Hi everyone,
I am an MA student studying Linguistics at Boğaziçi University. In this humble guideline of mine I will talk about the process how I have come to the place where I am right now for the ones who would like to pursue a career as a linguist but confused about what to do. Don’t worry, I am still confused. So the first question to ask yourselves is are you ready to face the problem of finding an academic position as a linguist when you have your PhD because in Turkey Linguistics is not a field of study much appreciated and known, at least not as much as ELT. If you can say ‘I don’t care!’ like I did, you may continue reading.
Well, the senior year can be a real challenge with all the questions in mind ‘What will I be doing this time next year?’ I think you can be anywhere you want; you are capable of that. The real problem is to decide on which schools to apply, and have a back up plan. For example; I took the necessary examinations to find a job as a lecturer at a vakif university just in case I don’t get submitted to any MA programme I applied. At the same time, I kept track of the programme application deadlines, prepared the statement of purpose adaptable to any school with small changes, studied for the written exam of Boğaziçi University. Another issue is to decide whether you want to study abroad or in Turkey. Well, I would love to be in UK but Boğaziçi’s MA programme is well known as well and if you check the website you will see that there are people who did their PhD at Ivy League universities like Harvard and MIT but their MA is from Boğaziçi. Let’s assume that you decided to apply to Boğaziçi, made your online application in April and had your language and ALES (EA) score ready and came to the stage of the written exam.
I had millions of questions in my mind about what they would ask in the written exam. Do not undermine it. If you check the suggested readings part on bounlinguistics web page, you will see two introductory books on Linguistics. They are both available in the library of METU. A month of studying would be enough. Especially the parts on Phonetics, Phonology and Morphology are very important. They do not ask any detailed question on Syntax, plus if you have taken any Syntax courses from Martina Hoca it would be enough. The most important part is to get faster while figuring out morpho-phonological rules from the given data. So it would be a good idea trying to solve the problem sessions given in these books in a fast manner. In the exam you are given approximately 2 hours and a booklet of data taken from 4-5 different languages. The questions have sub parts like 1a, 1b…etc and they sometimes go till ‘f’. In addition to these questions, they ask you an essay question to see how you picture language knowledge in your mind. In other words, to see if you really understood the logic behind the Chomskian Generative Grammar or just memorized its definition.
Last year there were 25-30 people sitting in the exam room and only 13 people were able to make it to the next stage, which is the oral exam. In the oral exam, the questions they ask obviously differ from one another for every candidate. In general, they want you to name an area of linguistics that you want to study and what seems interesting to you about it. Now pay attention to this part, you should read materials and understand at least some part of them to be able to talk about this topic using the correct terminology. I almost messed up my interview because I used the term ‘scramble’ instead of ‘movement’. Luckily, it was a slip of tongue and I was able to show them that I knew the difference between the two. They do not expect you to know everything, but you should know the basics. They know that you cannot fully understand an article on linguistics, so do not act like you can otherwise they will pressure you by asking detailed questions. I did not tell them I tried to read some journals, but could not understand most of it and they never asked whether I was reading any articles. By the way, find a good reason why you like linguistics and a subfield of it, they ask that.
Last year 6 people out of 13 were submitted to the MA programme. 3 of us are studying our prep year with undergrads. This year I am trying to fill my gaps in the area of Phonology and Turkish Structure. I spend 13 hours/4 days at school. This is what will happen to you if you are admitted. I wish you all good luck. I hope I was able to make things clearer in your mind. I know it is easier to give up, but in the end it is worth it. If you have any further questions do not hesitate to send me a msg on Facebook.
P.S: Sorry about the grammar mistakes if I had any, I know they can be irritating (!)
Duygu Göksu, METU FLE 2014
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