Linguistic Science

Core Theoretical Linguistics - Structural Linguistics

1. 1. Phonetics- Phonetics studies the physical properties of speech sounds—how they are produced, transmitted, and perceived. Example: Measuring how the tongue and lips move when producing the sounds in “tea” vs. “key.”

   2. Phonology- Phonology studies how sounds are organized and patterned in a language’s sound system. Example: Explaining why English allows “str” in “street” but not “rtst.”

   3. Experimental Phonetics- Experimental phonetics uses laboratory methods and instruments to test hypotheses about speech sounds and perception. Example: Using acoustic analysis to study how vowel length changes when speakers talk faster.

   4. Morphology- Morphology studies the internal structure of words and how meaningful units (morphemes) combine. Example: Analyzing how un-, happy, and -ness combine to form “unhappiness.”

   5. Syntax- Syntax studies how words are organized into phrases and sentences according to grammatical rules. Example: Explaining why “The cat chased the dog” is grammatical but “Cat the dog chased” is not.

   6. Formal Semantics- Formal semantics studies how sentence meaning is computed using logical and mathematical principles. Example: Representing the meaning of “Every student read a book” and showing its two possible interpretations.

   7. Lexical Semantics- Lexical semantics studies the meanings of words and how those meanings relate to each other. Example: Investigating why “dog” and “animal” are related but “dog” and “table” are not.

   8. Pragmatics- Pragmatics studies how meaning is shaped by context, speaker intention, and shared knowledge. Example: Understanding why “It’s cold in here” can mean “Please close the window.”

   9. Discourse- Discourse studies how language is structured and interpreted across longer stretches of conversation or text. Example: Analyzing how pronouns like “she” refer back to earlier people in a story.

   10. Linguistic Typology- Linguistic typology compares languages to identify patterns and universals in how they structure grammar and sound systems.
       Example: Classifying languages by word order (SVO vs. SOV vs. VSO).

   11. Cognitive Linguistics- Cognitive linguistics studies language as part of general human cognition rather than as a separate formal system. Example: Showing how spatial concepts like “up” and “down” structure abstract ideas like “high status.”

   12. Metaphor- Metaphor studies how abstract ideas are understood through concrete conceptual mappings in language and thought. Example: Analyzing why we talk about arguments as war: “defend a point,” “attack a claim.”

   13. Gesture, Cognition, and Culture- This field studies how hand movements, bodily actions, and cultural practices interact with spoken language and thought. Example: Comparing how different cultures use pointing or hand gestures while telling stories.

Cognitive & Biological Linguistics (mind/brain) Language in the Brain and Mind

1. 1. Psycholinguistics- Psycholinguistics studies how language is processed, produced, and understood in real time by the human mind. Example: Measuring how long it takes people to recognize a word while reading a sentence.

   2. Neurolinguistics- Neurolinguistics studies how language is represented and processed in the brain. Example: Using brain imaging to see which areas activate when someone hears a sentence versus a list of words.

   3. Language Acquisition- Language acquisition studies how humans learn language, especially how children acquire their first language. Example: Tracking when children begin using past tense forms like “walked” instead of “walk.”

   4. Phonological Development- Phonological development studies how children acquire the sound system of their language over time. Example: Examining why children say “wabbit” instead of “rabbit.”

   5. Communication Disorders- Communication disorders studies impairments in speech, language, and comprehension and their cognitive or neurological causes. Example: Analyzing why a person with aphasia struggles to form grammatical sentences after a stroke.

   6. Language and Thought- Language and thought studies how language influences or reflects human perception, reasoning, and cognition. Example: Investigating whether speakers of different languages categorize colors differently

   7. The Mind and Mathematics- This field explores the relationship between language, numerical cognition, and abstract symbolic reasoning. Example: Studying how children learn number words and how this affects their ability to understand quantities.

   8. Evolution of Language / Biolinguistics- Evolution of language (biolinguistics) studies the biological origins and evolutionary basis of human language capacity.
      Example: Comparing human grammar abilities with communication systems in primates or birds.

Social & Cultural Linguistics: Language in Society, Identity, and Framing

1. 1. Sociolinguistics- Sociolinguistics studies how language varies and changes across social groups and situations. Example: Analyzing how pronunciation differs between younger and older speakers in the same city.

   2. Sociophonetics- Sociophonetics combines phonetics and sociolinguistics to study how social factors influence speech sounds. Example: Measuring how vowel pronunciation changes with gender or social class.

   3. Speech in Society- Speech in society examines how speaking practices reflect and shape social relationships and norms.
      Example: Studying how politeness strategies differ between formal and casual conversations.

   4. Linguistic Diversity- Linguistic diversity studies the range of languages and dialects and their social, cultural, and political significance. Example: Mapping the number of languages spoken in a multilingual city.

   5. Bilingualism- Bilingualism studies how individuals and communities use and manage more than one language. Example: Investigating how bilingual speakers switch languages within a single conversation.

   6. Bilingual Individuals and Societies- This field focuses on the interaction between bilingual speakers and the social structures that shape multilingual communities. Example: Examining how schools influence language use in immigrant families.

   7. Language and Gender- Language and gender studies how language reflects, constructs, and challenges gender identities and roles. Example: Analyzing differences in conversational styles between men and women.

   8. Language and Sex- Language and sex examines how language is used to express sexuality, desire, and sexual identity. Example: Studying how euphemisms and slang for sex vary across cultures.

   9. Language of Advertising- Language of advertising studies how linguistic techniques are used to persuade and influence consumers. Example: Analyzing why slogans use rhyme or metaphor to make products memorable.

   10. Writing as Framing- Writing as framing studies how written language shapes how events and ideas are interpreted. Example: Comparing how the same news event is framed differently in two articles.

   11. The Linguistics of Television- This field analyzes language use in popular media as a reflection of social identity and cultural values. Example: Studying how characters’ speech styles index class or personality in a sitcom.

   12. Language in the United States: a Capsule History- This field examines the historical development of languages and language policies in the U.S.
       Example: Tracing how immigration shaped English dialects in different regions.

   13. Language Spread- Language spread studies how languages expand geographically and socially over time. Example: Explaining how English became a global language through colonization and media.

   14. Language and Linguistics- Language and linguistics provides an overview of what language is and how linguistics studies it scientifically.
       Example: Introducing core questions such as “What is a word?” or “How do children learn grammar?”

Historical & Evolutionary Linguistics (language through time)

1. 1. Introduction to the History of the English Language- This field studies how English has changed over time through sound change, borrowing, and social history. Example: The word “knight” used to be pronounced /knixt/ with a hard k and a throat sound like German Bach—a trace of medieval pronunciation.

   2. Comparative and Historical Linguistics- Comparative and historical linguistics reconstructs earlier languages by comparing related languages and tracking systematic sound changes. Example: By comparing father (English), pater (Latin), and vater (German), linguists reconstructed the Proto-Indo-European word *ph₂tḗr—a word spoken 6,000 years ago by people with no writing system

   3. Indo-European Comparative Linguistics- This field focuses on reconstructing the ancient Indo-European language family and its branches.
      Example: The English word “three,” Latin “tres,” and Sanskrit “trayas” all descend from the same ancestral word, revealing a prehistoric counting system shared across Europe and India.

   4. American Languages- This field studies the indigenous languages of the Americas, many of which have radically different grammatical structures from European languages. Example: In Mohawk, a single word can mean “I made him give it to her again”—packing an entire English sentence into one verb through complex morphology.

   5. Language Revitalization: Theory and Practice- Language revitalization studies how endangered languages can be documented, taught, and brought back into daily use. Example: Hawaiian went from near extinction in the 1980s to being spoken by thousands of children today through immersion schools called Pūnana Leo (“language nests”).

   6. Language Spread- Language spread studies how languages expand through migration, trade, conquest, and media. Example: English became global not because it’s linguistically “better,” but because of the British Empire, the Industrial Revolution, and Hollywood—turning a small island language into a world language.

   7. Evolution of Language / Biolinguistics- This field studies the biological origins of humans’ unique capacity for complex language. Example: Songbirds learn their songs in stages much like human babies learn speech, suggesting deep biological roots for vocal learning.

Applied & Educational Linguistics- Language in Real World Practice

1. 1. Communication Disorders- Communication disorders studies impairments in speech, language, and comprehension and their cognitive or neurological causes. Example: A person with Broca’s aphasia may only be able to say things like “walk… dog… park” but still fully understand complex sentences—revealing that grammar and meaning live in different parts of the brain.

   2. Language Revitalization: Theory and Practice- This field studies how endangered languages can be documented, taught, and restored to everyday use. Example: The Wampanoag language of Massachusetts was revived after 150 years of silence using only old missionary bibles and legal documents—children now speak it again as a first language.

   3. Bilingualism- Bilingualism studies how individuals and communities use, process, and manage more than one language. Example: Many bilingual speakers report having different “personalities” in different languages—feeling more emotional in Spanish but more formal in English.

   4. Writing as Framing- Writing as framing studies how linguistic choices shape how readers interpret events and ideas. Example: Calling protesters “freedom fighters” versus “rioters” frames the same event in completely different moral terms.

   5. Linguistic Analysis of Literature- This field applies linguistic tools to understand how literary texts create meaning and emotional impact. Example: Analyzing how Shakespeare’s unusual word order (“Gone is my father”) creates dramatic emphasis and rhythm.

   6. Language of Advertising- Language of advertising studies how words, sounds, and metaphors are used to persuade and influence consumers. Example: Why brands love invented words like “Spotify,” “Kodak,” or “Pepsi”—they sound memorable but carry no prior meaning, making them perfect vessels for branding.

   7. The English Vocabulary- This field studies the origins, structure, and patterns of English words and their meanings. Example: English has synonyms like kingly (Germanic), royal (French), and regal (Latin), all meaning “relating to a king,” reflecting three waves of conquest in English history.

   8. The Sounds of English- This field examines the sound system of English and how it varies across dialects and accents. Example: The fact that “pin” and “pen” sound identical in many Southern U.S. accents but different in others shows how even basic vowels evolve region by region.

Methodology & Data-Driven Linguistics

1. 1. Quantitative Methods in Linguistics- Quantitative methods use statistics and mathematical models to analyze patterns in language data. Example: Discovering that people are more likely to drop the “g” in “running” → “runnin’” when speaking casually, and showing this with probability curves rather than anecdotes.

   2. Linguistic Data - Linguistic data studies how language evidence is collected, organized, and interpreted scientifically. Example: Comparing millions of real sentences from the internet to test whether “strong coffee” is more common than “powerful coffee.”

   3. Corpus Linguistics - Definition: Corpus linguistics studies language using massive digital collections of real spoken and written texts (corpora). Example: Using billions of words of text to discover that “going to” is slowly replacing “will” for future tense in everyday English.

   4. Computational Linguistics / Natural Language Processing- Computational linguistics builds algorithms that allow computers to analyze and generate human language. Example: Training a model to recognize sarcasm in tweets or to translate between English and Swahili automatically.

   5. Field Linguistics - Field linguistics involves going into communities to document and analyze languages directly from native speakers. Example: Recording the last fluent speakers of a language in the Amazon and discovering grammatical structures never before described, like verbs that change depending on whether you saw an event or heard about it.

   6. Concepts, Theories, and Methodologies - This field examines the foundational ideas and frameworks that linguists use to study language. Example: Debating whether grammar is best modeled as a set of rules (formal theory) or as patterns learned from usage (usage-based theory).

   7. Introduction to Linguistic Science- This field introduces linguistics as an empirical science, covering its core questions, tools, and discoveries. Example: Learning that babies can distinguish between speech sounds from all languages before narrowing down to their native language by age one.

Interdisciplinary & Special Topics

1. 1. 1. Music and Language- Music and language studies the shared structures and cognitive foundations of musical and linguistic systems. Example: Both sentences and melodies have “syntax”: a wrong note in a song feels as jarring as a wrong word in a sentence, suggesting the brain processes musical and linguistic structure in similar ways.

      2. Gesture, Cognition, and Culture- This field studies how bodily movement and gesture interact with language, thought, and cultural meaning.
         Example: In some cultures, pointing with the finger is rude, so speakers point with their lips instead—showing that even gestures have grammar and cultural rules.

      3. The Mind and Mathematics- This field explores how language supports abstract reasoning and numerical thought. Example: Some Amazonian languages have no exact number words beyond “one,” “two,” and “many,” and speakers struggle with exact arithmetic—showing how language scaffolds mathematical concepts.

      4. Linguistic Analysis of Literature- Linguistic analysis of literature uses tools from linguistics to explain how literary texts achieve meaning and aesthetic effect. Example: Analyzing how repetition and sound patterns in Edgar Allan Poe’s “Nevermore” create a hypnotic emotional rhythm.

      5. Metaphor- Metaphor studies how humans understand abstract ideas through concrete conceptual mappings in language and thought. Example: We talk about time as money—“save time,” “waste time,” “spend time”—revealing how economic thinking shapes how we experience life.

      6. The Linguistics of Lord of the Rings- This field analyzes constructed languages (conlangs) and linguistic world-building in fictional universes. Example: Tolkien created full language families (Quenya, Sindarin) with historical sound changes, so Elvish languages evolved just like real ones—complete with ancient roots and poetic registers.