History is fun. Archaeology is fun. Can't quite get my finger on what the practical value of either of those are, though. How is studying any of these useful in life? What can you achieve through studying either of these as anything more than just a hobby?
I want to go out in the field and lab, go for a degree in archaeology. Being able to piece together history interests me greatly. However, the above mindset keeps haunting me and it's demotivating as fuck. Wherever I look on- or offline, the McDegree meme pops up.
Is there any reason to not turn law into a career instead of history/archaeology? Assuming you're capable of doing any of these, of course. You'd earn good pay and you're able to advise people on judicial matters, or even uphold the law.
Not bait. Just misguided, I hope.
>>1384064
And how is that of any use?
it is fun and a sizeable number of people find it to be interesting
why do you need something to have inherent 'value'? Law sounds dry as fuck and possible route to an hero if you don't have any true passion for it
>>1384064
If you find them as ends unto themselves that they have value and if you find that their value is greater than the opportunity cost in the material or sentimental benefits in some other field, yeah sure go into history or archaeology. Just understand that doing it for material reasons is misguided.
>>1384064
Become a lawyer and specialize in international law and/or antique, art and antiquities preservation and authentication. There has to be some way to do both. You might be one of the few on the planet.
>>1384064
I'll tell you this, from decades of experience.
Whatever you pick as a career, you're going to be doing it a lot, and for a long ass time.
It's better to pick something you love, and live frugally, than to pick something that you hate, and think you're going to enjoy living lavishly.
>>1384149
This
I told this to another anon on here. Based Steven Pinker said that in an interview. You should choose your job 50% on what interests you 50% on whether you would enjoy the daily routine of the job. So you're interested in archaeology and history but would you be interested in doing the shit that those jobs require on a daily basis? Same with law.
>>1384345
I want to echo this. If you love history and archaeology, by all means do that. There will be some daily grind aspect to it, but I can't speak to how much there is.
However, if you do law, be aware that a large portion of it, more than other professions probably, is daily grind. It's also one of those fields that has a heavy "pay your dues" culture before you'll get to do stuff that's actually interesting, and some people don't make it that far either by choice or because they just don't get the chance. This is becoming more true as the field is increasingly corporatized. Also, you should have an idea of what kind of law you want to practice and what career track you want; don't just do it because you think it's a ticket to a glamorous life.
Also, a lot of lawyers don't make bank (there are many on unemployment), and many of the ones that do burn out of the profession within 5 years.
>>1384103
>>1384113
This.
But also, there's a pretty important practical side of the study of the past that many people seem to overlook: the fact that the present in a result of the past, and modern people still rely on it to construct narratives. In basic terms, everything that most people think about their world and how things should be is influenced by the past. If you're involved in shaping that narrative, you're in a position to either support or refute the arguments made about the past. This has a lot of value in society.
Archaeology specifically also has the ability to either support, add detail to, or refute historical records. This is obviously an important role for the above, and is has a number of important real-world effects specifically because it can lead to actual narratives being created about things that weren't recorded in the past. For example, I've had a few professors who were directly involved with the federal recognition process for Native American groups and helping them prove continuous habitation and retention of cultural practices.
>>1384464
But that's why what Pinker said is so spot-on. To you and me, what lawyers do seems like "daily-grind", to a lawyer who enjoys his job it probably isn't. I chose my job wisely and despite having to do things that seem mundane to others, I don't even notice time passing. Same with archaeology, I love history and archaeology but could I cope with digging for hours under the sun to find a bit of clay (if I'm lucky) all summer and spending all winter holed up in a library doing research? No. My friends who are archeologists on the other hand absolutely love both of those things.
>>1384115
NAGPRA or UNESCO Law specialists are probably a thing
>>1384064
I'd go for law and just pick up amateur archaeology as a hobby. I feel that doing what you love hours on end every day will kill your interest in it.
>>1384526
I agree with you about the Pinker quote anon (tbqh he usually has good opinions whenever I've heard him speak), and I am glad you like your career!
I was speaking primarily from my experience as a lawyer and other lawyers I know. I spent the first few years in a field I thought I would love; I had really enjoyed my classes on it, opportunities for foreign travel, and had roots in international affairs. However, the practice once I got there was really "daily grind"; endless emails and paperwork, average 80 hour work weeks were draining. The work I had done in my internships was actually more interesting. I never used the foreign language skills I had worked on that I was told would be really helpful for the job. On top of that, only a handful of people would actually get to move on to the more interesting stuff after 10+ years, and that was only if you basically refused to ever day "no" to a request (which will kill your family and social life) and never once slipped up.
I did this for about three and a half years; the first year was okay, the next year and a half it started to feel like a grind, and by the last year I felt very disillusioned and was in zombie mode; I quit before I made some mistake that would sabotage me. I moved to a different field of law and have been doing that for a little over four years now, and it's better in just about every respect. Still a decent amount of daily grind stuff like emails, but less than before.
I know a decent number of other lawyers whose experiences are similar to mine, where the work itself ended up being much different than they thought. I figured anon might appreciate this perspective.
>>1385099
Fair enough, that's why internships are so important because you get to see what it's actually like. Although in your case it seems that wasn't so. For that reason, shadowing someone would be ideal, or at the very least speaking to a family friend/acquaintance/professor who does the job you want to do is the best option but obviously not everyone has access to that, especially with more obscure jobs. Glad you found a better field. What kind of law do you practice now? Corporate law is meant to be where the mega-bucks are, but I'm told it's kinda dry.
P.S. Pinker is indeed quite based. This is a nice debate with him in it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjJAwbc5IaE
>>1385123
Has Pinker ever debated Chomsky about something non-linguistics? Tbqh I would probably pay to see that.
As weird as this sounds, I do low-level tax law now (high-level is basically corporate). The practice gives me more control over cases and clients, and I can argue cases with the IRS. My prior work was international arbitration, which is really high stakes (corporations suing each other or corporations suing governments under international treaties), but way more dry than I thought it would be; it mostly paid off school for me, which is a plus. The legal profession tends to be extremely hierarchical, especially in the corporate sector.
>>1385180
No but this Chomsky vs Foucault debate is pretty ebin. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TUD4gfvtDY
That's really interesting, I would have expected it to be completely the other way round with regards to which career was more interesting. Although having more control over what you do is definitely better than being a tiny cog in a big machine. Why was international arbitration boring?
>>1385190
I have seen the Chomsky-Foucault debate, that is an epic one. I remember reading that Chomsky said after the debate that he liked Foucault personally, but that talking to him was like talking to another species.
International arbitration was extremely hierarchical; just a lot of drafting motions, tons of emails (honestly that was probably at least a third of what I did), researching tribunal rules, and poring over contracts and other similar documents; I liked researching cases and reading legal journal articles, and I almost never did that. Only the partners really got to develop case theories, and like I said, no matter how hard you work, it's not a sure thing you'll get there.
>>1385229
Another major time sink was depositions; this is where people are interviewed outside of court by opposing lawyers, but they have their lawyer present to tell them whether they have to answer and how to answer. You might spend over a month preparing for a big deposition by drafting questions and reviewing background documents, and then senior attorneys with 20+ years experience do the actual questioning. Afterwards, you do the transcript, which can be hundreds of pages, so that the deposition can be put into evidence as an exhibit before the court/tribunal.
>>1385229
But they almost are. They are so fundamentally different as people and ideologically. The funny thing is that they both belong to the "Left" broadly speaking. This is also a good Chomksy debate https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaR-T_hqRSM Buckley is a good speaker, but seems like such a slug.
>>1385263
Do you at least get to be there for the deposition itself? I suppose it's a good way to see how more experienced guys do it, before you try your hand at it but after a while I imagine I'd want to have some of the fun myself. There are many jobs that are like you describe (hierarchical) and it really sucks. That's why people take the plunge and become freelancers. There's a lot more risk but your work is more rewarding.
>>1385307
You're right about Chomsky and Foucault both being leftists, but in extremely different ways. Chomsky is arguably the most pro-Enlightenment thinker out there, and really believes in truth and morals. Foucault isn't, he's basically some weird kind of Nietzchean anti-Enlightenment materialist; realistically, his ideas could easily be used to justify any sort of government.
>Do you at least get to be there for the deposition itself? I suppose it's a good way to see how more experienced guys do it, before you try your hand at it but after a while I imagine I'd want to have some of the fun myself. There are many jobs that are like you describe (hierarchical) and it really sucks.
You do get to be there, but you just sort of sit off to the side or behind. Excellent deposing attorneys are really, I guess, type A personalities. Just very aggressive in questioning; it's worth remembering that the legal system is basically a replacement for settling disputes violently, so you get people sometimes with really combative personalities.
The hierarchy is especially bad in law, because where you went to school really matters; it's a big network, and having lawyers from Harvard-Yale-Stanford (or whatever the big UK schools are) is a big selling point for potential clients. I didn't go to one of those top 10 law schools, and I think I was fortunate to get the job in the first place given that. I kind of saw the writing on the wall after a bit that not being part of that network lowered me in the eyes of a large number of people, including some of the people who make promotion decisions. I guess it's like picking doctors when you have a major surgery; do you want the doctor who graduated from Harvard Med, or do you want the state school doctor? A lot of people just look at the diploma.
My girlfriend is a historian, like an actual one. She's the person who translated the Casgliad Brith.
Her daily routine just seems to consist of going to her office for a few hours, making coffee, doing like 5 minutes of work and then goofing off all day.
>>1384064
You don't need to study these fields to work on sites and digs.
My university education is in computer, phone and radio networking, and I've been at multiple digs as a volunteer, basically working minimum wage.
Started as a guy with a shovel and moving buckets of earth and rocks, in a few days of talking to people and showing I am not just a school kid in it for the pocket money I got "promoted" to more substantial duties, called for talks over what was found, my opinion and views were considered by the specialists there. After a while I was basically with the guys in charge, and in the following projects I joined I skipped the manual labor phase by recommendation.
However when people want me to quit my education (then) and job (now) to be an archeologist or historian, I always decline. Its a hobby and I want to keep it a hobby.
>>1386192
as a history student who works as a part time researcher I can confirm this
