Undergraduate Courses

(101) Either semester. Three credits.
The special properties of human language and of the human mind that make verbal communication possible. Basic topics in the psychology of language.

(102) Second semester. Three credits.
The birth, spread, and death of languages. A basic survey of the effects of geography, society, and politics on language families.

(103) Either semester. Three credits.
An overview of the languages of the world. Language families. Typological classifications of linguistic properties: what can we expect in a structure of a language? Unity and diversity in language systems. Mechanisms of language change and variation. Language myths and realities.

(110Q) Either semester. Three credits.
An introduction to linguistics as a science. Methods, findings and theory of linguistic research on the sound system and the structures of human language. The relation between structure and meaning. The basics of linguistic analysis. Applied linguistics.

(202) Either semester. Three credits. Open to sophomores.
A survey of theory, methods and findings of linguistic research: the relation between sound and meaning in human languages; social variation in language; language change over time; universals of language; the mental representation of linguistic knowledge.

(215C) Semester by arrangement. Three credits.
Prerequisite: PSYC 1100; and required preparation: LING 1010 or 2020.
Research methods and laboratory techniques for the study of language acquisition and/or sentence pro-cessing. Students design and conduct a study using a computer database of child speech

(225) Either semester. Three credits.
Prerequisite: LING 1010 or 2020, or consent of instructor.
The relationship between linguistic theory and second language acquisition. Effects of mother tongue and linguistic input. Pedagogical implications of second language acquisition research.

. (205Q) First semester. Three credits.
Prerequisite: LING 2020.
The analysis of sound patterns in language within a generative framework; distinctive features, segmental and prosodic analysis, word formation, the theory of markedness

(206Q) Second semester. Three credits.
Required preparation: LING 1010 or 2020.
The analysis of form and meaning in natural languages in a Chomskyan framework: surface structures, deep structures, transformational rules, and principles of semantic interpretation.

(244W) First semester. Three credits.
Prerequisite: ENGL 1010 or 1011 or 3800; open to juniors or higher.
The study of language, culture, and their relationship. Topics include the evolution of the human language capacity; the principles of historical language change including reconstruction of Indo-European and Native American language families; writing systems; linguistic forms such as Pidgins and Creoles arising from languages in contact; the in-teraction between language and political systems, the struggle for human rights, gender, ethnicity, and ethnobiology.