Linguistics

This is a special studies course involving an internship with a corporate, public, governmental, or private organization, arranged with the Study Center Director or Liaison Officer. Specific internships vary each term and are described on a special study project form for each student. A substantial paper or series of reports is required. Units vary depending on the contact hours and method of assessment. The internship may be taken during one or more terms but the units cannot exceed a total of 12.0 for the year.

This course provides a broad introduction to the linguistic analysis of Korean. Topics include phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics, as well as a small amount of orthography, history, pragmatics, and sociolinguistics.  

This course primarily focuses on Korean, but it will include examples from other languages to show how Korean compares and contrasts. 

The recommended prerequisite for this course is two years of college-level Korean. If a student has completed one year of college-level Korean, they must be prepared to put in extra time and effort. Students who have completed less than one year of college-level Korean are not encouraged to enroll in this course, unless they have already had some coursework in general linguistics (e.g., an introduction to linguistics, plus one or two additional courses in core topics such as phonetics, phonology, syntax, or semantics).  

This course provides a broad understanding of language learning and familiarizes students with some pedagogical considerations and second language acquisition theory as a necessary underpinning to the use of technology in language learning. Students learn a range of speech and language technologies that can be deployed in educational applications. Students learn practical skills in the design/development of digital educational content. 

This course examines common patterns and common forms of communication which are found across all sectors of society as well as across cultural boundaries for communicating ideological values and constructing subjectivities and identities. Topics include different approaches to ideologies; multimodal critical discourse analysis; a social-semiotic theory of communication; semiotic resources as a system of ideological choices; evaluation of stance; discourse representations of social actors and social actions in historical and cultural contexts; modality; nominalisation and presupposition.

This course examines the phenomenon of ‘globalization’ in relation to language and communication. It looks at the constant tension between language, languages and languaging as we negotiate similarities and differences in a global setting – by examining relevant notions such as monolingualism, multilingualism (semilingualism, fake multilingualism, parallel monolingualism, multiple language ontologies), universal language, lingua franca, translation and translatability, translingualism (polylingualism, translanguaging, etc.), and exploring global issues such as the digitalization/technologization of language and literacy, language commodification, as well as the topic of global English(es).

This course examines linguistic phenomena relating to the structure of language and how those phenomena are formulated and explained under the framework of so-called Generative Grammar.  

Course objectives include: i) to understand what is meant by the structure of language, ii) to examine linguistic facts discerned to be structural, iii) to appreciate conceptual/theoretical necessities to account for them (e.g., diverse developments from Generative to Minimalism), iv) to have a grasp of the idea of universal grammar. 

Topics include linguistics and syntax, ingredients of structure: linearity and hierarchy, syntactic categories, words to phrases, two kinds of merge: substitution and adjunction (external or internal), introduction to P-markers, various structural relations (Binding Theory), complement vs. adjunct (and specifier), covert elements: trace vs. empty categories (PRO/pro), movement and interpretation: 1. grammatical functions 2. thematic roles 3. displacement (overt movement vs. covert movement like QR), and transformation: substitution and ellipsis. 

This course examines how contemporary linguists address issues of language use. It explores topics such as the nature of human communication, the influence of social attitudes on language, first and second language acquisition and development, the historical development of languages, language universals and language typology, and regional and situational variation in language. 

This is an independent research course with research arranged between the student and faculty member. The specific research topics vary each term and are described on a special project form for each student. A substantial paper is required. The number of units varies with the student’s project, contact hours, and method of assessment, as defined on the student’s special study project form.

The course incudes the patterns of language use in Southern African, and Botswana in particular, the factors which influence language change and maintenance and the various efforts, both formal and informal, which are beings made in order to preserve, promote, and empower languages.