Language is fundamental to our thoughts, our relationships, and our civilisations. Through language, we transmit knowledge, from inviting someone for coffee, to promoting the latest scientific theory, to settling global political disputes.
This course will allow you to explore a variety of aspects of linguistics up to a very high level of expertise. In your first year, you will be acquainted with some of the fundamental aspects of the study of language, such as the description and analysis of sounds, words and sentences, the investigation of language in its social setting, and how language is situated and develops in the mind and in the brain.
You also can begin a specialist in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL). In the second year, you begin to specialise towards those areas that you are most interested in and, if your specialism includes TEFL, you will learn how to design, deliver and evaluate language classes and assessments. You then have the option of taking the third year to go abroad or do a placement year. In your third year (if you continue with your studies without this option) or the fourth (if you do spend a year on one of these activities), you will develop your specialism further and be acquainted with the cutting edge of current research in your area. You will also do an independent research project under the guidance and supervision of one of our expert members of staff and write a dissertation about this project.
In the final year, you will take several modules from our Postgraduate offering, in order to further develop your chosen area of specialism. You will receive further training on research methods, and be able to conduct small-scale research projects, using our state-of-the art lab facilities (including eye tracking, EEG, sound analysis and reaction time paradigms).
Your future
Studying language and linguistics allows you to develop your research and IT skills by collecting and analysing linguistic data using state-of-the-art technology, and a combination of team-work and independent projects enhances your communication, problem-solving, and management skills.
Our graduates have gone on to have careers in a wide variety of fields, including teaching, journalism, advertising, marketing, travel, communications, publishing, speech and language therapy, and business administration.
For example, some of our department’s recent graduates have gone on to work for a wide range of high-profile companies including:
The British Council
English in Action
Cambridge University Press
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
Royal Bank of Scotland
Norfolk Constabulary
We also work with the University’s Student Development Team to help you find out about further work experience, internships, placements, and voluntary opportunities.