It feels like some people do programming for the sake of programming (like linguists). Others create poems and exquisite novels with it (authors). I’d argue you don’t need to be a linguist to be a nobel (or pulitzer) prize winning author. Why? It’d be a distraction. You’d start focusing on the wrong kinds of things.

Linguists are still highly respectible people. Society needs them. Just that being a great author does not require you to be one.