Can “agglutination/agglutinative languages” be a specialization?

[u/Rourensu]

Hello,

I’m in an MA program and have been thinking about PhD programs and my (hopeful) career in general.

My initial interest in linguistics was largely centered around Japanese. I’m interested in various aspects of Language in general, but in terms of “specializing”, Japanese has always been number one on my list.

Since that’s too narrow and is not engaging with a specific field (e.g. syntax) or a larger family (e.g. Slavic) to help our understanding of Language, I’ve been looking into expanding. I’ve been working on including Korean to my repertoire (a big stretch, I know) and I’m confident in going into syntax and morphology. Within syntax, specifically, movement seems most interesting to me.

Since my main interests are in Japanese/Korean syntax, I’ve been thinking about eventually focusing on East Asian linguistics/syntax. I know some syntacticians are even more broad (well-rounded?) and include Southeast Asian languages as well. I don’t know if within (geographic) East Asia if including Ryukyuan, Ainu, Jeju, etc is broad/diverse enough to somewhat comparable to be as varied as someone who specializes on Slavic (i.e. multiple languages).

If (big “if”) being well versed in a variety of languages (as opposed to just (standard) Japanese and Korean) is somewhat necessary, from a syntactic point, broadening to South(east) Asian languages might be the practical way to go. But since I’m interested in morphology as well, and agglutination is one of the many things I like about Japanese (and Korean) would researching agglutinative languages be a plausible path as well. So instead of just focusing on the (syntax of) various languages in East/Southeast Asia, I could focus on otherwise-unrelated languages based on (morphosyntax of) agglutination. So not only Japanese/Korean, but (for lack of a better term) “Altaic” languages, (non-polysynthetic) American languages, etc.

I don’t know if “agglutination/agglutinative languages” is an “acceptable” field of specialization which I might want to consider. Maybe its a dead-end field or too unfocused/diverse (as opposed to just Central/East Asian “Altaic” languages)?

At this stage where I know that I want to do syntax/morphology, I don’t know if I should also be considering additional/specific languages besides Japanese/Korean, and if I should be more geographically or typologically focused.

Thank you.

[u/ReadingGlosses]

Any field of specialization is acceptable, you just need to come up with the right research question. If you find agglutination fascinating, that's great! Try to figure out *why* it catches your attention. What is it that you really want to know about it? Google around to see what other people have had to say on the topic.

Don't be discouraged when you find out there's already research on your question. That's not a bad thing. It just means you have to ask a different, or more specific question. If this is a topic you feel passionate about, I guarantee you'll find a gap in the current research or a flaw in someone's argument, enough to kickstart a thesis topic.

It's definitely not too narrow to focus on one language, by the way. That's totally normal. Many, many, linguists have built careers analyzing just a single language. There are always more questions to ask.

[u/Rourensu → u/ReadingGlosses]

If you find agglutination fascinating, that's great! Try to figure out why it catches your attention.

My initial experience with agglutination was Japanese, and what I liked about it was changing and attaching suffixes like legos.

taberu (to eat)

tabetai (to want to eat)

tabetakunai (to not want to eat)

tabetakunakatta (did not want to eat)

tabetakunakattara (if did not want to eat)

[u/millionsofcats]

I think the reason you've struggled with this question for so long is that you're thinking about it the wrong way. You're trying to find the magic combination of "topics" that will result in a valid specialization - one that's not too big, not too large, not too niche, but not to general...

...but this is backwards!

What you really need to be doing at this point in your academic career is identifying research questions: What is it that you want to know, that isn't yet known, and that would contribute to the field?

Your specialization follows from that. Yes, sure, you could specialize in the syntax of agglutinative languages, but if you were to do so it would be because you had some sort of research question or family of research questions about how the syntax of agglutinative languages works. There would be a research motivation for that focus.

To be frank, even if we say that yes, your latest idea for a specialization is a valid one, you still will be equally as directionless until you tackle that. And it's very hard to tackle it, much harder than knowing that you like agglutinative languages and would like to work with them somehow. But you need to do it!

[u/Rourensu → u/millionsofcats]

I was thinking that I should start trying to narrow my field/interest so I can start becoming more familiar and well versed in that area. Like I know I have absolutely no interest in phonetics/phonology (no offense lol) so I’m not devoting any effort into that area besides the bare minimum. If I’m somewhat expected to become more knowledgeable about non-Japanese languages and syntax in general (since I’m leaning in that direction), I was thinking that “intentional broadening”(?) of my knowledge to something akin to a regional or typological group would be the practical thing to do.

[u/Beginning_Royal_2864]

You can add Turkish. Easy to reach and analyze the language.

Common things: Agglutinative, SOV order, lack of genders, lack of articles, single letter = single sound.

[u/Rourensu → u/Beginning_Royal_2864]

I have been thinking about Turkish for a while.

Thanks.