Prompted Post #1: Preconceptions about Political Science

Going into political science, as one can imagine, I had a lot of preconceptions.

Two Major Preconceptions Included:

1.     Most political science majors become either lawyers or politicians.

2.     Professionals that majored in poly sci are boring and that their work is boring.

Through my introduction to political science class, I was encouraged to get to book 4 Novel Approach to Politics. Through its use of popular culture and humor, it tested these preconceptions I had. And this is what I learned:

1.     There are a lot of career options out there for political science majors including working with an interest group, a business, a nonprofit, becoming a lobbyist, journalist, reporter, etc., or working at any position at the local, state or federal level of government.

        It’s just that from the outside there doesn’t look like many options but from the inside there are many possibilities yet to be discovered.

2.     This textbook used humor to show that things in government aren’t as boring as they seem, and it did this by analyzing government functions and processes and democracy and the list could go on. The key thing is, if you find an area of this field that you’re passionate about, like international relations, then it won't be boring.

https://www.mrconservative.com/2012/02/1945-government-beauracrat-cartoon/

A lot of people have assumptions about the government and how it works, like some believe that officials are all crooks or that the man on the moon was staged. Whatever the idea was, I would like to believe that I had a pretty good understanding of the truths of this field.

I know that not everybody involved in politics in some way is corrupt and I know that they’re not out to get people. Even though I had a realist point of view going into this major, this textbook helped clear up the assumptions I had left about political science.

-Riley