Discourse and Communication Analysis

30 credits
Spring teaching, year 1

This courmodulese focuses on discourse analysis of spoken or written text in the widest sense. It will provide you with insight into methodological and ethical aspects of data collection. You will be introduced to observation and elicitation techniques as employed in dialectology and other branches of social linguistics, and to discourse transcription conventions.

The Discourse of Social and Personal Identity

15 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

The module presents the concept of identity as socially constructed, as communicatively produced and constantly negotiated and reinvented. The focus is on situated talk and especially narrative, although not exclusively, as social practice. The module is divided into two sections that aim to presents two facets of the identity issue. The first part revolves around the negotiation of personal identity in a number of different contexts, from courtroom testimony to negotiations in committee meetings (along the line of work by Gumperz and Goffman). It considers the issue of positioning of self and others especially through the use of deixis, time and space. This first section includes the consideration of some of the sociolinguistic literature on self-narratives in interaction and oral history in a number of social settings, from immigrant discourse to traumatic recollections. Discussion of some TV programmes revolving around personal stories will be included as an opportunity to reflect on the impact of the medium and the function of 'infotainment' on identity.
The second part of the module focuses on the representation by others. It discusses the media representation of given communities and highlights the ideology that such representation construes in the readers' mind. Examples from case studies are the Islamic community in the UK press (Poole, 2002), the representation of countries at war, e.g. the Iraqis during the 2003 conflict (Haarman and Lombardo eds. 2008), the identity that some political parties offer to their constituency in TV interviews etc.

First Language Acquisition

30 credits
Spring teaching, year 1

This module focuses on one facet of psycholinguistics: first language acquisition. You will compare competing theoretical assumptions about what is involved in language acquisition and explore some of the controversies that rage in the field. Some of the central questions include: What processes are involved in learning language and learning to use it? Are humans born with a genetic 'blueprint' for language? Is linguistic knowledge fundamentally different from other areas of cognition? You may also have the opportunity to reflect upon whether and if so how learning a second language (or learning two first languages) is fundamentally different from learning a first language, and may also take the opportunity to obtain some first-hand experience in psycholinguistic research by designing and carrying out a psycholinguistic study of your own.

Intercultural Communication

15 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

This module examines how cultural assumptions and values influence interactional style. In order to do so, we interrogate British culture what do we consider to be polite or rude, natural or unnatural in communication with others? What values and habits shape our expectations of what communication is, what it is for, and what forms it should take? We are then in a position to appreciate the ways in which intercultural communication can lead to stereotyping and miscommunication and to discuss whether claims of universals in human interaction are tenable. Each year, we will have a main focus on communication in three countries and their mainstream cultures (one of which will be native-English-speaking), while you will have the opportunity to specialize your work on a particular region/cultural group. Key areas of exploration will include linguistic and cultural relativism, context (high and low), identity, face, and time.

Language Description and Analysis

30 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

This module introduces you to the study of formal linguistics, with the aim of familiarising you with the main sub-branches of the discipline. Topics include: sounds and sound patterns (phonetics and phonology); word and sentence structure (morphology and syntax); and linguistic meaning (semantics). Emphasis will be placed on using the theories, methods and techniques from each of these sub-disciplines to examine real language data. You will also carry out practical analysis of spoken and written texts.

Language Variation

30 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

This module provides you with an introduction to topics in and approaches to language variation, focussing primarily on regional and social variation.

In the first part of the module discusses aspects of regional variation in terms of phonology (accents), grammar and lexicon. The second part introduces you to main aspects of social variation, namely social class, age, gender and ethnicity, and the means of analysing them. In the third part, you will cover fundamental theories of language change, both linguistic and sociolinguistic, looking at how variation within a speech community can lead to change in the following generations, and how regional variation is shaped by such change.

While there will be a focus on variation in English, other languages will also be used for comparison and illustration, whenever appropriate.

Language and Gender

15 credits
Spring teaching, year 1

In this module students explore the relationship between language and gender/ sexuality from a wide range of theoretical perspectives. Although the module mainly takes a linguistic perspective on the construct of gender by enabling students to draw on their knowledge of sociolinguistics, language change, and discourse analysis, it also provides students with an opportunity to discuss the construct of gender by exploring relevant areas of sociology, anthropology, ethnography, and fictional discourse (mainly in film and theatre). By the end of this module students will be able to draw on interdisciplinary approaches and employ traditional and modern methodologies (e.g. quantitative, interactional, and ethnographic) to critically assess key issues and controversies in language and gender studies.

Language, Mind and Brain

15 credits
Spring teaching, year 1

This module focuses on linguistic ability as a unique quality of humans. How does human language differ from animal communication systems? How is the human body, particularly the brain, adapted for language? Is language a special kind of cognition, or the product of general higher cognitive abilities? We further investigate how humans understand and produce speech in such a speedy and efficient way, using a variety of evidence to evaluate theories of how the mind is structured for speech. We'll ask questions like: How are words stored in the mind so that we can find them? Why are grammatical sentences like The horse raced past the barn fell actually very difficult to comprehend? Why are words sometimes 'on the tip of the tongue'?

Modern Dialectology

15 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

Pidgins and Creoles

15 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

This module represents an introduction to pidgin and creole languages, focusing on their structural properties (morphology, syntax and phonology). Grammatical properties discussed include topics such as word order, tense mood and aspect systems, serial verb constructions, relative clauses and information structure. Phonological properties discussed include a description of creole sound systems and their prosodic properties, from syllable structure to tone. The module also explores the unique sociocultural history of pidgins and creoles and theoretical approaches to their emergence, exploring the circumstances under which creole formation can occur and theories concerning the origin of the grammatical features found in creoles. Finally, the module will also provide a typological survey of creoles, looking at creoles from around the world, and creoles with different lexifier languages, beside English.

Research Proposal (Applied Linguistics)

15 credits
Spring teaching, year 1

This module follows on from Researching Language in Use. In this module you will a)identify an interesting project, b)identify appropriate research questions and c)identify an appropriate methodology. By the end of the module you will have identified your dissertation topic and written a proposal, on the basis of which you will be assigned a supervisor. You will be supported by means of regular seminars, peer-group editing and support sessions, and by special skills workshops as needed (for example, on statistics, phonetics software, using MS-Word effectively), and by Study Direct discussions.

Researching Language in Use

15 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

This module introduces students to the practice of linguistic research. A diverse range of issues regarding the development of a research question, methodology and argumentation are explored through the topical theme of 'language in use'. On this module, you will read works on the theme of 'language in use' that exemplify good practice in research and argumentation, and will critically reflect upon and discuss methodologies and practices used in these and other works. You will receive lectures and practical workshop training on the following:

* accessing linguistic materials and using them appropriately
* identifying tractable research questions
* interpreting research findings
* linguistic field methods (ethnographic and language structure)
* quantitative research methods (survey & experiment design)
* structuring a linguistic argument
* ethical considerations in linguistic research
* self- and peer- evaluation

In order to put these skills into practice, you will complete assessed research exercises.

Second Language Acquisition and Research

30 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

On this module you will study how languages are learned and how the different research methods in language learning may affect language teaching in the classroom. You will analyse theories of language learning and explore the difference between qualitative and quantitative research.

You will be expected to undertake a mini classroom research project at the end of the module.

Syntactic Theory

15 credits
Autumn teaching, year 1

This module represents an introduction to syntactic theory, focusing on the current transformational framework developed by Chomsky. The module investigates ways in which properties of human language (such as morphological agreement, argument structure, phrase structure, tense and aspect, grammatical functions, case and interrogative clause formation) are explained within this theoretical perspective. This module provides students with an understanding of the way in which formal syntactic theories are constructed, and provides them with skills in analysing the above morphosyntactic phenomena, furthering their abilities in constructing and testing hypotheses and representing sentence structure by means of explicit notation. The module will be based on data from English and other languages, and will encourage the students to take a critical approach to theory construction.