Underwater basket weaving is an idiom referring in a negative way to supposedly useless or absurd college or university courses, and often generally to refer to a perceived decline in educational standards. The term also serves as an intentionally humorous generic answer to questions about an academic degree. It is also used to humorously refer to any non-academic elective course, specifically one that does not count towards any graduation requirements.
Possible origin of the phrase
In weaving willow baskets, a trough of water is needed in which to soak the dried willow rods. They are then left to stand until pliable and ready to be used in weaving. The weaving is, however, not done under water. An issue of The American Philatelist from 1956 refers to an Alaskan village where "Underwater basket weaving is the principal industry of the employables among the 94 Eskimos here. By way of explanation - the native reeds used in this form of basketry are soaked in water and the weavers create their handiwork with their hands and raw materials completely submerged in water throughout the process of manufacture".
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Early use
The phrase in its pejorative sense has been used since at least the mid-1950s. In a letter to the editor of the Los Angeles Times in 1956, a correspondent bemoaned an alleged decline in academic standards among college football programs and mentioned "majoring in underwater basket weaving, or the preparation and serving of smorgasbord, or, particularly at Berkeley, the combined course of anatomy and panty-raiding". The following year, an article in the National Review mentioned that "the bored students in the educationists' courses call those dreary subjects 'underwater basket-weaving courses'", and another year on a newspaper column noted that "One seaside university is bowing to the stern educational demands of the times by eliminating its popular course in underwater basket weaving". An article in the Daily Collegian at Penn State University in 1961 refers to a parody in which "a 'typical' Miami coed majoring in underwater basketweaving was interviewed". An article from 1976 refers to football players so dumb that they had to take underwater basket weaving, and another 1976 article refers to underwater basket-weaving as "an old old family joke".
Notable uses
Some of the boys she knew from college were trying to dodge the draft by taking graduate courses, "underwater basketweaving and things like that," as Vonda contemptuously put it.
The phrase was used during the Vietnam War era to describe the sort of major that many young men who would otherwise not have entered college undertook to escape the draft. US Senator Gordon L. Allott referred in 1968 to "the situation that we were in after World War II where we had universities setting up courses in underwater basketweaving, and all this sort of thing". Senator Robert Byrd used the phrase in 1969 when questioning the use of funds to offer professional training to Cuban refugees. The University of Portsmouth, UK, has a joke syllabus for underwater basket weaving on the Technology faculty pages, and another joke syllabus proposal was posted by a University of Central Arkansas student magazine.
US Punk band NOFX referred to an underwater basket weaving course in their song "Anarchy Camp".
Linkedin adopted "skill endorsement" in 2012, and in response to the arbitrary nature of those skill attributions, some LinkedIn participants began to list "Advanced Underwater Basket Weaving" as a skill, thereby exercising some control over their online profile.
As a taught course
Since 1980, Reed College in Portland, Oregon has offered an underwater basket weaving class during Paideia, its festival of learning that offers informal, non-credit courses.
The Student Resource Center at the University of Arizona offered a submerged snorkeling basket-weaving course in spring 1998. In early 2009, a Rutgers University scuba diving instructor offered a one-off course. Underwater Basket Weaving is a trademark of the US Scuba Center Inc., which offers a specialty class designed to improve or more fully enjoy diving skills from which participants can "take home a memorable souvenir."
As an April Fools joke, Coursera offered an online course on underwater basketweaving as of April 1, 2013. The class was supposed to "consist of short lecture and demonstration videos, between 8 and 10 minutes in length, short quizzes, and practical weaving exercises." However, the joke is seen by some as being disrespectful of indigenous cultures, and the joke designer issued an apology which was posted on the Coursera class page for "Aboriginal Worldviews and Education." The apology read, in part, "By posting the course and video, we were not intending to be disrespectful to indigenous cultures, and we sincerely apologize to anyone we offended by the content of our video."
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