Part I Linguistics

This course comprises:

* LING101 Language Description (Term 1 and Term 3)
* LING151 Introduction to General Linguistics (Term 1)
* LING152 Linguistic Fieldwork and Analysis (Term 2)

This course is available to visiting students (ERASMUS, JYA etc) as follows:

* Full Year (October to June) - students take the full course as detailed above - 10 semester credits or 20 ECTS credits
* Michaelmas Only (October to December) - students take LING101 plus LING151 - 5 semester credits or 10 ECTS credits
* Lent and Summer Only (January to June) - students take LING152 - 5 semester credits or 10 ECTS credits.

Please note that this course cannot be taken with Part I Sociolinguistics (because there is an overlap).


LING101 Language Description

LING101 is designed to introduce you to basic analytic skills that you will need in the study of language. It is taught through a single lecture each week in the Michaelmas term and the first half of the Summer Term. However, an equally important part of the course are the web-based activities that accompany each lecture. These include readings, transcription exercises and self-tests; you will also interact with a grammar teaching tool called Cytor and a corpus analysis program called WordSmith.
Course aims

* To familiarise students with the International Phonetic Alphabet and the basics of phonemic transcription;
* To give students a basic grounding in grammar and morphology;
* To introduce students to corpus linguistics and acquaint them with the use of the concordance analysis package WordSmith Tools.


LING151 Introduction to General Linguistics

In this module you will be introduced to a number of key issues in Linguistics. By the end of the course you will have a keener appreciation of what linguistics is, and a deeper understanding about some of the main topics that linguists study. The course is arranged in a number of blocks of several weeks each. There are two lectures and one seminar per week.

BLOCK 1 - BEGINNINGS & ENDINGS

In this first block we'll introduce you to the course as whole, before discussing the 'beginnings' and 'endings' of language. We'll cover both the origins of language in a person and in the human species, and we'll also examine how people learn languages other than their own. We end this block by considering the end - or loss - of language, e.g. by looking at language disorders such as aphasia.

BLOCK 2 - DESCRIBING VARIATION IN LANGUAGE

Next, we focus on variation in language. We will consider variation in sound (the phonetics of some accents of English and other languages). For example, does BATH have the vowel of START or of CAT? We will also consider variation in dialect - that is, we'll concentrate on the grammatical differences which, whilst not relating to pronunciation, still identify a speaker as being from a certain place. To do this, we'll use a case study of Lancashire dialect and describe some of its features using linguistic terminology.

BLOCK 3 - MEANING IN LANGUAGE

In this block we focus on meaning in language. We begin by looking at what meaning means - how we decode the meaning of words and what information we can glean from the context. We also examine how speakers say one thing and mean another, using pitch and pauses to create different pragmatic effects. We end this block by examining how animals communicate - do they have meaning? And is that language?

BLOCK 4 - APPLIED LINGUISTICS AND CORPORA

In the final block of the course, you will begin to apply some of the technical concepts and terminology you have learned to other areas of language study. For example, we will examine how linguistics is used in language teaching, and also how we can use linguistic concepts to study a range of literary genres in insightful ways. We end this block - and the course - with an examination of how computers are used in the study of language to enhance our understanding of it.
Course Aims

By the end of the course you will:

* have a keener appreciation of what language is, and of what linguists study;
* have become familiar with a variety of technical terminology;
* have had lots of opportunity to critically evaluate basic linguistic principles, and apply them both to English and to other languages.

Recommended Reading

Aronoff, Mark & Janie Rees-Miller (2001) The Handbook of Linguistics, Oxford: Blackwell


LING152 Linguistic Fieldwork and Analysis

All languages - and all varieties of language - are structured in terms of their sentences and their sounds. This course is an introduction to the study of language structure. It builds on the course LING101 Language Description and introduces basic notions of phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics. Students will become familiar with how linguistic terminology is used to describe different aspects of language, and how linguists can look beyond specific detail to find similarities between languages which can seem very different on the surface. The course will give you an insight into how linguists go about the task of doing fieldwork that eventually results in descriptive grammars of languages, and will give you the tools to describe your own variety of the language(s) you speak in depth.
Course Aims

By the end of the course you will:

* have considered how language is structured, in terms of sentences, words, and sounds;
* have been given lots of opportunity to practice analysing language;
* have become familiar with how to analyse not only English but also other languages and be able to recognise linguistic similarities and differences;
* have become familiar with a range of technical terminology and be able to use it to describe language in detail.


Assessment

LING101: Tests x 2 (worth 10% overall)

LING151: Test (worth 10% overall) plus essay (worth 10% overall)

LING152: Pieces of coursework x 2 (worth 20% overall)

LING151/152: Combined exam (worth 50% overall)