They will also learn how to confront texts in languages they do not know. There are weekly problem sets, readings, and two hour exams. A World of Words. In this course we will study and attempt to answer these ad other questions about the English language and its vocabulary. Introduction to Linguistics.
Nothing is more distinctly human than our ability to use language.
This course is an introduction to the methods which linguists have developed in the process of analyzing and describing human languages. Our study will draw on examples from a large number of the languages of the world. We will look at the sounds of language, how they are produced, and how they are patterned into words. We will study the diverse ways in which individual languages approach the processes of word and sentence formation, while we try to decide if there are processes which are universal to all human languages. These readings generally complement lecture material that is not covered in the text.