Getting Involved in Research

As a top research university, MSU strongly supports undergraduate research, and the linguistics program is no exception. Majors are required to do at least one research project as their senior thesis, but majors and non-majors alike are encouraged to get involved. This is by far the best way to find out if a career in linguistic research (or scientific research in general) is right for you, and in any case you will be able to list any work you do on your resume/CV, along with any presentations and publications that result from your work.

Joining a Lab

Linguistics and linguistics-related labs at MSU include:

• Language Acquisition Lab

• Sociolinguistics Lab

• EEG Lab (Neurolinguistics)

• Speech Perception-Production Lab

• MSU Semantics Group

All of these labs accept undergraduates as research assistants and do not require you to have taken a class in that subject area; contact the head of the lab to see if there is room for you to join. Whether or not you are particularly interested in experimental linguistics, working in a lab is a great way to get an insider's view on how scientific research is done.

Labs typically have multiple projects going on. As an undergraduate research assistant, you will most likely start by helping with a professor or graduate student's project, but if you think of a project of your own (either before or after joining) you will usually be able to work on that while receiving guidance and feedback from your lab members.

You will not necessarily be paid for any work you do, but you can apply for funding from various sources (see below) or your lab may already have some funding that they can allocate to you.

Independent Research Projects

If you're interested in an area of linguistics other than those covered by the labs at MSU, you are not necessarily out of luck. Most of the linguistics faculty are happy to work with undergraduates if you ask.

Even if you don't know yet what specifically you want to do, if you at least have a topic you want to study then they will be able to start you off by giving suggestions for books and articles to read in order to learn about unsolved problems in that area. Once you come up with an idea, your professor will be able to tell you whether you are on to something and how difficult they think it will be to pursue, and give you further direction if you decide to go for it. Often, professors already have ideas for various projects they would like to do if they had the time, and simply need someone able and willing to help!

Funding for Undergraduate Research

MSU linguistics majors (and other majors in Arts and Letters) can have a faculty adviser apply for funding through the College of Arts and Letters Undergraduate Research Initiative (CAL-URI). Students in the Honors College can also apply for various scholarships. There are probably many other viable sources of funding within and outside of MSU.

Presenting your Research

Once your research is underway, you may consider submitting an abstract (=overview) of your project to a conference. When you apply, you will be able to request either a poster presentation or an oral presentation (typically, oral presentations are more competitive).

Although it can be difficult for undergrads to get accepted to major conferences (it takes time and several tries to come up with a project that is sufficiently interesting and important), there are several linguistics conferences specifically for undergrads, including MSU's own MSULC and GLEEFUL, which are held in April. MSU undergrads also make a showing at various "real" linguistics conferences both in the U.S. and abroad.

At the very least, MSU students should apply to MSULC or GLEEFUL (or both, if you're working on several projects). You should also present your research at the University Undergraduate Research and Arts Forum (UURAF), which accepts all applicants, in order to represent the field of linguistics. You can even present your work several times, using the feedback from one conference to improve your work (or at least your presentation) for the next one.

This page originally written by Kenneth Hanson (class of 2014). Last updated 12/30/2013.