A souless yuppie in American Psycho

I’ll never forget a conversation I had with an American expat.

We happened to be at a  faux-exclusive club in Shanghai with shark tanks and a glittering, ghostly clientele. It was a clear night, save for the fuzz of smog that filtered the 24th floor view through the violet gauze of pollution.

He asked where I went to school. I was a rising junior at Harvard at the time; he had graduated from Georgetown a few years back. Then he asked what I was studying.

“Social anthropology,” I said.

“That’s nice,” he said, eyes widening. He paused to collect his words. “But that’s not like, something you could build a house with.”

He settled into his velvet seat with a cigarette and a shit-eating grin, looking pleased with his metaphor.

I forget how I replied.

The truth is – and I’ve learned this from those smarter than myself – that what you study in undergrad probably won’t be directly applicable to a job. And if you’re a humanities/social science major like myself, you’ll occasionally have to converse at length with douchebags in suits (DBIS). Disclaimer: not all corporate dudes in suits are like this. But a few are. They’re probably rather young, and high on their own importance.

If it’s a short conversation, it’s better just to nod, smile, and escape. But if you’re stuck across a dinner table from a DBIS, you might want to build a convincing argument that you’re an intelligent life form, too.

Here’s how.

1) Be confident.

Smile, but don’t bend. Show no fear. Angle your argument as a friendly, thoughtful meditation, not a personal attack. Only insecure English majors sulk in the face of DBIS-ery.

2) Ask about your DBIS

“It’s interesting you say that! I was actually thinking about this topic,” you’ll begin before asking for their occupation and college major. It’s easiest to make a DBIS understand your argument if you craft it around his/her own self-centered DBIS existence. Chances are they majored in something “practical” like business, accounting, or finance. In a pinch, they might be an econ major.

3) Flatter them.

Say something like, “I can tell you’re great at what you do, so….”

3) Have them dig their own grave.

Ask the DBIS what makes someone in their industry good at their job. They’ll likely cite a bunch of soft skills – networking, being comfortable with numbers, analysis, working in a team, knowing about the industry, etc. If they name more specific skills, you’ll easily be able to reduce them to similar components.

4) Point out that they’re mistaken.

They’ll admit their soft skills were probably learned doing something like bartending or playing on the sports team. And they’ll probably allow that you can pick up industry lingo by reading a trade paper and attending a lot of mixers. As for analysis, doesn’t reading 30 research papers and writing a 20 page report account for the same thing? When it comes to numbers, point out more number-heavy majors that aren’t topically related to your DBIS’s job. I would probably BS a bit and claim that social anthro involves numbers, too. (Well, it could. If I wanted it to.) If they claim they’re an Excel ninja, just roll your eyes.

4) Kill them off with some stats and anecdotes.

Like that one about people switching jobs 8 times. Then cite some anecdotes: the History major who works for Goldman Sachs, the molecular biology major who’s now a cookbook author, etc. (All true.)

5) Bask in your liberal arts glory.

Done! If they have any more objections, use your analytical and argument-building skills developed from reading Beowulf to slash any objections.

Unfortunately, my DBIS was a lost cause. Later, he went on to say that he saw no point in befriending women and that women shouldn’t be in positions of power.

He did allow, however, that I had a good grasp of the English language.

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