Jobs for the Major
How this major affects a job search
Think about all the skills that the mythology and folklore major teaches you. Now, think about all the career fields that put those skills to good use.
Still scratching your head, huh? Yeah, we figured.
It doesn't look good, but the mythology and folklore major can be the springboard to a successful career. Really, it can. You just need to know where to look, and you can bet we'll be here to help.
Many students move on to get an advanced degree. As with pretty much all majors, going to grad school increases your chances of getting a good job. Downside? More student loan debt. Womp womp.
But this is the dialogue you'd be having regardless of the major. So let's move on.
People with degrees in advertising can go to work for ad agencies and students with degrees in law can become lawyers. Unfortunately, the job outlook for "folklore experts" is smaller than you'd probably like to hear, and smaller yet than enthusiasts might have you believe.
Still, you will have still gained valuable knowledge through your studies. Understanding the human experience is one of the best outcomes, and it can be applied to countless fields if you can successfully sell what you have to offer to potential employers.
Some would say, "Hey, it's not all about the money." To this, we generally say, "Come on. You owe us two months of back rent, Larry."
Common Career Fields
Academia. After acquiring all of this specific knowledge on such particular subject, it's easy to see how academia could be a perfect world for a mythology and folklore graduate. Because many of the myth and folklore degrees are at the graduate level or higher, there's a good chance you'll be asked to teach at some point. (Many Master's and PhD programs have a focus on education, which means you'll work as a TA or spend some time in a K–12 classroom.) Essentially, you'll be transitioning from learning to teaching, which sounds like a great excuse to talk about the stuff you're interested in
all day…and to hopefully rope in the next generation with all the intriguing stories you've got.
Advertising. So you've got a degree that focuses on the most popular stories in human culture. Some of them have lasted for thousands of years, and we still tell our children those stories today. After your academic life in mythology and folklore, you'll have learned why those stories are so successful and potentially how to recreate their success. This type of knowledge might make you an excellent candidate for creating advertising campaigns. After all, their success relies on understanding what captivates audiences. For example, the Old Spice andHump Day commercials wouldn't be as popular ten years ago as they are today. People would probably think they were too bizarre instead of bizarrely funny.
Anthropology. Those who study mythology and folklore could very well excel in anthropology: just ask Indiana Jones and his father Sean Connery (who was obsessed with the Holy Grail). Anthropology students are more likely to look at the remains of five people in an area and tell you why they're there, but myth and folklore students could provide the background for what kind of ideas they might have had and the prevailing culture of the time. When you combine these fields together, you can paint a more complete picture of the past.
Cryptozoology: Yes, this is a real job and it's awesome. Cryptozoology is all about finding Bigfoot. Seriously. The term translates to "the study of hidden animals." In practical terms, it means finding animals that most of the world thinks don't exist. This can range from creatures that are widely regarded as never having existed at all (like mermaids) to animals that are considered extinct, as was the case with the Coelacanth. Yep, they thought this fish was extinct since the Cretaceous period, but it resurfaced in the 1930s. Coolest. Job. Ever.
Gaming. Gaming companies such as Blizzard (World of Warcraft) and Bethesda (The Elder Scrolls series) rely heavily on lore to drive their games. These mythology-based games create their own canon, but also use what's already there, like the existence and power of dragons or the magical properties of elves. The same goes for card games like Magic the Gathering or board games like Myth. Okay, we're done nerding out…for now.
Journalism. Part of the mythology and folklore education is understanding cultures that are vastly different from your own. Imagine a nineteen-year-old woman from Kentucky learning about Mesopotamian harvest gods. That isn't going to be the most relatable topic, so she'll have to adapt. This is a key skill in journalism. Journalists often travel the world and immerse themselves in foreign cultures so they can package all that tasty info into nice, bite-sized parcels. And at the root of journalism is story-telling. Unlike folklore, though, the stories journalists aim to write are, well, the truth.
Fiction Writing: This is what mythology and folklore is all about. People either have a creative idea about a character or setting and expand on it, or they draw from their own experiences and embellish in order to create a compelling scenario. Learning about the best creations in mythology and folklore is perfect training for becoming a fiction writer. Just don't try to pass your stuff off as nonfiction. No one's going to believe you flew too close to the sun on wings made of wax.
Current unemployment of the major
8.4%Percentage of majors who get a higher degree after college
37%Stats obtained from this source.