KK: Tell me your story of how you moved from the PhD into what you do now?

CG: Linguistics is not often thought of as a field with strong set of career options, either in academia or outside, unless you’re in the computational realm, which I was not.  I was doing theoretical linguistics, Chomskyan generative linguistics, and the writing was on the wall pretty early.

In 2008 I graduated from undergrad and directly went into a PhD program.  2008 was a very bad time to graduate from undergrad, as it turned out, but I had my little life raft of grad school. But it was really obvious that the tides were rising, the island was shrinking, and everyone was clawing at each other for the very few places that would remain. {laugh} I looked at people above me and how miserable they seemed, and I thought:  I don’t have the fight in me for this kind of life.

Fortunately my brother and my father both worked in tech, so that was always an option I knew existed. I saw how their lives were and they looked a lot better than what I was seeing in academia. Growing up I’d never explored programming, and through undergrad I stayed far away from it, but over time I came around and started playing with coding. I took every course I could in grad school that touched on computational work, even though it wasn’t my actual degree — statistics, computational methods for linguistics, things like that. I started to find it genuinely interesting. Actually, linguistics is a really good background for programming, especially theoretical linguistics, because programming languages and human languages are all variants of the same underlying system. So I threw myself into building my tech literacy over the latter half of my dissertation, and by the time I graduated in 2014 I’d already been doing some small programming projects.

KK: This really points to your entrepreneurialism right there which is unusual. What did your peers in grad school and your advisor think of this side project of yours?

CG: My advisors were wise to the realities on the ground and very supportive. The other grad students were more mixed: there’s something about being on a ship when someone starts inflating the life raft while everyone else is sipping wine {laugh}. Some were supportive, some were confused, but after a few years a lot of them were doing the same thing. I can think of at least two friends from grad school who’ve gone into tech, that same trajectory from linguistics into data analysis and then into other areas.

These are people with a lot of skills they don’t even realise they have. Once they finally do realise it, it tends to catch up with them.

KK: I want to ask you what skills you think PhD’s have.  But before I ask that I want to hear the rest of your story!

CG: So, I started doing side gigs, starting with data analysis projects, and that put me in a position to be working with usually either consultants or startups.

KK: Hang on, what did you do with the startups?

CG: They would hire me to add data analysis features to their software…

KK: I don’t think I know what data analysis means in your world.

CG: For example, one company I worked for was called Flaredown. They did chronic illness symptom tracking. You’d log your symptoms every day and the system would surface insights like, “Have you noticed your symptoms flare up every Monday?” My job was to write the tools that analysed that data. Largely exploratory data analysis.

KK: Did it require coding?

CG:  It required coding, but the code could then be wrapped into the program by the development team. I got more and more curious about what they were doing: how would I do that? I’d look over the developers’ shoulders, then go home and try it myself. Eventually I got comfortable enough to do it myself, and that’s where my career took me: straight-up software development, which I did for a fair few years.

KK:  Oh! I don’t think I knew that part! So you were making pretty decent money by then?

CG: Yeah, pretty decent money. The problem I found with software development was a disconnect. I enjoyed the intellectual challenge and it paid well, but my entire purpose had always been to focus on language, and now I was writing systems, for example, to help people schedule meeting room availability in government buildings. There was an itch I wasn’t scratching.

This was around the time of the pandemic, and there was an opportunity: a lot of people were at home and wanted things to do, and I wanted to do things {laugh}.  I wanted to use those linguistic muscles I hadn’t used for a few years. So I started doing informal courses online. These were linguistics courses, including one on language and thought, which was about how the language you speak shapes the thoughts you can think, which I just wrote about on Substack actually.

KK:  The great linguistic disciplinary question!  At least for anthropological linguists anyway… anthro was my area.

CG: Right! So there’s a lot of interesting research at the connection of linguistics and neuroscience, neurolinguistics. We were looking at the strong and weak Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and reviewing the evidence for that. So we had fun with that. My social media network at the time was half tech people, half academics — just the perfect mix. But the one course that really changed the trajectory for me was a course on Old English.

KK: Amazing.

CG: I put out a poll on Twitter — I called it the Dead Language Society, which is where my Substack got its name — and asked people to choose a language from among several historical languages I had some experience with. Which did they want to learn? They chose Old English.

I worked up a course, and alongside the traditional grammar and readings I started thinking about second language acquisition research. What if I combined Old English with the methods the research actually said would work (which no one had done before)? That became my book Osweald Bera, a story-based approach to learning Old English. And that’s what led me to the Ancient Language Institute. They heard I was working on the book, published it through their arm, and invited me to teach. I’ve been there ever since.

KK:  I’m curious, when you developed those courses did you build your own platform or did you use one of the pre-existing platforms for giving courses?

CG:  There was a group on Twitter called Hyperlink Academy, they had a little pandemic-era course platform they’d built themselves. They seemed like nice people so I messaged them one day asking if they were interested in anything to do with linguistics. They said, “Yes, come teach on our platform.” So I didn’t have to build it myself; they took care of all that.

KK: How much do you teach at the Ancient Language Institute now?

CG: Right now I’m teaching three courses, and I also do administrative work as Dean of Students.

KK: I actually don’t know who they are, the Ancient Language Institute.

CG: They are not from academia at all; it was a marketing professional named Ryan and a Latin teacher named Jonathan and, actually, Ryan was Jonathan’s Latin student. Jonathan taught using the same kinds of methods that I used to teach Old English which is how we got in touch. But way back even before COVID Jonathan was teaching Ryan and Ryan said, “You know, this method is so good but no one knows about it. We should try and spin something up to get more people into it.” And they did and it ended up becoming a steady ongoing business. It’s all online; they do summer immersion in person programs every year but the vast majority of it is online because the audience is mainly working professional or people who retired, but from all over the world.

KK: This is fascinating! So, if you don’t mind my asking the awkward question about money (I always talk about money because I just feel like you can’t talk about careers without talking about money) but is the Substack your main financial thing now or is it the teaching or is it a combination?

CG:  It’s the teaching and administrative work that I do with the Ancient Language Institute that’s my main source of income now. The Substack started in earnest when I was doing the promotion for my book. I realized that I’d benefit from having a platform to bring people to the book. At the time, I had a Substack with maybe a few hundred people on it, and I decided, as part of the marketing push for Osweald Bera, that I was going to write on it seriously. So I did and for some reason I hit on something that resonated with people!

KK:  I can tell by the comments!  I can’t believe the number of comments you get!

CG: Yeah me neither!!  And on the most obscure posts!  It’s amazing!  Every time I post something, I think, “surely this one is going to be the one that breaks them” {laugh} but no, they keep coming back! It’s really interesting how, if you get the framing right, even quite obscure topics can bring people in and get them to engage with the ideas.

KK:  Well you’re also really really good! I don’t know if you’re familiar with the Professor Is In but I’ve been running it for 16 years, and it’s an all online business and the challenge is, what question do you ask that draws people in what makes them feel seen and heard. I often think just from a business perspective… one of the reasons I was so impressed with you was because I’ve coached and worked with many many PhD’s who have said I want to start a small business like akin to mine or maybe something more akin to yours, and then I talk to them about what is it you want to communicate and the things they want to communicate are these obscurities that they’re obsessed with, and I’m like well have you looked if there’s a market for that and they’re like no. I feel like people skip the step of going from their own internal obsessions too what people out in the world actually want. And so, I feel like that’s something you do really well! You make it quite entertaining but without dumbing it down.

CG: I never want to dumb it down. I think there is always a way into anything. It’s just how much patience you bring, how many words you need. Something that’s interesting to me is probably interesting to a lot of people, if they can get a bridge. Teaching has really helped me build those bridges. When I’m teaching Beowulf, which I do fairly often, every time I teach it I get another ‘at bat,’ another attempt to show people why a particular section is interesting. Over the years you learn the angles that work. You can feel a bit like a comedian: you’ve got your routine, you know which joke lands where. The challenge is keeping it fresh, but if you really love the material, that’s not so hard. Those are the muscles that transfer most directly to writing, to what they call public linguistics.

KK:  So, what’s your favorite translation of Beowulf?

CG: It’s one by Liuzza. It’s not well known, not a literary translation per se. He’s an Anglo-Saxonist. What Liuzza’s does is it doesn’t get in the way: it gives you a really clear view of the poem as close as you can get in modern English. Everyone likes Heaney and I like Heaney too, but his Beowulf is its own thing. He’s a great poet who put his own twist on it, which can be distracting if what you want is the best substitute for reading the original. I always say it’s the best second translation to read.

KK: I’ve read a more recent one that was by a woman whose name I’m forgetting just now…

CG: Ohh, Maria Dahvana Headley!

KK: Yeah! That one! I really enjoyed that one, but I’m curious what you thought about it.

CG: It’s a very controversial one! {laugh} But I think it’s great: whatever you can do to get people interested in something. Sometimes it takes a bold translation!

KK: “Bro”! That’s the first word, right?

CG: The first word is “bro,” yeah! That’s why it’s known as the “Bro Translation” {laugh}. It’s a real accomplishment to take a text that’s been translated so many times and bring something new out of it in a way that speaks to a lot of people. I thought it was a real accomplishment!

KK:  I really enjoyed it because I love the gendered element, you know – the signaling of the masculinist ethos of the original so overtly was really effective.  I mean, without being a specialist being able to judge the accuracy or anything.  I just love the vibes.

CG:  And I think this is the thing with a poem like Beowulf: it’s a poem that you can read so many different times. The challenge is getting people to realize how deep it is. So whatever the first translation that does that is great, because the key is that it’s a poem you come back to. This is what I always tell students when we go through it in Old English, where it’s very challenging in many parts. I say, “Beowulf is going to be there with you for the rest of your life if you’ve been bitten by the bug…  which, if you’re in the third semester of taking an Old English class reading Beowulf, I suspect you have been!” {laugh} So, don’t feel you have to get everything on this reading.  There are new things I see every time. It’s endlessly rewarding, like Homer or Milton or Shakespeare, so give it the space to breathe and you’ll be rewarded.

KK: I love it! So, now that I know more about you, I’m actually more mystified now or even more impressed!  Because I honestly thought from that one Substack post that you titled something like, “who knew Old English was a growth industry”?

CG: “Etymology is a growth industry” {laugh}

KK:  Yeah that one! From that I thought your Substack is your primary thing, and I didn’t realize the teaching is actually your primary thing. So now I want to know, how do you manage your time, because your pieces are long and they’re very closely edited! They’re not off the cuff –  you even have like footnotes I think right –  how do you manage your time?? This is, by the way, something people ask me all the time about how they should manage their time as they try to balance all the demands of a transition out of academia.

CG: It’s not easy. When I started the Substack, it was just to have a platform to help the eventual sequel to the book! And then it’s grown of its own momentum. I do have an editor who is fantastic — she is ex-BBC — and she gives me wonderful notes and really helps me with framing, which is a huge asset. So it’s demanded its fair share of time, but that’s an investment I’ve been very happy to make. It helps that it’s fun, and in service to the mission that I’m trying to accomplish, which is to help people understand this language of ours in a deeper way. But, between teaching, writing, and administrative work, it’s something of balancing act. That’s the honest answer.

KK: I appreciate it!  Does the book sell enough to be an income source?

CG: Yes!

KK:  WOW!

CG:  I know, I know, it’s very strange! {laugh}  I mean, I couldn’t live off of it, but I like to think in terms of a portfolio strategy. A portfolio of elements that make up my living. So what that means, is the book is one element in the portfolio that required a lot of investment up front, but now it sells and I just get royalty cheques.

KK: Yeah!

CG: And that’s the lovely thing of writing books.  The Substack is its own element in the portfolio and the teaching is another. But I like to have different sources of income because it makes me… well, I feel like, having graduated at the time that I did in 2008 and seeing everyone I knew have such a hard time and then myself going through a transition from academia into industry, I sort of have these memories of … getting by on ramen, you know?

KK: Absolutely.

CG: I’m always like, what if it happens again.

KK: Sure, it’s trauma, it’s like PTSD.

CG:  I wouldn’t necessarily say PTSD, but it’s a bit of a scar from the experience of difficulty in those times. And so, I like to have income sources that are not entirely correlated, or not the “all of your eggs in one basket” syndrome.

KK: I think that’s very wise for people who are starting out to think about their transition.

CG: It’s like asking whether you’d put all your money in one company. Probably not, even if you thought it was the greatest company in the world. Your time is also an investment. If all your income comes from exactly the same source, everything is always on the line, and that makes every decision harder. Multiple income streams let you start prioritising more clearly. The danger is splitting your attention, but you choose the problems you want to deal with.

KK:  That is tremendous advice, just that little nugget right there!

But right now, I want to make an observation and then ask a question.  My observation is that you are remarkably –  or appear at least  – remarkably not conflicted about being a PhD working outside the academy. That is incredibly rare.  Is that accurate?  You’re at peace with it?

CG:  Now I am, yeah. For a few years after leaving, though, I wasn’t. Because I saw all these different people in my cohort moving on and doing different things in academia, and [wistfully] ohh….  There are some things you miss, right?

KK: Absolutely….

CG: But with time I found all of those things again, in different forms. It’s not all in one package, but it’s all there. It’s not a one-pot meal, it’s more like a…

KK: Like a traditional Japanese meal!

CG: Right, exactly! A One-pot meal versus a bento box, you know? {laugh}.  There’s nothing wrong with that; you just have to work a bit to find it.

KK:  I find the same thing –  I get to have all the joys of working with PhD’s and all the intellectual stimulation every day, and I also get to go all around the world giving talks which was the thing I loved about academia – the conferences and stuff  –  but I don’t have to do go to faculty meetings and I don’t have to grade!

CG: Or, like IRB forms… {laughs}

KK:  Exactly!  I mean there’s still things that are never replicated you know some delights of the academic job, but yeah no you can make up a lot of it. So my question is, if you were to distill your advice for some PhD who’s really still fairly heartbroken because they’re closer to that stage you were in years back—like, they really thought they wanted to be a professor but it’s not going to work out and they know they have to do something else, but the regular job market is shit too obviously… how would you advise them?

CG: My advice to someone in that position: it’s going to feel bad for a few years. Everyone I know who’s made this transition has gone through the same thing: friends who’ve gone from physics into data science, mathematics into software engineering. Each of them had a dark period even after they were employed and earning. They were either still pining for academia, or they wanted nothing to do with it at all.

KK:  The stages of grief  – the denial, the bargaining, anger, depression…

CG:  Yes! Until you eventually get to acceptance. But it’s totally nonlinear. So first, just accept that something like that is going to happen.

Then take an inventory of the skills you’ve acquired and realise how valuable they are — they just have different names. If you managed RAs, you understand project management. If you wrote grant applications — and you can write grants in the private sector too — you know how to present research to a specific audience in a compelling way. That’s marketing.

KK:  You know that’s actually how I teach grant writing! I really, literally say “this is PR and marketing,” but I never actually did it…

CG:  …the other way!

KK:  Yeah I never flipped it around!

CG: Yeah, it’s just that in academia you’re marketing to a very, very small audience.  These skills are transferable, but you haven’t had the vocabulary to talk about them, and you haven’t seen enough of the inside of companies to recognise them.

You also don’t know how bad it is out there. People who’ve been through academia have been beaten up by Reviewer 2, bruised by their committee, through a brutal job market, subjected to “more of a comment than a question” — all of it does a number on your self-esteem. So you slink away nursing your wounds, and when you think about the private sector you immediately think “I’m way down there in the rankings as an applicant.”

But that’s unlikely. In a lot of cases you are well above the level you need for many jobs. There are whole industries in which people are really not trying. {laugh} Think of your experience as a consumer trying to get service — it can be a disaster! Each of those experiences represents an opportunity for someone to do it better. You are likely better than the norm that’s currently operating.

My uncle once told me, “When you’re in undergrad surrounded by smart people, you think you’re the bottom of the barrel. Then you get into the working world and realise you’re not.” The same is true for PhDs. There’s no way out of that mindset except experience, so lean on friends who are already out there in industry, get a sense of how companies work, what skills are valued. A lot of it is just a mental transformation.

KK:  You’re saying exactly  – but much more eloquently – exactly what I spend my time saying in my talks! But it’s really hard to get it through.

So back to the portfolio thing, you might appreciate this:  I have a side hustle which is restoring and selling vintage rhinestone jewelry on eBay! It’s called Mad Bunny Vintage and I adore it; it’s my absolute joy, but it also very much feels like a part of a portfolio career like you spoke of. I’m 61 I don’t think I myself have lived trauma from financial disruptions, but my parents were depression kids and absolutely passed their trauma on to me, so I also have this thing of feeling like it could all collapse at any moment. So to have a tangible thing that I sell to actual people feels really good because having an entirely Internet based business feels a little scary.

CG:  Yes I agree and it’s good to hear someone else say it — it makes me feel like I’m not crazy.  Just the idea of maintaining something else that’s not correlated with other parts of your income. I mean, etymology is discretionary spending, right? {laugh} So the portfolio logic really does apply.

KK:  Well listen, on that note, I’ll tell you one other thing! My partner Kel is opening a bookstore! A brick and mortar bookstore a few blocks down the street. Taking it over from a guy who ran it for 35 years, a tiny little place.  It was already an alternative bookstore to a degree but it’s going to be called Outliers Books, and it’s going to be basically the queer, alternative abolitionist, anti racist bookstore in town, you know that whole thing. Kel has been running the Professor Is in business with me for about a decade now and we make decent money,  we could keep doing this all the way through retirement– we’d be OK. But she was like, I’m dying, I just can’t anymore… we’re in fascism, everything’s collapsing, the violence, the trauma is so overwhelming. And so she decided that she needs to be in a physical space seeing actual people and having a tangible books to mediate these conversations and build these community connections.  That’s how she’s going to survive this moment.

CG: That is really cool.

KK: Anyway, thank you so very much for your generosity in spending this time with me. You’ve been amazing, and I am really looking forward to posting this on the blog, and hopefully getting more people to your incredible Substack, and your book, and to learning Old English with you!

CG:  Thank you! It’s been fun!

*The O in Oswald is supposed to have a macron over it and did in the original Word mss of this interview; however, no matter how many different methods I tried to insert the macron into this WordPress version, it would not stick. I apologize for the inaccuracy.