How did you come to study your discipline?

[Roll Right]

I was just thinking about the last few questions here, what we study and why, and what would we study if we could do it again. Logically, the next question is how we came to study what we do study?

I kind of fell into sociology. I've always been interested in socialism, and while sociology and socialism are not inherently connected, Karl Marx is one of the intellectual giants in sociological cannon. In high school I spent a lot of time reading on it. Originally, I wanted to go into electrical engineering. My math wasn't the best, and I realized I really don't enjoy the physical sciences at all. I just thought the money would be good.

So I walked away from engineering and became interested in criminology. My undergrad didn't offer criminology so I majored in sociology, not being sure what sociology was. There was a concentration in crime, law and deviance, so that's where I thought I ought to be. After my first year I realized that everything I was so interested in during my high school years was intimately related to sociology. I became uninterested and a little bitter with criminology, no one listens to criminologists and the criminal justice system is so FUBAR that I couldn't stand to study it. While no one listens to sociologists (almost never), at least I won't feel as though I'm beating my head against a concrete wall.

Eventually I became good friends with a professor who studied terrorism and religion (mainly religion). He introduced me to a lot of paranormal studies, which led me to studies of transcendental experiences and phenomenological studies of monks and medicine men. Since then I've become extremely interested in conflict and neo-conflict theories which has led me to study religion from a material perspective. What classes worship what, and how do they express their faith??

[fuzzylogician]

The short answer to how I got to study linguistics is: by accident.

[Dr._Robotnik's_Shadow]

Originally I wanted to be an actress so after years of successful theater and some film acting I decided to major in film production so I could act in my own movies and learn some behind the scenes stuff as a back up plan. I ended up loving directing, screenwriting and later film history so now that's what I do. The acting bug is long gone but I still act in my own movies.

[captiv8ed]

Mine grabbed me and stalked me and wouldn't release me.

I took sociology my first quarter. I was in love. So happy. But I was hesitant to pursue an "impractical" degree. My mother-in-law got a degree in anthropology when she was about my age and then worked as an executive assistant all her working years, finally retiring in poverty at the age of 70. I did not want to follow this path. So, I grabbed onto all sorts of more practical paths: library science, corporate trainer, teacher, career advisor, lawyer, policy analyst. And yet I kept finding myself incredibly jealous when I would talk to someone who was doing sociology or anthropology. So I began to think maybe it was the right path for me.

Then one day I asked my mentor, "If you could play God, what career would you like to see me in?" She didn't answer at first, but then came back to it and said that she would love to see me as a sociologist. That was the first time I thought that I could actually go all the way with it. Up until then, I figured I would only be able to get a bachelor's and then have to apply it to a career. But with her confidence behind me, I realized I could try for the PhD and actually work directly in the field.

[jacib]

Mine grabbed me and stalked me and wouldn't release me.

I feel the same way. Literally, the first time I read the Bible itself was in liberal public high school during a class called "Biblical and Classical Lit", and when I saw "Abram" and "Sarai" for the first time, I thought they were a more accurate transcription of the traditional names. I was actually shocked when story twisted and Abram became Abraham! The thing had power, and I was really attracted to it. Why was it so important, and such. Everything I read about religion fascinated me and I ended up consuming massive amounts of information, on subjects ranging from First Century Heretics to Scientology, from True Pure Land Buddhism to YHWH and his Asherah. I grew up in a secular Jewish household (though we went to Humanistic Jewish Sunday school once a month) and at one point when I mentioned I was considering joining the Rabbinate, my father asked me why and then spent an hour trying to convince me that I should be a social worker instead. It's just the subject for me. It's what I do in my free time, it's what I want to talk about. My GPA in Religion is a full point higher than my GPA not in religion. However, the vagaries of studying religion at the graduate level has led me to want to study religion from the sociological side of the aisle.

Edited January 2, 2010 by jacib

[90sNickelodeon]

I came upon it by chance, actually. I landed a job at a university and really liked it. After making a list of my career-related and personal priorities, I realized that I wanted to work at a setting like a university. Imagine my surprise when studying university leadership was an actual discipline!

[psycholinguist]

I've always loved words, and in high school I got really interested in etymology. Somewhere along the way I noticed that one of the authors of one of my favourite books on wordplay and word-origins had multiple degrees in linguistics. Because I had no better ideas (I no longer wanted to study literature or engineering, which were earlier aims), I put it as my intended major on all of my university applications, figuring that I would actually end up changing my mind at least a half-dozen times about what to study. When I got to university, I found I wasn't thrilled by Linguistics 101, but it was only because of the professor, who really came across as if she had no idea what she was doing and didn't enjoy it much either. So (against what would have been the advice of my professors if they had realised it at the time), I dropped the course and switched into a class on minority languages instead. Which was awesome. As a result, I didn't once question my decision to major in linguistics. Okay, so I didn't realise I wanted to go to grad-school until I started my honours-thesis and became aware of how much I love language-research, but never mind. I figured it out.

[ColorlessGreen]

When I applied for college, I checked the box for "linguistics" under "intended major" on the form because I loved languages, and I was good at them, and I was confused about what "linguistics" meant. Don't ask me what I thought it was - just believe me when I say I was wrong. It may have been the best mistake I ever made.

I took my first linguistics class during my freshman year and I loved it. The teacher was great, the class was great, the textbook was great, and the people were great. When I entered college I had the over-ambitious idea that I would triple-major, but before I even got the grades for the semester, I decided to change my Spanish major to a minor so I could concentrate on linguistics. I kept taking linguistics classes, but I kept my Japanese major as well, even though I was already starting to think that I didn't want it. In the spring of my sophomore year, I took the highest-level Japanese language class that was offered and aced it. Unfortunately, I still needed 20 hours for the major, if I wanted to complete it, and I couldn't stand the idea of taking seven (7!) lit and culture classes, when I was only interested in the language. I realized I was in the wrong department, and I dropped my Japanese major in favor of a minor, which I already had more than enough credits for. My safety nets were gone. I was committed wholeheartedly to linguistics, and I loved it.

I had always been told I would make a good teacher, and I couldn't really imagine myself in a job where I wouldn't be learning something new every day, and so last year I made the decision to attend grad school and shoot for a job in academia. I signed up for the April GRE, made myself a list of possible schools, and told myself I would get everything done early (that didn't happen). This fall, I followed through on my decision to apply.

I think my parents were a bit surprised, but not too much. They've probably always thought I'd do something impractical and low-paying, although they might have been expecting something a bit more altruistic. I know they'll be really proud of me if I get into a program somewhere, though. It's nice to know I have people rooting for me.

[johndiligent]

The year I went to the university was the Year of the Double Cohort. For those outside of Canada, the Double Cohort happened when the province of Ontario got rid of Grade 13, meaning that the number of applicants effectively doubled, since Grades 12 and 13 were matriculated at the same time. Further to that, Canadian universities - ever out to increase their enrollments - let in way more students than they had ever accomodated before (or reasonably could).

Course selection was tough because there were so many students that if you didn't register immediately, pretty much every class you could take was closed. I'd gone to university in the hopes of studying English (including Film and Drama) since I wanted to be a filmmaker, but every single English course was closed. Every single Philosophy class was closed. Every single History class was closed. Everything that I'd gone to university interested in was closed. So I took the only Humanities discipline that was open: Classics. Even though at the time I had no idea what it was.

Of course, I ended up falling in love with it.

[psycholinguist]

Hehe!