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When Marquis Scholar Lindsay Rutt ’06 (Stevens, Pa.) decided to make a job in public relations her career goal, she combined majors in English and American studies to prepare herself. Her focus in American studies, high and popular culture, fit well because it includes an emphasis on media forms.
But recently, Rutt decided that she wants to become a high school English teacher.
“I chose to keep my American Studies major, however,” she says, “because it encourages and requires you to take courses in many different disciplines and draw connections, which I feel will definitely help me to be able to connect the English I will be teaching to other issues such as history, cultural elements in politics, art, social values, etc.”
“The program allows a lot of flexibility so the student is able to work with an adviser to select courses which fulfill requirements, but also allow the student to focus the major according to his or her interests and therefore create a major which looks in depth at an aspect of American identity that he or she wishes to pursue,” she adds.
In the program’s Photography and American Culture seminar this spring, Rutt is taking skills she uses for literature — reading, interpreting, examining context, and drawing connections – and applying them to photography.
“The course is helping me to become a more effective interpreter and also teaching me a lot about the way Americans tend to perceive themselves,” she says. “We also look at historical significance, contemporary photos, novels, articles, and drawings, and so make connections to many different disciplines and methods of presenting and communicating information.”
The course includes a field trip to the International Center of Photography in New York City, working with historic images in Lafayette’s archives, and attending several evening film screenings. Students complete both an analytical research paper and a creative photographic project.
In the archives, campus pictures from different eras shed light on changes in photographic technology, the desired presentation of photographs, and the campus and student body. They have shown Rutt how much society depends on visual evidence, primarily photographs, for preserving its history.
“It also makes me realize that many things I take for granted, which for me have always existed, are relatively recent things,” she says. “Photography has come a long way in less than 200 years. This campus has grown incredibly and now accepts women. These are just a few examples of things I’ve learned.”
“Another benefit of the American Studies major is that I have really seen how difficult it is to neatly and easily define what America is, what it means to be American,” she adds. “There are so many aspects at play that are connected. This fact becomes more clear to me as I take a variety of classes in subjects such as English, politics, art, anthropology, etc.”
Rutt enhanced her education by traveling to London and Dublin for a Lafayette interim session course focusing on theater in England and Ireland. She is a member of the worship team for Lafayette Christian Fellowship and volunteers through the Landis Community Outreach Center.