I have a BA in Linguistics and I want to get my Master’s, but I am undecided in whether to get it in Computational Linguistics or Computer Science. I have been researching trying to get a feel of which would be beneficial, but unfortunately I do not know anyone that works as a Computational Linguist and my undergrad school did not have anyone for me to speak to about it.
Is there anyone that is working in the Computational Linguistic field or planning to work in the field have any input?
I basically got my BA in 2.5 years because I entered with a lot of credit from high school and I never had the same teacher twice, so I am nervous about asking for a letter of recommendation which is another problem.
Also, what kind of internships, if any, did you participate in? I am in South Florida and most places want those that are fluent in Spanish and English and despite majoring in Linguistics with a concentration and minor in Spanish, my focus was not to become fluent in the language, but rather discourse analysis (phonology, morphology, syntax, etc.).
I am so flustered trying to sort everything out and I would greatly appreciate any kind of advice given. It might be cliche, but my family is from a country where the majority of people did not go to college and my parents were not the exception so this entire process is difficult because I don’t have anyone that can answers all these questions that I have.
First, I’d go for a doctorate rather than a masters. You will want to look for funded positions which will cost you zero. Master’s degrees are usually full pay and that can get expensive. I’d expand my search to the entire country or even internationally.
CS is going to get you a lot more flexibility. If you are not thinking about a linguistic academic career CS is a better route. GT has a great on-line program where you can get a master’s for under $10K.
It depends on what you want to do. Instead of working forwards (“I want a master’s degree and I need to choose between two fields”), work backwards (“I want to be a _, and in order to do that, I need an MS in _.”) What do you want to be? When you look at job ads, the ones that sound like dream jobs to you - what credentials do they require? Look around at people on LinkedIn who hold jobs that sound amazing to you. What kind of degree do they have?
If you don’t know the answers to these questions yet - or don’t really know what a dream job looks like yet - don’t go to graduate school yet. Go work for a few years and figure out what you want to do.
I would not, unless I was sure that I wanted a research career - either as a university professor or a researcher at a think tank or a private company. Master’s degrees do make you pay - usually - but saving money in theory is really not a good reason to go after a PhD, in my opinion. They’re completely different degrees with different goals.