A moment of silence —

due deference to the memory of the first two programs made martyrs in the name of cost-cutting, budget shortfall and the new “E” in education — not endowment, emergency or extra copies of former-president Lehman’s new book in the presidential suite in Day Hall, but Economy.

As the German Studies Department shuffles sadly off the platform with the remains of its Swedish and Dutch language programs — don’t forget to take those two staff jobs with you — and the hooded henchman of the administration sharpens the axe on a Redbud stump, who is the next in line for the cutting board? Viticulture, landscape architecture, American studies? Your major?

Economy this, economy that, blah blah blah. All we’ve gotten is press release after press release quoting Provost #567, about transparency, quality of education and the principles on which Cornell was founded, “where any person can find instruction in any study.” But when Skorton’s red pen signs the death sentence for the next hapless victim of the economic crisis, what have we got?

Silence.

Silence is exactly what they, and we, and even the administration, don’t need.

Enter yours truly. After spending the first (almost) four years of my journalism “career” writing news for The Sun, attempting to navigate the tentacles of the Cornell Press Release Office, I put down my yellow pad and my press pass. I was exhausted and disillusioned, particularly by the last bout of dismally Draconian devices arrived at by the administration as a “last resort” to balance the budget.

We’ve had to make some hard decisions.

We don’t even know what’s coming next.

Believe us, if we knew, we’d tell you.

But in case you haven’t noticed, I am now a columnist. I was thrilled to be myself again. I would revel in the realm of the ridiculous, the forgotten Straight tradition of shenanigans. Until now. Destiny calls, and I must answer.

Though I have always had an opinion, I have now been imbued with the power of expression, and by God I am going to shout it from the inky pages, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Except throw it away. If you do, please recycle.

Thus, I begin my defense of pointless, impractical or otherwise useless majors by first admitting my personal investment in such a defense: I am an English major.

Let the stereotypes ensue.

This disclaimer prelude is purely for you, the reader, lest you subsequently cry, “I am appalled at the monstrosity of subjective journalism and bachelor of arts bias!,” and thereby attempt to refute or undermine the aforementioned unrealized argument.

I have a very good and very intelligent friend. This friend is rightfully incensed about the decimation of a particular Physical Sciences Library, recently deemed dispensable and deceased by the Almighty Axe. This same friend, granted in a late-library, little-sleep state of mind, recently asked me, “What are you doing at an Ivy League University?”

Why did he ask me this? Because I have not taken calculus.

A “crime” he called it.

And of course he’s right. I have blatantly cheated and abused the system. I have enjoyed every class I have taken in my major, have rewarded myself after a long hard day by doing my homework — reading! Blessed reading! — before I went to bed, and have even looked forward to class at 10:10 a.m.

I have enjoyed English, and, ergo, it must be a pointless major. Knowledge for knowledge’s sake is an expense we can no longer afford. Next Trustee meeting, I am recommending it be moved up in the line for the guillotine. Make monetary room for calculus! I’m sure the mob would agree.

No, I don’t have a career path so to speak, so Cornell won’t be able to put me in a promotional packet and sadly, I think they’ve already given up on asking me for alumni donations and I am not even an alumni yet.

No, I wouldn’t ever dare propose that the also ever-shrinking budgets of some esteemed grad schools help fund the continued education of such a subject that will never help the world. A world that, of course, doesn’t really need literature. Or a coherent sentence. Or the study of a language spoken by roughly 10 million or 27 million people — a conclusion I’m sure Sweden, the Netherlands, and a number of other countries will come to any day now. They’ll consult the next Cornell committee about how to save their drowning economies.

You shouldn’t be scared. It’ll never happen to you, or your major. You are important. You belong at an Ivy League University. You matter.

If you thought you came here to learn, or least of all, to enjoy learning, you were wrong. If you thought that academic diversity was a necessity to produce future generations of critical thinkers and innovative leaders, you were wrong. You are a walking pile of much-needed money admitted to be educated in ways to make your own little piles of money to continue the system of admitting more piles of money. A campus chock full of automaton ATMs.

In conclusion, I have no defense. Pointless is what I do — I told you I was an English major.