ooh, I feel villainous

For those of you who don't know already, I'm back in school, hoping to start on a second master's degree in linguistics (a field I've been fascinated by for years, albeit from a distance). I'm currently just taking two classes: a graduate intro-level "Fundamentals of Linguistics" class, and "Sociolinguistics," aka "Language and Culture," which is a bit like anthropology but specifically as it relates to languages and speech use.

Anyway, one of my classmates just told me she sees me as the "future arch-nemesis" of our sociolinguistics professor.

What does that even mean? This friend appears to like me, so I don't think it's that I'm scary or mean. (Well, I might BE both those things, but I don't think that's what she was saying here, anyway.) And it's not that the professor reviles me or anything; she manages to appear to like everyone in the class (more kudos to her!)

I think it has to do with the difference between the two classes; as far as I can tell so far (and take this with a grain of salt, as I'm a newbie!) sociolinguistics is a bit softer and fuzzier, more about people and how they relate and communicate, far more qualitative than quantitative, etc. Traditional linguistics seems to be very analytical, logical...for lack of a better word, "math-y." It involves deriving grammatical rules from the language use you observe; setting up taxonomies and hierarchies, structures and syntax, that sort of thing. I am far more analytical than creative, and hence seem to be fairly good at it (which is tremendously egotistical to say, considering I've been studying this for all of eight weeks or so now, but bear with me...)

I think my friend's comment means that she sees me as good at traditional/theoretical linguistics (not sure if that's really a technical term, but "Chomskyan" may not mean much to anyone outside the field), and that type of linguistics appears to have quite a rivalry with socio, so she's anticipating me developing into a rival for any sociolinguistics advocate, my professor included.

Anyway, I'm sort of flattered; being an arch-nemesis sounds kind of cool, and I've certainly never been described that way to my face before. But I'm trying not to be slightly hurt, too, because I happen to LIKE socio, and to find it really interesting. I would like to be good at it, too, and not just relegated to "oh, that girl who's just weirdly good at math." Is she saying that I'm not good at socio, or that my comments in class are somehow lacking in content or quality? Or I'm just bad with people, and would do better in fields that don't involve them?

For what it's worth, this whole post would probably not have been worth writing if I wasn't thinking about the linguistic value of my friend's comment to me. What does it mean? Just pondering...