Is it misleading: astrophysics vs astronomy
A friend told me today they decided to major in astrophysics, which confused me because I didn’t think that major was offered at our university. We kept talking about it where they repeatedly kept using that same term and eventually showed me their schedule, where I noticed some of their classes were astronomy courses. That made me realize their official major is astronomy. Perhaps they wanted to make their degree sound more impressive? It would be something they could care about but not too certain.
I know that at some universities the undergraduate degree is called astrophysics, while at ours it’s astronomy, even though students take astrophysics courses. I believe our university does have specializations for this particular major, which affects the choices for upper-level courses, including astrophysics, astronomy - data science, and astronomy - physical sciences.
So, is it accurate or generally accepted for someone to describe themselves as an astrophysics major if their official major is astronomy? And what about after graduating when it comes to jobs and whatnot where they’ll have a diploma for astronomy?