Career Options
Like many other majors offered in colleges and universities, Linguistics (as a field of study) is not a direct path to a specific career in the way that say a major in Accounting or Electrical Engineering might be considered. People who choose to study linguistics often do so with the intention of going into a specific career path, such as work in law, psychology, computer and information science, anthropology and sociology, to name a few fields and professions where linguistic training is particularly applicable. Many majors opt for a career in teaching, especially teaching a language to non-native speakers either here in the United States or in other countries (see "Teaching Abroad"). Other linguistic majors are not certain where their love of analyzing language fits in with other possible career paths.
The Linguist List has put together a helpful and detailed FAQ on linguistics as a career. Additionally, several linguistic programs in the US and in other countries as well as university career centers have put together excellent discussions in answer to the question:
Check out this small sampling:
- The College of William and Mary - Dept of Linguistics (with an article from Anthropology News)
- Rutgers University - Career Services
- The University of California at Riverside - Career Center
- The University of Georgia - Career Center
- The University of Melbourne (Australia) - Dept of Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
- The University of New Brunswick (Canada) - Counseling Services
- The University of North Carolina at Greensboro - Career Center
- The University of Sydney, Australia - Dept of Linguistics
If you still want more information, try your own search using one of these search engines: