There’s an extent to which the sniping at Media Studies courses is just another example of a bizarre combination under which Britain seems to labour: that of failing to value erudition, while simultaneously deriding the (perceived) stupid.
Certainly, I think it ludicrous to encourage Media Studies graduates to read Physics instead, when the former is more employable than the latter. Also, I’ve started seeing terrifically able, driven, inspirational, witty and knowledgeable Media Studies graduates – a far cry from the mostly sullen and – let’s be blunt – thick mob who threw themselves on Monday’s Guardian recruitment pages only a few years ago.
Sure, it is ludicrous that there are more students of television studies than there are people making the stuff. But to dismiss the entire subject on that basis is to be both a snob and an inverted-snob simultaneously. Which feat I admire, but hardly wish to repeat.