More future musings

I can't help but daydream. I justify it, because at the end of the line, it's a real concern. It's fun to think about, but the question remains: what am I gonna do?

I break it up into steps because it's easier to think in small chunks. So first thing's first, what could I do with an Associate's degree of Liberal Arts? Jack. That's a pretty easy one to sum up. I'm doing it first because it's cheap.

What could I do with a Bachelor's degree? Regardless of what it's in, I could go teach English in Japan. That's the only requirement to do that-- you don't need any sort of teaching degree or experience, or any relevant field of study. Just a Bachelor's. In my case, I know what my degree will be in (say it with me, you should all know it well by now)-- Japanese/Linguistics double major, Psych minor. I don't know that I've said it straight out in this blog or not, but I'm set on that Psych minor now. With this whole thing, I'm seeing a lot of low-level research stuff (such as "research assistant") on the Linguistics side and "Windows System Administrator" on the Japanese.

Other options at this level of education included governmental or military work. In the Army or the Marines, I'd be doing "cryptologic linguistics". Gov't side? FBI, baby. Contract Linguist/Monitor/Tester, or even Special Agent Linguist. I think the FBI jobs sound the most exciting, even the contract jobs. That would be such an interesting experience. Some contract linguists are offered full-time positions as Specialists, which actually only require a high school diploma. I think the Special Agent positions are where the Bachelor's requirement comes in, but I threw it all together here anyway.

At the Master's level, things open up. All of the previous stuff at a marginally higher pay, full-blown research gigs, and teaching at the undergraduate level. After lamenting long enough about how I just wanted to spend my life learning instead of working, the words of my professors started to sink in. At the graduate level, you can start doing real, hardcore research. For a -living-. It often entails working through a university, but hey, if it works, I'd do it.

My mom said "I thought you didn't want to teach." I went into Eastern the first time for Music Education (for the very first of several majors I declared), which would have meant K-12. I never made the distinction between teaching there and teaching at a college. I -like- college. I hated high school. The big difference is the atmosphere. I wasn't in Redford Union schools to learn, I was there because I was legally required to do so, and I only graduated from their high school because employers like diplomas better than GED's. But people at college tend to have more of a drive, more of a reason than just "I have to." I WANT to go. I could work a regular or low-key job, but I want to learn instead.

I've looked into the "where" of my graduate studies, and it's really open. There are so many schools, I wouldn't think I'd have a hard time getting where I wanted. Most of them offer an MA in Linguistics, but there are a couple places that offer an MA in Cognitive Linguistics, which is what I would prefer. Prospective schools include; U of C Berkeley, where one of the major names in cognitive linguistics (George Lakoff) teaches, Case Western Reserve, which is my main pick, since it's close, and the degree is actually Cognitive Linguists (Berkeley is just Linguistics), and tied for distant third are Bangor University (again, Cognitive Linguistics, but it's over the pond) and Brown (just because it's Ivy League). If all else failed, I'd just do what all my other friends are and hit up Eastern for an MA in Linguistics.

I said once that the Master's was purely wishful thinking. But in my mind, I'm formulating everything so that maybe even a doctorate wouldn't be out of the question. In the meantime, I gotta wake up in eight hours and do this fucking Intermediate Algebra class.....

Easy to get wrapped up in theory.

Sean