



“This is Water,” is a speech in which the twentieth century author, David Foster Wallace, reveals the deeper meaning behind earning a liberal arts degree. Throughout his piece, Wallace insists that the process students have to undergo in order to master liberal arts ultimately grants them a better understanding of humanity and the active world around them, opposed to just teaching them shallow knowledge only so they can get a well paying job after graduation. Many people view earning a liberal arts degree as just another way to earn money and be, “successful,” in terms of material wealth, but Wallace strongly disagrees.  By looking at, “ This is Water,” it can be seen that Wallace uses the word experience repetitively to show his audience what lies below the surface of a liberal arts degree and the gifts it can truly give to someone. This is crucial to his speech because his use of the word experience helps make his piece more personal to the audience so they truly comprehend his point.

When Wallace uses the word experience, it personalizes what he is trying to say for the audience so they can better understand the meaning of a liberal arts degree. For example, Wallace explains, “learning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience” (Wallace, xiii). What Wallace is trying to explain is that within the education of liberal arts, a student doesn’t just learn how to analyze a book. They learn how to pay attention to certain details and the way things piece together to better their understanding. Wallace uses the word experience to explain to the audience, the skill of analyzation from a liberal arts education, goes beyond the classroom and carries on to people’s day to day lives. The word helps the audience connect the fact that liberal arts teaches people to observe life around them in a more effective way that can impact their own lives.

David Foster Wallace also uses the word experience to explain the meaningful lessons that liberal arts offers when he says, “It’s the automatic way that I experience the boring, frustrating, crowded parts of adult life when I’m operating on the automatic unconscious belief that I am the center of the world, and that my immediate needs and feelings are what should determine the world’s priorities. The thing is, that of course, there are totally different ways to think about these situations” (Wallace, xv). What Wallace means by this, is that naturally, humans view themselves as the center of the world because no one’s feelings or thoughts are more immediate than one’s self. One meaningful lesson that can be taught through liberal arts, is the realization that the world is not all about one’s self, and that one’s self is a working part of the world; a bigger picture. As mentioned earlier, liberal arts education can teach someone that there are many different ways to analyze situations.  By using the word experience, Wallace makes his explanation more real to the audience and explains that there are different and often more positive ways to view situations which can help better someone’s, or in this case his own life. It helps push people outside their comfort zones and understand for the better. With this kind of skill, a person can analyze a situation that appears negative to them, and turn it into a positive one because they have the ability to see how that situation is beneficial to the world and not just themselves. An example of this, could be someone who stuck at a stop light. That person could chose to be frustrated because maybe they are in a hurry to get somewhere, or that person could chose to be thankful for the stop light because without it, there could be a deadly car accident waiting to happen. 

Lastly, Wallace also explains how liberal arts teaches students to search for deeper meanings. With this being said, another example of Wallace’s repetitive use of the word experience is when he exclaims, “But if you really learn how to pay attention, then you will know there are other options. It will really be within your power to experience a crowded, hot, slow, consumer-hell type situation as not only meaningful, but sacred, on fire with the same force that made the stars:love, fellowship, the mystical oneness of things deep down” (Wallace, xv). In this quote, Wallace reiterates the fact that he believes a liberal arts education can help improve someone’s life in ways other than gaining material items and money through a job. He believes it can help a person have a better grasp on the way human nature works and can help them to behold the world in a more positive way. Yet again, he uses the word experience to personalize his message to the audience and describes the fact one can learn how to control his or her own experiences. If a person thinks in the way that liberal arts teaches them to, they can turn their own negative experiences to something drastically more meaningful which makes liberal arts a very powerful tool in education and everyday life.

 In conclusion, David Foster Wallace uses the word experience multiple times to help personalize his message about the true meaning of a liberal arts education. In his speech, he discusses both his own experiences, and everyone else’s daily experiences. He claims that by applying the way liberal arts teaches you how think, a person’s life can become immensely improved. He also discusses how people have the tendency to view themselves as the center of the universe, but by applying skills from liberal arts, students can train themselves to view the world from the perspectives of other people instead of only their own. Wallace’s use of the word experience brings awareness to the fact that people are in control of the way they perceive situations all from the skills learned with a liberal arts education, having a great impact on their lives. 


