to talk about it.  Simple, right?

Apparently not.  Because the first thing "Lisa" said in reply to this was along the lines of, "I don't want an analysis, I just want to know what was on the test."

My first thought was just a gigantic eye-roll and a silent lament over how thick-headed some people could be.  But after a bit, I realized that this was actually a pretty monumental event.  In one sentence, "Lisa" had finally revealed exactly why my friends couldn't stand English.  It's all about how they prefer to learn.

See, even though we're "gifted" (I only put it in quotes because I think using the term "gifted" to describe smart kids is stupid.  Everyone's gifted; for some people, it's in their ability to learn.), we're still products of the public school system.  So even with all the freedoms we're given, we still want order.  We still want to know what we have to memorize to get better.

It's kinda funny; we're smart not only because we can pick up on things faster, but because we've learned how to game the system.  In past schools, we were expected to hit the minimum requirements necessary, and we could do that easily because we realized that all the current system required us to accomplish was rote memorization.  This isn't really a "gifted" trait as much as a human one; no one wants to do more work than necessary.  And after a while, that habit just gets ingrained in your mind, and it's pretty hard to break.

I think another factor is what career they're aiming for.  Subjects like science and math not only encourage, but require rote memorization; you can certainly teach them creatively, but in the end the main goal is to make sure you know the quadratic formula or the various forms of carbon by heart.  I'm not saying that isn't important if you want to be a doctor or such, but it does make that your preferred method of learning.  So when something like an English class where this isn't any real way to write a true "study guide" for last-minute cramming hits that person that's used to trig study guides and concrete periodic tables, it blows their minds.  Same with being asked to think outside the box: we have three core classes that ask us to think of concepts in a linear fashion, and one that tells us to color outside the lines every chance we get.  It's the kind of paradigm shift that needs a real change in your thinking, and in these kinds of cases (like many things in life), the majority always wins.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I've discovered that loving English class doesn't mean I'm crazy.  It means I just think about things differently, and that other people that prefer science and math think about things different too.  Others are practical, while I'm metaphysical.  That's all there is to it.

Of course, you could always make the argument that we're all insane and the only thing that's measurable in this world is how close we are to the level of insanity that inspires daily robe-wearing and long conversations with magical pandas named Walter.  I figure I'm about two crackfics and a bit of bad meth away from that, so that's officially the standard now.