Taylor Roberts-Sampson (CC ‘20, UCLA Law ‘23) spoke to us about her linguistics studies, law school experience, and current work as an attorney. Taylor gave this interview in her personal capacity.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Can you tell us a little about yourself?
I grew up on the East Coast outside of Philadelphia. I went to Columbia for undergrad because I wanted to go to the big city. And I got to school, and I had no idea what I wanted to study, but I took Intro to Language & Culture with Professor Mara Green who teaches at Barnard, and I was really interested in linguistics and how it impacts communities and cultures, and how people communicate. And from there, I took a million other linguistics classes. I took Professor Landman’s Field Methods class, where we did fieldwork for the Dioula language; that was a really cool experience. I TA’d for Professor McWhorter. I would say I was pretty involved and interested in language, specifically how it impacts culture, community, and people, and how it is a living thing that changes very often. And that’s also what I wrote my thesis on [on up-and-coming gender-neutral and gender-inclusive pronouns in Spanish, French, Hebrew, and English]. And then I decided to go to law school and asked a lot of people a lot of questions about that. Some people thought I was a little crazy, but I saw a connection and wanted to pursue it. And now I spend a lot of time thinking about language and what language means in the context of law.
What was your most memorable moment in a class at Columbia?
The first thing that comes to mind is just a very vivid experience of sitting in Professor McWhorter’s History of English and realizing how the English language was created—where it comes from and how complicated it is. Just realizing, ‘well, I don’t even know where the language that I speak comes from’ was kind of a crazy experience. And then also getting to study Black English and see myself represented in classes and discuss code-switching—these were some of the most impactful things I learned. They gave me the tools and words to talk about things that I had already experienced. I think the top three [classes] for me, if I had to pick, the ones that stick with me the most are Phonetics & Phonology, History of English, and Mara Green’s Introduction to Language & Culture.
What specifically influenced you to go to law school?
I was thinking about what jobs would interest me, where I could use the skills that I had learned in undergrad and also pursue some of the things that I really care about. And that’s what led me to law school. I definitely thought about getting a PhD in linguistics and staying down that path—and I still think about it, maybe I’ll do it one day. But I wanted to feel like I was applying what I had learned a lot, and I wanted to feel like I was meeting with clients every day and involved in shaping how society is working and understanding more about how the legal system exists.
What skills from your linguistics degree have you found apply to your work?
I thought about it as a new language that I could learn, a new thing that I could go out and study and figure out how it works and how it functions. A big thing that I think people struggle with in law school is that you can’t just read a statute and expect it to mean what you think it should mean. You have to cross-reference all these different things to figure out what it actually means. To me, that was very similar to Phonetics & Phonology, taking all the little pieces of the words and figuring out what the actual word means. To be able to take one problem set and then apply it to new cases is very similar to analogizing arguments and cases. So, to be able to take one case that’s written out and that has certain facts and then apply it to an argument that I’m writing to the court, it feels a lot like applying a problem set to try to decipher a language.
There aren’t a lot of linguistics students in law school or in the legal field. One of the questions that I got during all of my law school interviews was ‘what, what are you doing, what’s going on here?’ But people were genuinely really interested, and it comes up pretty often with my colleagues, because I think as linguistic students we are taught to pay attention to details and context all the time. And that’s like, everything that you need for the law—that’s the exact skill set that you need to be a good lawyer.
I’ll also say that interpreting and translating are a huge part of the legal field — a lot of the best legal interpreters are also lawyers. Being able to work with clients in the languages that they speak and having that connection is really valuable. So, you know, Columbia Linguistics makes you learn another language as part of your major, and that can be really useful.
How does your experience from the Field Methods class inform your work?
In the same way that in Field Methods, the speaker is the expert of the language, and we are the expert of the linguistic backdrop, as lawyers, we are the expert in the law, but our clients are the expert in their own lives, their own stories, and their own needs. And so it’s very much a collaborative, teamwork process, especially when we’re doing direct client work, where the client is the expert in their life. They know what sort of paths—immigration paths—are going to be best for them. They know the facts of their own life—when they came to the United States, where they’ve lived, what their personal story is. I’m making sure that they feel comfortable with the process because ultimately, it’s their life, and this is a service for them.
Also, with immigration pro bono specifically, it can be really challenging because everything is really charged, and the questions and things that you’re asking about and talking about are some very difficult parts of people’s lives and stories. And so there’s also just a level of humanity to it, where ultimately it’s a conversation. You need to be able to build rapport and talk to the client and make sure that you get to know them as an actual person. The speaker that I worked with in Field Methods, we chatted at the beginning of our meetings. We were friends by the end of it. And so I think in the same way, if you’re going to be asking personal questions and trying to help your clients on their journey, you have to build that kind of relationship with them.
What’s your favorite part of where you work now?
I really like getting to finish a case and see a resolution happen. A resolution can look different depending on what the client wants and is looking for. I like that we get to get creative with that. I like that not all of our solutions are like you win a jury trial, but for some of them, you settle or you get the type of injunctive relief, like, ‘you can’t do this harmful practice that you were doing’—getting wins like that are also really important. In terms of my own work, I really enjoy working with my colleagues and solving problems on a team. I never imagined a job where I would have to work by myself, and I’m really thankful that that’s not the job that I have, because I definitely work better with others.
Do you have any advice for students in linguistics (or otherwise) considering law school?
I would definitely advise you to talk to some lawyers. I did that, and I wish I had done even more of that. There are a lot of different ways that you can use a law degree and there are a lot of different things you could be doing and getting a sense of whether you would actually be interested in doing those things is really important, because it is a professional school, which means that at the end, you are going to be an attorney, and I don’t think I necessarily appreciated that in full.
I would also say don’t feel rushed to go. It will always be there. You can go one year out, or you can go four years out. I have friends who have had full careers before going to law school, so it’s not a thing that you must do right away. Law school is a really great experience, and I think that it’s even more great if you are ready for it. I didn’t take any time off between law school and undergrad, but that is because of COVID, and I think that it is beneficial to take a year off in between, or to consider if you would want that. In law school, you work every summer. You work a job, and that’s part of the apprenticeship aspect of law school, and that’s a really great experience. But it does mean that when you start law school, you start working full-time. You do law school, then you graduate, then you take the bar, and then you have to do the job. So think about that in advance, and consider taking a really nice break before you do that. Travel, go learn a new language—we, as linguistics majors, all love that! Work at a coffee shop, just do life things. And also, see all of the experiences that you’re doing as something that could enrich your experience in law school.
You also can do it right after undergrad—I was fine, it was fine. Columbia prepared me very well for law school. The coursework is challenging, but it is not any more challenging than anything that you have dealt with already. Law school sounds really big and really scary, and it is. It is hard. And it is a big deal to go to law school. But it also is just a school, like any other grad school in a lot of ways, and it’s a very attainable thing to do.
And you don’t have to change who you are or what you’re interested in in order to do it. I don’t think that you have to have a bunch of legal internships in your summers of undergrad to get into law school. I definitely did not do any legal internships or anything– literally anything– law-related in undergrad. And I was fine, and most of my friends didn’t either. And so I would say, it’s okay to pursue what you’re interested in. You should pursue what you’re interested in undergrad and in the years leading up to law school. I think that people who have more diverse interests and experiences make for better lawyers, and people who’ve gotten to law school through different paths often have really rich and amazing experiences to contribute to their practice. And so I definitely think that law firms are looking for that. And it really helps to have other academic pursuits and interests outside of just the legal field. I was asked about linguistics in my law school interviews. I was also asked about linguistics in my law firm interviews. So it’s something that still comes up in my work. It definitely was a very valuable path for me, in addition to being something that I am really interested in.
Is there anything else you would like to add?
I would definitely say to pay attention to the laws and how they’re changing. This is a very important and concerning time for immigration law. And we are all tracking it very closely, and it’s changing every day. So definitely pay attention to it.
