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[tahnan]

There's a question that linguists get all the time after they tell someone they're a linguist, which is, "How many languages do you speak?" It's an intensely frustrating question, because it misses much of the point of the work a linguist does.

Similarly, I know that friends who have masters' degrees in children's literature dread questions about whether that means that they're writing a children's book. (Also, nearly any question that mentions Harry Potter.)

So I ask my readers, out of curiosity. When you tell people something fundamental about who you are or what you do ("I'm a linguist"; "I have a Masters' in Children's Literature"; "I'm from Serbia"; "I have a wooden leg"; "I brew beer"; or what have you), what question is it that you dread getting in return, but which seems to be fairly inevitable?

Comments

[qaqaq.livejournal.com]

"Oh, you must be really smart" and its variant, "Oh, you must know a lot of words!" are both pretty common. I still haven't figured out how to answer either one well.

Frankly, I try to avoid the conversation entirely because I'm tired of all of the standards: Which do you write first, the words or the clues? Do you use a computer? I'm no good at them myself, but my uncle Harold solves it every day...