5 careers to consider with an English Literature degree

 Are you currently reading English Literature and considering your options for the future? Or have you recently graduated and aren’t sure what your next steps are?

You’re not alone. Whilst reading English Literature can be hugely rewarding, you probably picked it because you love it and may not have been thinking about your future career. But that’s OK. One of the best things about English Literature graduates is that they develop a huge variety of transferable skills that prepare them for the working world. So, what careers could you consider with an English Literature degree?

Law

Whilst a career in law often requires a law degree, you could do a law conversion course with an English Literature degree, which would transfer your excellent research, analytical and negotiation skills. If you don’t fancy a law conversion, there are also many roles that utilize any undergraduate degree, such administrative, clerical and paralegal roles. One of the great things about a career in law is that there’s a huge variety of great companies to choose from, such as chaliklaw, and you can easily find a company that’s the right fit for you.

HR

As an English Literature graduate, you probably have excellent interpersonal skills, due to the amount of group-work and presentations you gave during your time at college (and don’t forget the empathy you’ve got from relating to all your favorite literary characters). So, why not consider a career in Human Resources? With a huge array of different companies, you can focus on improving strategies, work on a range of different tasks and work your way up an ambitious career ladder. It pays well, too.

Teaching

If you’re looking for a rewarding career that makes a difference, you can’t go wrong with teaching. As an English Literature graduate, your impeccable spelling, grammar and punctuation will put you in good stead and you’ll help your students write a mean essay, too. You’ll have to do some further study, a good deal of work experience and give up your evenings to marking, but it’s certainly worth it. The long holidays help, too.

Marketing

If you’re looking for something creative, a career in marketing could be an obvious choice for an English Literature graduate. Using your highly-developed writing skills, you could be creating content for exciting companies and learning how to engage with audiences on social media. You could also be collaborating with colleagues on campaigns and using your excellent inter-personal skills to interact with clients and members of the public. A career in marketing can give you a varied working day and plenty of areas of expertise to choose from.

Journalism

Like marketing, a career in journalism is creative and allows you to have a flexible working day. You’ll be using your research, writing and editing skills to create engaging content that finds new angles and challenges its readers. A highly competitive industry, you may wish to preemptively find ways to stand out; such as blogging, writing for your college newspaper or collating a portfolio. You’ll have to be highly motivated – but, as an English Literature graduate, you already are. You didn’t have many scheduled contact hours, right?