English Major – Major problem?

I deserve an award for the number of times I was asked, “Oh, an English degree? What are you going to do with that?” Frankly, what won’t I do with that? The possibilities are endless. While the area of Intellectual Property seems to have a large demographic of STEM majors, my English major is how I stumbled upon my interest in IP.

My Introduction to Intellectual Property

I was first introduced to Intellectual Property law through a literature and law course in my junior year of undergraduate school. At this stage, I planned to attend law school in order to pursue health law because of my long-term interest in healthcare, medicine, and medical technology. However, this course expanded my interests. It was a small elective that surveyed how different aspects of law and legal authority were incorporated into various pieces of literature. During one of the lessons, my professor introduced the class to copyright law, explaining how it applies to books and other forms of art. Before her explanation, she hosted an exercise where students had to determine whether the modification of a preexisting work of visual art was protected by copyright laws.  Basically, she was asking whether the modification would infringe, i.e., violate copyright in the original work. As a junior in undergrad with a vague understanding of copyright law, I had no idea what infringement upon an author’s copyright looked like before this exercise. Using only my gut instinct, I figured, “Hmm…this does not feel right—must be an infringement.”  I soon learned that many uses may not violate a copyright for various reasons, like whether a new piece is used as a critique of the original, whether the piece would be in competition with the original, and other reasons.

The process of deciding whether a piece of art was significantly different or had some aspect that made the new piece protectable by copyright law intrigued me because it made me think critically about a second user’s use, intent, and purpose.  It also led me to become more curious about intellectual property in different applications. While the lesson focused solely on copyrightable material, I discerned IP was something I wanted to further explore both generally and within medicine.

Increasing my IP interest

My interest in IP exponentially grew during my first year of law school. With the goal of exploring all avenues of interest, including the intersection of health and IP.  I joined Loyola’s Intellectual Property Law Society (IPLS). I was also lucky enough to have the director of the IP law program, Professor Ho, as my professor for civil procedure. Professor Ho helped to further my interest in IP through personal conversations and presentations to my IP legal writing class. In this specialized writing section, I was able to familiarize myself more with the forms of intellectual property by writing research memorandums regarding patent and trademark infringement, as well as writing a trial brief on copyright infringement. My experiences in both IPLS and IP legal writing have affirmed that I want to pursue a career path at the intersection of Intellectual Property and Health law. While I don’t know exactly what that career will look like yet, I’m certain I’ll find it. So, for now, I’ll continue to appreciate IP in my personal and everyday life.

IP Inspiring Curiosity in My Everyday Life

While I consider myself an inherently curious person, IP gets me even more curious. My exposure to IP has genuinely made me more curious about both the trademark and patent information for the items I see. I’m eager to know whether there might be a patent for a technologically advanced spray on dress or for something more mundane like my phone case and its built-in card holder. I even think about the trademarked aspects of commonplace items like the Apple logo on my computer or the encircled siren on my Starbucks coffee cup. Recognizing these examples of IP in the real word excites me because it reminds me there are types of protected marks that do not require a STEM background.

Lack of Limitations of My Non-STEM Background

Although some areas of IP, such as patent prosecution which is the application process of obtaining a patent for an invention, require a STEM background, my legal writing course informed me that there are plenty of opportunities in IP that do not require a scientific background like trademark and copyright law. No one at Loyola has made me feel that my humanities background has put me at a disadvantage in the IP space. My English background and personal interests have fueled my appreciation of the more artistic applications of IP, like those in literature, music, and other arts. I’ve found just as the content of IP law can vary from science to art, so can the backgrounds of those who practice it. While my humanities background introduced me to IP, it propelled me to pursue this area of law in tandem with my initial interest in the legal profession and I cannot wait to see what that career will entail!

Maya Smith
Assistant Blogger
Loyola University Chicago School of Law, J.D. 2025