<p>Does anyone know the best school for linguistics?</p>
<p>And can anyone explain in basic terms what you learn in linguistics? I understand the definition, but do you learn languages or just learn like grammar and stuff?</p>
<p>Linguistics majors often love languages and learn languages, but that isn't what linguistics is. I think that linguistics is more of a scientific discipline. </p>
<p>Wikipedia says:
Linguistic structures are pairings of meaning and sound (or other externalization). Linguists may specialize in some subpart of the linguistic structure, which can be arranged in the following terms, from sound to meaning:
- Phonetics, the study of the physical properties of sounds of human language
- Phonology, the study of sounds as discrete categories in the speaker's mind that distinguish meaning
- Morphology, the study of the internal structure of words
- Syntax, the study of how words combine to form grammatical sentences
- Semantics, the study of the meaning of words (lexical semantics) and fixed word combinations (phraseology), and how these combine to form the meanings of sentences
- Pragmatics, the study of how utterances are used (literally, figuratively, or otherwise) in communicative acts
- Discourse analysis, the analysis of language use in texts (spoken, written, or signed)
Many linguists would agree the divisions overlap considerably, but the independent significance of each of these areas is not universally acknowledged. Regardless of any particular linguist's position, each area has core concepts that foster significant scholarly inquiry and research.
Intersecting with these domains are fields arranged around the kind of external factors that are considered. For example
- Stylistics, the study of linguistic factors that place a discourse in context.
- Developmental linguistics, the study of the development of linguistic ability in an individual, particularly the acquisition of language in childhood.
- Historical linguistics or Diachronic linguistics, the study of language change.
- Language geography, the study of the spatial patterns of languages.
- Evolutionary linguistics, the study of the origin and subsequent development of language.
- Psycholinguistics, the study of the cognitive processes and representations underlying language use.
- Sociolinguistics, the study of social patterns of linguistic variability.
- Clinical linguistics, the application of linguistic theory to the area of Speech-Language Pathology.
- Neurolinguistics, the study of the brain networks that underlie grammar and communication.
- Biolinguistics, the study of natural as well as human-taught communication systems in animals compared to human language.
- Computational linguistics, the study of computational implementations of linguistic structures.
- Applied linguistics, the study of language related issues applied in everyday life, notably language. policies, planning, and education. Constructed language fits under Applied linguistics.</p>
<p>The University of Chicago has an excellent linguistics department.</p>
<p>Georgetown has a section of its College called the Faculty of Language and Linguistics; you apply specifically to it. It is a very respected program.</p>
<p>Put simply, linguistics is the scientific study of language. Yes, that's right -- scientific.</p>
<p>It isn't necessarily the study of any specific language, but rather the aspects, qualities, and structure of language in all its forms. It is descriptive, not prescriptive -- meaning that it describes how language is used rather than dictates how language should be used.</p>
<p>Contrary to popular belief, linguists don't necessarily know many languages, but their linguaphilia tends to lead to such -- or at the very least, knowledge of many languages. Linguists don't all agree on what the primary goal of linguistics is, as many fields draw on it (from psychology to biology to anthropology), but some of the basic ones are:</p>
<p>1) to find "linguistic universals" (i.e. features common to all languages)
2) to discover how the mind facilitates language
3) to see how language works culturally and socially
4) to understand how language is learned, acquired, and retained</p>
<p>Like many fields, linguistics can be divided up into theory (the elementary aspects that make up language) and application (how language fits into various contexts). </p>
<p>Theoretical:
Phonetics (study of sound)
Phonology (study of sounds within a language)
Morphology (study of word structure)
Semantics (study of word meanings)
Syntax (study of the rules that dictate how words come together)
Pragmatics (study of how language is used to communicate)</p>
<p>Applied:
Historical linguistics (language change)
Psycholinguistics / cognitive linguistics (language in the mind)
Sociolinguistics (language in society)
Computational linguistics (language in computers)
Various others like neurolinguistics and clinical linguistics</p>
<p>Some say that linguistics is the "hardest" humanity but the "softest" science. Many schools classify linguistics as a humanity, though really, it is a social science (which is why it is often done under the anthropology department). Some call it a cognitive science. For example, from Stanford's site:</p>
<p>
[quote]
Linguistics concerns itself with the fundamental questions of what language is and how it is related to the other human faculties. In answering these questions, linguists consider language as a cultural, social, and psychological phenomenon and seek to determine what is unique in languages, what is universal, how language is acquired, and how it changes. Linguistics is, therefore, one of the cognitive sciences; it provides a link between the humanities and the social sciences, as well as education and hearing and speech sciences.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I've posted in a "best linguistics schools" thread before; I'd recommend you look at my post there:</p>
<p>The most current rankings are, I believe:</p>
<ol>
<li>MIT</li>
<li>Stanford</li>
<li>UCLA</li>
</ol>
<p>I studied Linguistics at both Stanford and UCLA. UCLA was far superior in the late 70's.</p>
<p>The above posts describe linguistics very well. One normally takes an introductory course which surveys the field, then individual courses in phonetics, phonology, syntax, historical, etc. By junior/senior year you are likely taking courses with students in the graduate program.</p>
<p>Undergrad the languages I used for study were English, Spanish, French and Tagalog. By senior year I was using Chickasaw, an american indian language related to Choctaw.</p>
<p>Chi-KA-asha chok-MA!</p>
<p>okay thank you all for your replies.</p>
<p>im not really sure if i want to go into linguistics right now. for the longest time, i was sure i wanted neurobiology. but now im not so sure. im going into my junior year of high school next year, so i do have some time to think. but im just worried i wont end up choosing a specific subject in time...</p>
<p>what i was really looking for was a program to learn different languages. so then can you take different language courses within a linguistics degree? i dont know much about how college/university works because im from a small canadian town haha.</p>
<p>Have you considered the "Three Languages" program at the University of Delaware? It is indeed a program to learn different languages. Check it out. You need to study three languages to graduate, and that's your major. "Three Languages" No, English doesn't count as one of the three.</p>
<p>FLL</a> Undergraduate Majors</p>
<p>
[quote]
what i was really looking for was a program to learn different languages. so then can you take different language courses within a linguistics degree?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, other languages are not a requirement of the linguistics degree. If you wanted to take other languages, you'd also have to do the linguistics courses.</p>
<p>Many universities also have a "general" foreign languages degree -- you might look into that.</p>
<p>But don't worry if you don't choose a specific subject in time; major, for the most part, has no bearing on admissions (unless they're impacted), and you usually have two years to figure out what your major is once in college.</p>
<p>By the way, McGill is known as one of the best schools for linguistics.</p>
<p>Yes I was looking at the Three Languages at Delaware.
My problem is I already have a major: neurobiology. I just wanted to minor in linguistics, because I love learnind languages, but as of now, I am only fluent in French, and have a basic understand of Japanese. I want to expand my venue of language. So the languages are not really a career-related interest, but merely a hobby. Unless I choose to study language from a neurological point of view (neurolinguistics was it?) But thats not really what I wanted to do.</p>
<p>Interesting info from a Grinnell thread which talks about linguistics ratings (post #2).<br>
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/grinnell-college/467408-what-grinnell-known-academically.html?highlight=grinnell+linguistics%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/grinnell-college/467408-what-grinnell-known-academically.html?highlight=grinnell+linguistics</a></p>
<p>Penn is good, too...</p>
<p>For what it's worth, this is the last NRC ranking of linguistics Ph.D. programs from 1995 (the NRC rankings, although now somewhat dated, are among the most respected rankings of Ph.D. programs, and supposedly will be updated soon):</p>
<p>
[quote]
Linguistics </p>
<p>1 MIT 4.79
2 Stanford 4.59
3 UCLA 4.56
4 Massachusetts 4.44
5 Penn 4.16
6 Chicago 3.97
7 Cal Berkeley 3.97
8 Ohio State 3.80
9 Cornell 3.78
10 Cal Santa Cruz 3.66
11 Texas 3.61
12 Southern Cal 3.58
13 Arizona 3.58
14 Cal San Diego 3.43
15 CUNY 3.41
16 Connecticut 3.36
17 Washington 3.16
18 Illinois 3.10
19 Georgetown 3.00
20 Brown 2.94
21 Harvard 2.92
22 SUNY Buffalo 2.87
23 Pittsburgh 2.83
24 SUNY Stony Brook 2.82
25 Hawaii Manoa 2.79
26 Oregon 2.68
27 Indiana 2.66
28 Delaware 2.60
29 Boston University 2.60
30 Yale 2.57
31 Michigan 2.37
32 Wisconsin 2.20
33 Colorado 2.15
34 South Carolina 1.91
35 Kansas 1.91
36 NYU 1.84
37 Florida 1.78
38 Michigan State 1.76
39 Rice 1.72
40 Texas Arlington 1.26
41 Indiana Univ Pennsylvania 0.55
[/quote]
<p>
[quote]
Interesting info from a Grinnell thread which talks about linguistics ratings (post #2).
What is Grinnell known for academically?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Except if you follow the link it doesn't back it up. Also, if you look on Grinnell's website, they have no professors who have PhD's in linguistics.</p>
<p>The measure is not what people at Grinnell currently have PhDs but what Grinnell grads have PhDs. Tetrishead addressed the results of the 2005-6 HEDS study while the Earlham report refers to a different time frame (and doesn't directly address linguistics).</p>