27/05/2026
/// [The Curse of Knowledge] is a cognitive bias where you assume that other people have the same kind of specialized knowledge that you do. Once you know something, it’s hard to remember what it felt like not to know it. We forget that we had to learn what a language family is, or even what it means for languages to be related.
This causes two problems: First, it hinders your ability to communicate ideas to others. Second, it means you’re very likely to overlook or underappreciate just how much you’ve learned, because you’re not aware of it.
[...] I think, genuinely, that a linguistics degree is the most useful, versatile, and generally enlightening degree that you can get at university. Allow me to convince you:
For starters, linguistics makes you aware of cognitive bias. You know that linguistic discrimination is one of the last bastions of socially acceptable discrimination only because the majority of people are largely unaware of it. You understand how it affects hiring decisions and dynamics in the workplace. You’re much better prepared for how to think about and address these issues.
Linguistics also makes you a better communicator. You know that language is often less about what is said and more about what is implied or accomplished with speech—Gricean maxims, and the difference between semantics and pragmatics.
[...] Finally, because it’s such an interdisciplinary field, linguistics exposes you to theoretical paradigms and methodologies from a huge array of different fields.
[...] That breadth of knowledge benefits you tremendously because real insight comes from making connections across domains.
[...] You’ve been given a slew of different frameworks for understanding the world. You’ve been taught to think in systems. You know that it’s not enough to find a few similar-sounding words in different languages to call them related, and that you have to look for systematic patterns instead. You’ve come to appreciate the fact that bottom-up, emergent systems like grammar function just fine without top-down, authoritarian oversight. You know that there are often competing pressures at work in any given system. Linguistic relativity (the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis) tells us that language influences the way we think, but we also know that language is shaped by how it’s used. There are counterbalancing processes at work. And you’ll think about that every time someone makes a bold, absolutist claim in a field you know nothing about. It raises a red flag because you know that the world is more complicated than that.
[...] So I hope I’ve convinced you that your linguistics degree is more valuable than you realized, and that you are more knowledgeable than you maybe appreciated. It’s easy to take for granted how much we’ve learned in life and just how far we’ve come. You’re already suffering from the Curse of Knowledge!
[...] This talk is about linguistics, but also not about linguistics. It’s about taking the time to appreciate how far you’ve come and what you’re capable of. It’s about reminding you that what makes you capable of making an impact in the world isn’t your specific skillset or technical expertise, but the fact that you sought out different ways of seeing the world. And I think there’s an important lesson in that. ///
Inspiring words for linguistics majors
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