The growing emphasis on employability in higher education has increasingly placed literature and other humanities disciplines under pressure to justify their relevance to an ostensibly skills-driven labour market. Yet, the assumption that literature is disconnected from employability is not adequately supported by research. Studies of graduate employability consistently identify communication, critical thinking, problem-solving, adaptability, teamwork, and research skills among the competencies valued by employers, precisely the transferable capacities that literary study can cultivate through close reading, interpretation, argumentation, discussion, and writing. Established research has identified English proficiency, teamwork, communication, and personal attributes as significant employability factors, while also highlighting the continuing challenges faced by graduates in research and persuasive communication. Rather than rendering literature unnecessary, therefore, the employability agenda provides an opportunity to rearticulate literature education as a site for developing transferable human and intellectual capabilities.
These pressures seem to have been going as long as I am have been in this field, in the face of what research indicates. Maybe it’s the focus on what is easier to measure, skills aptitude versus communication, comprehension, writing skills.
Alas I have no insight here except to agree with you and ask how making a case for this can be made. Are there collections of research one this we can refer to?
Thank you! Yes, there is a substantial body of research on language skills and communication, but I think there is still relatively limited research that focuses specifically on the role and value of literature in language education, particularly in terms of how its contribution can be evidenced and assessed. This could actually be an interesting area for research collaboration. I would be very open to exploring this further and looking at how we might collectively make a stronger research-based case for the place of literature in language education.