Linguistics Major in college: A Decision

I'm not a Linguist but I know some, as I used to work for Dictaphone (now a part of Nuance Communications. They make voice recognition software).

I know that my former boss went to Indonesia for her graduate project.

Understanding the languages is one thing (and a difficult thing at that, I suspect), but you will eventually need to consider employment. Which, I suspect, is mainly either an industry such as the voice recognition field, or academia. Of course if you know something I don't, by all means spill, but one need not be a Linguistics major to learn Sanskrit, yes?

true, one can certainly learn language through other means than a linguistics degree. but studying the way people communicate through the most basic means of sounds and syllables and syntax, it's very fascinating, though I don't know all about the career possibilites other than voice recognition, and 2nglish as 2nd language teaching.

Linguistics has very little to do with learning a language. It is the "scientific" study of linguistic data under various headings like phonology, semantics and syntax. Sub-topics include perceptual psychology, acoustics, and computational modelling.

Precisely, the parts that most interest me. I would then use what I'd learned to improve my ability to learn languages. But the elements of what linguistics is, they at least seem to be fascinating and something that my brain comprehends. I'm a musician with a very sensitive ear, with any sound.
jobs though? besides voice recognition software, that i'm not interested in.

Ironically, the ability to "discriminate" sounds has little to do with modern linguistic theory since "redundancy" seems to be a feature of the data stream. Native languages appear to be learned "automatically" by exposure alone. Further languageacquisition may be impeded or otherwise by first language mapping mechanisms depending on the age and cultural conditioning of the learner. Job prospects based on a linguistics degree are more likely to come from experience with the logical analysis processes involved rather than the language content per se. In that respect it is no different to any other social science. If you specifically want employment speaking a foreign language, you would be wasting your time with linguistics.

Ironically, the ability to "discriminate" sounds has little to do with modern linguistic theory since "redundancy" appears to be a prevalent feature of the data stream . Native languages appear to be learned "automatically" by exposure alone. Further language acquisition may be impeded or otherwise by first language mapping mechanisms depending on the age and cultural conditioning of the learner. Job prospects based on a linguistics degree are more likely to come from experience with the logical analysis processes involved rather than the language content per se. In that respect it is no different to any other social science. If you specifically want employment speaking a foreign language, you would be wasting your time with linguistics.

I see, well I guess the trouble is the usual: I just don't exactly know what I'm looking to do. I can only think of lots of things at once it seems

The other side of it I'm entertaining is Environmental Studies and also Geography as a maj/min combo.
Traveling is something I will be doing.
As well as living and working in and around forests and mountains.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a cartographer, wierd pick in kindergarten, I know. I still do want to make maps, but that's mostly GIS nowadays, from what I hear. That's not exactly what I want to be doing for a living.

Hmm. I have a cartographer friend who is now retired. He's had an interesting career, in that he is also a landscape architect and for a long time has mapped flora and fauna of various areas in california and the western united states for his own interest.

I haven't talked to him often lately, and on those occasions not about cartography. He probably has opinions about the field.

Figuring out what you want to do can be a problem since we find out more about what we are really interested in as we age - I studied landscape architecture rather late, in my early forties, had never heard of such a thing when I was studying in my regular university years.

I like your second idea, but I'm biased towards that.

Well thanks for that, it's making me feel better about my possible future degrees'carreers,. I refuse to get a degree for the sake of it, or for the sake of just a job. Work plays a big role obviously, but it's my opinion that the possibilities are numerous enough where I can save two birds with one stone, so to speak. Ha.

Living a fulfilling life, helping spread positive vibes, while also making a living for me, and my lady and all other expenses.

Working in the environment and with genuine people, who tend to be in higher concentration in lower income areas, and indigenous, is my goal as of now.

Overall, to live as close to nature and be as self-reliant as possible. Self reliant as in me and a group of a few others who share this take on life.

So I guess not linguistics major in college. That was easy.

Ok, then!

no longer linguistics, more likely going to be anthro>archaeology.