BA Linguistics
University of Essex
Key Information
Campus location
Colchester, United Kingdom
Languages
English
Study format
On-Campus
Duration
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Pace
Full time
Tuition fees
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Application deadline
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Earliest start date
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Introduction
BA Linguistics
How does age, sex, social background and regional origins affect the way we speak? How do languages change over the course of time, and why? How do children learn to talk? Why do some languages appear so different from others? Linguists study these and other questions to gain insight into what it means to “know a language”. An understanding of our language enhances our self-awareness, inspiring us to address fundamental questions about our communication as human beings.
Linguistics is an increasingly important subject, impacting on areas in psychology, philosophy, education and artificial intelligence. It has real-world applications in such diverse fields as human rights, computer-assisted language learning, and the study of institutional language in settings like doctor-patient interactions, interviewer-interviewee dialogues, and courtroom exchanges.
Our course offers you a solid grounding in linguistics, while still allowing for a large amount of personal choice. You explore a wide range of core topics in linguistics, mastering key concepts in phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics, and also investigate specialist areas including:
- Multilingualism
- Language and Gender
- Language and the mind
- Conversation and Social Interaction
We are a leading UK university for language and linguistics research (REF 2014), a place where talented students become part of an academic community in which the majority of research is rated ‘world-leading' or ‘internationally excellent', placing us firmly within the top 10 departments in the UK. You have an opportunity to study different kinds of linguistics from structural linguistics to applied and experimental linguistics.
Admissions
Scholarships and Funding
Several scholarship options are available, please visit the university website for more information.
Curriculum
Year 1
- Words and Sentences
- Foundations of Sociolinguistics
- Understanding Data in Linguistics
- Sounds
- Careers and Employability Skills for Languages and Linguistics
Year 2
- Careers and Employability Skills for Languages and Linguistics
- Research methods for language and linguistics
Final Year
- Careers and Employability Skills for Languages and Linguistics
- Project: Linguistics
- World Language Structures
Program Tuition Fee
Career Opportunities
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.
Program delivery
BA Linguistics: 3 years
BA Linguistics (Including Year Abroad): 4 years
BA Linguistics (Including Placement Year): 4 years
- Teaching is arranged to allow freedom in how you organise your learning experience
- Examples of practical work include digitally recording dialect speakers in a small traditional fishing community, or scouring digitised child language databanks
- Other teaching methods include lectures, demonstrations and learning by teaching others
- In your final year, you conduct research on a topic chosen with one of your lecturers, for your dissertation. Your lecturer supports you throughout your project and is an expert in the research area.