Since my freshman year in high school I have always had a love for writing and reading. It may have only been defined to some bizarre teen fiction at the time and what I was able to recollect in an every-so-often diary, but my admiration has only continued to grow from there.
When I came into my first English course in college, it was an honor’s contract course on introductory English composition, but boy was it an eye opener. Thinking I had superb writing skills and a knack for turning out great papers, I was way ahead of myself even the first day. It turned out I didn’t know a whole lot about writing proper essays, let alone being engaged in a conversation about them and other literary-related topics. However, within a couple weeks of a very demanding freshman semester, I learned how to organize my thoughts on a topic, gather the appropriate research to support it, relay these points throughout the paper, and overall become a much better writer.
My professor was a very rigorous grader when it came to grammar, composition, and even content, but I would not trade the lessons I learned in her class for anything. She renewed my love for writing and gave me a much needed upgrade from the writing and analysis reading I had done before that. However, being that I was still a bit oblivious about what I really wanted to do in life and what I felt was right fit for me, I continued to be a biology major and for the next semester severely squandered the initial high GPA.
From there I dabbled in studio arts, only recognizing that I had a love for teaching and an aspiration to be in the Peace Corps one day, but it was not until finishing my last English requirement in introductory literature that I had really found my craft. I thoroughly enjoy reading the classics and expanding my knowledge for all types of literature, at very different times. I have only excelled since switching to a literature major, with my once withering GPA and my own personal outlook. I still have a passion for art, but that only drives my writing to be more creative and my reading to be more interpretive.
Since this realization some time ago, I can truly convey my dream profession and the reason I seek to further my education in the English PhD program. Since initially graduating as an undergraduate from Dominion University, I have continued to pursue my passion for literature by taking courses in the Master’s English program. I had high aspirations in seeking my Master’s program and if I’m being honest, to a degree have let myself down. Dr. Imtiaz Habib truly inspired my desire to work towards a career in English Literature and with his passing, along with my own personal difficulties with the pandemic and the professors I had established strong connections with in my undergraduate and graduate coursework leaving Old Dominion, I began to sideline my love for learning and literature (especially in the classroom) more and more. It felt as if I was taking classes just for the requirement rather than my own interests or building my career and publications, and ultimately a knowledge I hoped to gain so one day I could convey the same passion for literature instilled in me by Dr. Habib and Joseph Cosco to a new generation of students. However, I am still holding onto that dream and wish to re-instill this determination to strive for these goals and become a professor that does not dwindle at the face of the challenges I have mentioned and would make either of my literary inspirations proud.
My love for literature and education is not an avenue I want to give up on. The study of literature not only helps in my pursuit to become a professor because I want to teach the subject of literature, but it helps in a wide array of areas. Literature should be studied solely because it enables anyone to have a richer life. All of the places we go, all the people we meet, or even aspire to go and to meet, we first get to experience a background for at the comfort of our home. Learning situations by reading about them, discussing them, and thinking critically about all different types of time periods and all different types of literary conventions. Every book I have read has changed me in some way. Giving me a new outlook to draw from, even when I was not specifically studying literature. When I was an art major, there was still literature to be read and instead of authors, artists to be studied that all bring a new perspective to further develop one’s self.
Not only does the subject of literature help in making for a richer life, but the study of history could not be left out as an accompaniment. The element of history is always there, whether it be in the background or at the front lines, it is always present and a part of making up an individual and everything they do. My own history is what has driven me to writing, and my own history and what is going in the time period will reflect in my writing. The same can be said for any author I have had the pleasure of reading. History is a vital aid in the passion to pursue writing what they have come to know and what they wish to know. In other words, history is basically the laboratory of human experience. Any account of history that is read or perceived through a literary text now inhabits your own mind and adds valuably to any opinion or thought you now develop.
Not only have I gained new perspectives of writing and new history lessons throughout the courses I have attended (both in-person and virtually) at Old Dominion, but I also obtained new insight for myself. Through each and every assignment I have learned in one way or another to interpret the text differently, whether it be summarizing with a modern adaptation in a tweet or reflecting a literary character in a meme, I would never have broadened my thinking to reflect it in the modern without the teachings from these courses. I wasn’t entirely sure I was going to follow through with completing my Master’s and in other words, just intended to take the remaining classes for my requirement until financial aid decided it was done with me. Now, with some momentum and high hope we eventually see the end of Zoom classes and the pandemic, I am determined to prove I can get the degree and go beyond that. I’ve been in a state of despair with losing the foundations I initially had for my love of literature at Old Dominion and then everything seemed to continue to drift following those departures. However, my love of literature has remained the same and with the faculty I’ve had the pleasure of learning from in the past years such as Professor Reed, Dr. Keefe, and Professor De Barros (also unfortunately has left), I hope I am given the chance to prove I belong in the English PhD program. I would love to focus in Shakespeare studies, but feel this is a limited possibility at Old Dominion. The two concentrations I would like to pursue are Rhetoric (Classical and Modern) and Critical Theory. I have listed myself as online in my application but I would ideally like to be on campus part-time.
Being a literature professor in a specified literature subject of my taste with the title of Doctor in front of my name is all too much a distant dream at the moment. However, through all that I have learned so far, I know it brings me that much closer to obtaining it. Without literature in general, I know I would not be the individual I am today and the individual I aspire to be, and I only hope that as being a teacher of the subject one day that I can help at least one of my own future students have the same realization I did. The realization that literature is a need in everyday life, and if you have an underlying passion for it then there is nothing to do but fully pursue it and expand it.
