Courses

This course gives students the opportunity to examine and interpret how the socio-cultural context affects the way people speak in that setting. Topics in focus include regional and social dialects, multilingualism, language attitudes and their impact on national and personal identity, linguistic politeness, the maintenance, shift, loss, and spread of languages, and the impact of modern technology. Applications to gender and education are explored in depth.

Theoretical and practical introduction to the broad range of human speech sounds including tone, intonation, stress, and duration; extensive drill in producing and recognizing these sounds and recording them with phonetic symbols; and practice in recording and reproducing the sounds of selected languages.

The study of sound systems of human language, including initial principles of phonological analysis. Application of these principles to a wide range of natural language data.

Theories of grammar and principles of language analysis. Topics include: morphology, syntax, stems, words, phrases, sentences, and categories of meaning. Problem solving with data from a variety of languages is a major part of the course.

This course provides linguists, translators and literacy trainers with principles of adult learning to increase their knowledge, skills and attitudes as effective trainers of adults in cross-cultural settings Students will interact with literature in adult education; describe how these principles might apply cross-culturally; practice teaching using these methods; then analyze and compare approaches used in other cultures with practical application to training across cultures. While the focus is for training linguists, the principles can be applied to training adults in a wide variety of training situations.

This course introduces crucial concepts in anthropology and ethnography to linguists. It focuses on cross-cultural communication with an emphasis on participant observation as an effective methodology for such research. Students collect and analyze data related to topics such as oral traditions, kinship, and social structure. They are introduced to various tools for ethno-semantic analysis, including analysis of cultural themes and worldview, semantic domain analysis, and taxonomic analysis.

Designed to give students practical experience in a linguistics-related field. Students will plan and pursue independent learning through contexts such as a research project, job shadowing, or community experience. Students will present their experiences and dialogue about big-picture ideas such as the equality of all languages, promoting linguistic diversity, and a Christian perspective on language and culture. Students will have an opportunity to reflect on their own growth and their development of perspectives related to linguistics and its influence on their life and work.

The linguistics practicum course is designed to give students a short-term practical experience in a language development program. Students work with a faculty member at TWU and a mentor on location to develop their ability as field linguists through making a contribution to language development work. The location, length of assignment, and work commitments are determined by the faculty member in consultation with the student and field mentor. 120 hours of work are required.

This course explores the rich variety of morphological and syntactic constructions and processes found in human language, deepening the students' understanding of morphosyntactic phenomena from a typological perspective. The topics are examined within the framework of a current theory of syntax.