Hey guys.

I want to go to grad school for Linguistics, Applied Linguistics, or TESOL.

I'm looking at some programs now and realizing how intense this app process really is. I want to go to somewhere good like Columbia, McGill, Harvard, Berkeley, Middlebury, etc....but they're all so nuts.

Does anybody know anything about this field and what schools might be worth looking into?

Does anybody have any general advice about applying for grad school?

my friend does that at Rutgers

do they have a good program? is it a close enough friend that i could email them and ask some questions?

I guess so. It all depends on who you want to work with and where you want to study ie SUNY Stony Brook may have a much better program than, say, Harvard. You have to do your research.

Major in Asian studies.

This Embecile's Shit Outta Luck

I guess 'imbecile' wouldn't fit in so why not change the spelling?

Make sure you are unique...on the essay, make some good shit up, a good story, so that you stand out.

BLAST!!! You've bested me again, Frew! But mark my words...I shall exact my revenge most swiftly and harshly!!! *insert convincingly maniacal laugh here*

Get your TESOL certificate to teach if you actually wanna get a job.

Im a psycholinguist, not a linguist- but certain areas of the fields are rather liquid. First, let me ask why you want to do linguistics? And second, what you expect to have as a job when you graduate (assuming you arent independently wealthy)

my girlfriend is working on a masters degree in spanish linguistics--she recommends checking out uc-davis.

i want to do reasearch on second language acquisition.

i want to teach english as a second language.

i just want to go further with languages in general.

i was looking at TESOL programs and I was reading that you could get a degree in Applied Linguistics and use that to teach English as a second language....so then I thought why not look further into linguistics and find something cooler.

I'm something of an amateur linguist and my current majors are Secondary Education and French, but I can speak Spanish, I read and write Armenian and Russian, and I can fake my way through German.

I don't know if i'm ready for the intenseness of say, the McGill Linguistics grad dept, but I could do applied linguistics.

I'm just wondering if i could get into a serious program with my background

Maybe some real-world experience first? I recommend you go teach ESL overseas, see firsthand how much it sucks, then change your discipline. And TAing a few hours a week does not equal 40+ of instruction.

Two cents in your skyrocket.

i think i would enjoy it...i'm going to go to school first and get the degrees and the experience.

and also, that's why i figure i should get a linguistics MA instead of just a teachong one....that way i can go into the linguistic field if i want and get a phd.

i'm trying to avoid painting myself into a corner here. i am going to go get that firsthand experience though.

and to go further on that point

the applied linguistics/tesol thing is like a fall back job option...what i'd really be interested in is research on code-switching and the emergence of what some people call "spanglish" in america but what i have been calling "neo anglo-spanish" like you hear on the radio or certain tvstations where people mix up thetwolanguages.

i'm really fascinated by how cultures collide and words get shared...it's nuts to me to read a French newspaper and see like 2% of the words be American/English ones.

do you have any advice for me in that regard? who studies this stuff? i need to talk to robert barsky, my advisor at school who writes chomsky biographies...he would know.

I confess that I know very little about degrees in linguistics (i.e. 'applied) that could readily translate into jobs teaching language (other than University positions). When you first said linguistics or TESOL- I wasnt sure if you knew what linguistics was (given the seemingly different paths those degrees would take you on)- however, it seems as though I was wrong.

Entrances into the best linguistics programs would most likely be PhD programs- not masters levels. You should look into that- of course you could leave after your Masters- and still have that degree- but in terms of acceptances- they generally admit people to PhD not just MA. (This is a rule that Im sure doesnt hold everywhere).

Your interest in code-switching could suggest Linguistics or psycholinguistics or numerous other disciplines- (See 'One Speaker, Two Languages: Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives on Code-Switching' Edited by Lesley Milroy & Pieter Muysken).

'spanglish' or other languages/dialects seems to suggest again, linguistics, psycholinguistics, or sociolinguistics.

If you are interested in code-switching with french - François Grosjean- at Neuchâtel University in Switzerland has done some relevant work I believe.

But my general advice to you would be: search the literature for aspects of research that interest you, find specific articles that you say to yourself "yes, this is what I want to do" then look up the authors and where they teach. Then apply to those programs. (Im not sure how your academic record is, but generally high standardized testing scores account for most of the variance in who gets into what programs).

I must say that university jobs in linguistics are rather sparse- my bias would be to do linguistics through psychology (i.e. psycholinguistics) where you could research and teach in a discipline that is usually one of the largest in a University (and therefore have more open hiring positions). But of course that means you would probably get stuck teaching more general psychology courses along with a couple of your specialized language based courses- however, the state of affairs is such that linguistics programs follow the trend of humanities- downsizing departments not growing them. Anyhow, thats all down the road.. Id say first figure out what you would want to do

any other questions, let me know