Linguistics at FSU

The Linguistics Program at Florida State University equips students with the skills to investigate the sounds, structures and meaning in human language. It also helps prepare them for careers in fields such as teaching, translation and interpretation, voice or speech recognition software development, literacy programming, curriculum development, data analysis, and U.S. intelligence or foreign service, among others. We offer a wide range of courses in syntax, phonology, psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics, descriptive linguistics, child language acquisition, second language acquisition, historical linguistics, research methods, and computational linguistics. Our labs include a language processing and eye-tracking lab, a phonetics lab, a psycholinguistics lab, and a second language acquisition lab. Some of our students are involved in undergraduate research and/or write an honors thesis.

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Linguistics Majors

The linguistics degree consists of 30 credits. Of these, 18 credit hours correspond to six required core courses, and 12 credit hours correspond to electives. The electives allow students to choose between two different majors in linguistics:

• a general linguistics major, where majors take four linguistic electives (at least one of them has to be at the 4000 level), and
• a linguistics and languages major, where majors take two linguistic electives and complete two semesters of a language course beyond or different from the language courses used to satisfy the Arts and Sciences language requirement. 

Students select one or the other major based on their choice of electives. Students can get a B.A. or B.S. degree in either major, depending on their coursework. Students who would like to pursue a B.S. will take at least two electives in research methods, language acquisition, statistics, mathematics, computational linguistics or computer science. For a list of courses, please click here.

Please contact Antje Muntendam, Ph.D. (amuntendam@fsu.edu) or Lara Reglero, Ph.D. (lreglero@fsu.edu) for more information.

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Linguistics Minor

Undergraduate students in linguistics must take at least 12 semester hours from the linguistics courses listed below; two of these must be core courses. 

Core Courses:

LIN 3041. Introduction to Linguistics I (formerly Linguistics for Foreign Language Majors). This course examines what is language and introduces phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics and sociolinguistics.

LIN 3042. Introduction to Linguistics II. This course continues the examination of language, focusing on the differences between human language and animal communication, first and second language acquisition, psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics and computational linguistics.

LIN 4030. Introduction to Historical Linguistics.  This course introduces students to linguistic families, the comparative method, internal reconstruction, and the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European. Several theories of sound change are also discussed.

LIN 4040. Introduction to Descriptive Linguistics. This course provides an understanding of the organization of language, provides tools and techniques for describing language data, and examines various models of linguistic description.

LIN 4201. Sounds of the World’s Languages. This course covers sounds and sound patterns in the world’s languages, focusing on sounds occurring both in majority and minority languages, with a special attention to those attested only in certain language families or used for special purposes.

LIN 4512. Introduction to Syntax (formerly Introduction to Transformational Grammar). This course is an introduction to syntax, that is, the study of the structure of sentences. This course approaches syntax from the perspective of generative grammar and focuses on central topics in syntactic theory (Phrase Structure, X’-schema, θ-Theory, Case, Movement and Binding Theory).

LIN 4600. Sociolinguistics. This course explores language in its social context. It focuses on the study of language as a means of communication and expression of identity, as the identity of the speaker and of the speech community define the choice of the language.

LIN 4623. Psycholinguistics of Bilingualism (formerly LIN 4930: Topics in Linguistics). This course explores the relationship between language and cognition in individuals who speak and understand more than one language. It examines issues such as spoken language processing, written language processing, language acquisition and the bilingual brain.

LIN 4716. Child Language Acquisition (formerly LIN 4930: Topics in Linguistics). This course offers an introduction to the study of child language acquisition and development in both the monolingual and bilingual setting. The goal of the course is to better understand the linguistic, psycholinguistic, sociolinguistic, and neuro-linguistic dimensions of language acquisition.

LIN 4930: Topics in Linguistics: Second Language Acquisition. In this course, students will be introduced to a wide range of theories and key constructs within the field of second language acquisition (SLA). Students will also become familiarized with SLA research methods and data analysis procedures.

LIN 4930: Topics in Linguistics: Research Methods. This course introduces students to specific research methodologies and statistical procedures used in quantitative experimental research on language. It will provide students with the means to critically evaluate quantitative research in any area of language studies and the basic tools to design and carry out a data-based research project.

LIN 4930: Topics in Linguistics: Discourse and Pragmatics. This course investigates how critical discourse techniques are derived from various disciplinary fields and explores the analytical tools that address issues about relations of class, gender and culture in everyday conversation, including conversation markers, coherence, transcription theory and practice, turn-taking, adjacency pairs, repair, identity construction, politeness theory, and conversational style.

LIN 4930: Topics in Linguistics: The Semiotics of Emoji. This course examines emojis as a social practice and explores the different functions of language in social media that facilitate intercultural interactions. It studies theories of visual rhetoric and semiotics to understand how emojis have become a communication revolution.

LIN 4930. Topics in Linguistics: Spanish in the US. This course examines Spanish in the United States, with particular emphasis on sociolinguistic aspects. Topics include varieties of Spanish in the United States, language and identity, language attitudes, maintenance and loss, language policy, bilingual education, and Spanish as a heritage language. 

LIN 4930. Topics in Linguistics: The Syntax-Phonology Interface. This course focuses on the interaction between the syntactic and the phonological component in the grammar. In particular, it explores how sound is used to convey information about sentence structure and meaning, and how syntactic structure can impact phonetic detail and prosodic phrasing.

LIN 4905r. Directed Individual Study. In this course, students arrange with individual faculty members to undertake specialized study in areas outside of or in addition to the regular curriculum. May be repeated to a maximum of six semester hours.

LIN 4930r. Topics in Linguistics. Special topics in linguistics, including language and culture, language policy, the globalization of language, and history of East Asian languages.

Other Courses: 

EXP 4640. Psychology of Language. This course focuses on the mental processes involved in language use (e.g., speech, comprehension, conversation, and writing).

FRE 3780. French Phonetics. This course targets pronunciation practice using the phonetic alphabet with the objective of improving production of standard French pronunciation. 

GER 3780. (German) Phonetics. In this course, the objectives are the acquisition of correct German sound formation by comparison with English phonetics and the improvement of the student’s conversational German through pronunciation exercises. The course is conducted in German. 

GER 3930. Special Topics: The Globalization of Language. Globalization has been used to describe a process, a condition, a system, a force, and an age. Most often, we understand globalization as a set of social processes that appear to transform our social condition by shifting forms of human contact. In this approach, language plays an essential role as far as it is a medium to communicate our identities and to function in a community. Language is also used to communicate across cultures; we use language to understand ourselves, our neighbors, and to establish contact with them. This course examines how globalization has an effect on languages, and specifically on the creation of world languages, as well as, how language effects the process of globalization.

GER 3930 / LIN 4930. Special Topics: Language and Society. Language and Society is the study of language in its social context. We will study language primarily as a means of communication and expression of identity as the identity of the speaker and of the speech community define the choice of the language. We will look at questions like: What are the different language varieties? Who speaks what language variety to whom, why, and with whom? What happens when we find languages in contact? What influences the speaker’s language attitude? How does language spread, shift, die, or revive? This course will explore the above questions in an interdisciplinary manner by using critical thinking. 

IDS 2291. Language Birth, Language Death. This course explores how languages are born, the ways and reasons why they change, and the limits of language learning and teaching. The course also examines the factors leading to language loss and language death, the reasons why we, as global citizens, should care, and how language specialists and activists attempt to bring dying languages back to life.

ITA 4930. Historical Romance Linguistics. This course focuses on the interconnectedness of the Romance languages through detailed linguistic analysis of phonological, morphological and syntactic changes in the development from Latin into various Romance varieties.

LIN 3108. Introduction to East Asian Linguistics. This course introduces linguistic features of the Chinese and Japanese languages and cognitive aspects of sentence processing of these two languages.

PHI 3220. Introduction to Philosophy of Language. This course explores major philosophical contributions to the understanding of language and its functions in communication. Discussion of the concepts of meaning, truth, reference, understanding, and interpretation. Readings include classics of 20th century philosophy.

RUS 4780*. (Russian) Phonetics. This course provides an understanding of the phonetic and phonemic structure of Russian with extensive oral practice. 

RUS 4840*. History of the Russian Literary Language. This course studies the development of the phonological and grammatical systems from the earliest records to the present.

SPN 4700*. Introduction to Hispanic Linguistics. This course examines the origin, development and present-day variation of the Spanish language and provides an introduction to Spanish linguistics from a theoretical and empirical point of view.

SPN 4701*. Spanish Second Language Acquisition (formerly SPN 4930: Studies in Hispanic Language). This course explores the cognitive processes involved in the acquisition of a second language in adult learners, and provides a detailed understanding of acquisition theories and the various pedagogical interventions available to teach a second language.

SPN 4740*. Hispanic Sociolinguistics. This course provides students with a cultural and linguistic awareness of the Spanish language and of the various and numerous societies in which it is spoken. Topics that relate to Spanish may include linguistic variation, language and gender, the sociology of language, the rights of linguistic minorities, language movements, and language policy. 

SPN 4780*. Spanish Phonetics. This course involves training in the production of acceptable speech sounds in Spanish and a knowledge of when to use those sounds (allophonic distribution). The class meets both in the classroom and in the language laboratory. The nonnative speaker can profit most from this course. 

SPN 4810*. Bilingualism in the Spanish-speaking World (formerly SPN 4930: Studies in Hispanic Language). This course explores bilingualism with an emphasis on bilingual communities in Spain, Spanish America, and the United States.

SPN 4840*. History of the Spanish Language. This course examines the origin and development of Spanish in the context of Indo-European and Romance languages, explores the linguistic changes that took place from Latin to Spanish, and compares them to those undergone by related (co)dialects and languages.

SPN 4930r*. Studies in Hispanic Language. Special topics in Hispanic language and linguistics, including Spanish in the US and Spanish sociolinguistics.

Note:  Additional courses may count with approval of the linguistics curriculum committee. 

* These courses will not count toward both a minor in linguistics and a major in a language.

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Linguistics Entrepreneurship Minor

The minor in linguistics entrepreneurship is a 12-hour course of study open to students in any major at FSU. Students completing the minor will be knowledgeable about the innovative applications of linguistics. The curriculum will provide students with the skills, tools, and resources to transition from academic life to careers using linguistics and/or languages (including in industry).

Required Courses (6 credit hours)

ENT 2000 Introduction to Entrepreneurship (Fall, Spring, Summer)

LIN 3041 Introduction to Linguistics I (Fall, Spring)

Electives (6 credit hours)

Choose one of the following linguistics electives:

• LIN 4201 Sounds of the World’s Languages (Fall)
• LIN 2004 World Languages (Fall)
• IDS 2291 Language birth, language death (Honors; Fall, Spring)
• LIN 4512 Introduction to Syntax (Spring)
• LIN 4600 Sociolinguistics (Spring)
• LIN 4623 Psycholinguistics of Bilingualism (Fall)
• LIN 4930 Special Topics: Programming for Linguists (Fall)
• Please contact the Linguistics advisor for more options.

Choose one of the approved entrepreneurship electives, for instance:

• ENT 2802 Entrepreneurship and Contemporary Society
• ENT 3173 Franchising
• ENT 3283 Women in Entrepreneurship
• ENT 4255 Negotiations

For more information, please contact Antje Muntendam, Ph.D. (amuntendam@fsu.edu).