Subject guide to Linguistics
Linguistics at Manchester
Linguistics is about the science of language. It explores questions such as how languages change over time, how children acquire their first language, how language varies between groups and across regions, the similarities and differences between world languages, and what happens when speakers of different languages come into contact.
Our teaching and research strengths cover phonetics and phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics, historical linguistics, sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, child language acquisition, forensic linguistics, field linguistics and quantitative corpus-based approaches.
Special collections in the University Library provide a rich source of archival material for linguistics students and researchers. These include the Ahmed Iqubal Ullah RACE Centre collections, the British Pop Archive (popular music and popular culture), LGBTQ+ Archives, and collections covering the Middle East, East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia and Australasia, and Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies.
Manchester is such a diverse city both culturally and linguistically, which suits my course as I am able to learn more from the community alongside my degree, and have been able to conduct research better through the local multiculturalism.
Alice Bull / Linguistics and Spanish, 2025.
Video: Discover more about studying here
Courses - 2027 entry
BA Linguistics and Modern Languages is a 4-year degree course, with an integrated Residence Abroad year.
Students can study Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian or Spanish. The degree title will state the language studied. For example, BA Linguistics and Modern Languages (Chinese).
For information about entry requirements, tuition fees, scholarships and bursaries, please visit the online prospectus.
There is also a 3-year, single honours course for Linguistics.
Course structure
BA Linguistics and Modern Languages provides students with a range of choices. When considering the choices you’d like to make, please note:
- Each year, all students study 120 credits of course units. Most course units are 20 credits unless indicated.
- The course unit titles for each year of study have been listed.
- Joint honours. The number of credits taken from Linguistics varies each year. Year 1 is 60 credits. In Years 2 and 4, students can take 40, 60 or 80 credits, although in Year 2 the number of credits is influenced by the language chosen. The remaining credits for each year of study are taken from your chosen language.
- Essential course information for students studying a 4-year degree.
Course content
Students take 60 credits of course units from Linguistics, and 60 credits of course units from their chosen language. Course units are 20 credits.
The list of course units is small but mighty! This curated list of course units has been designed to provide the essential skills and knowledge for accessing the widest range of topics in Years 2 and 4.
English Word and Sentence Structure starts with the essential building block of any communication – words. Students look at how words are formed and word families before looking at the principal parts of speech, known as lexical categories (noun, adjective, verb, adverb and preposition), and how they are used in the English language. This course unit also covers phrases, main and subordinate clauses, and active and passive voice. After this course unit, students rarely look at any sentence in the same way again.
In The Sounds of Language, students learn how sounds are made, how they can be described, analysed and transcribed, and how the sounds of English differ from those of other languages. They also study the relationship between sound and meaning.
The Study of Meaning covers topics such as how sentence meaning is composed from the meanings of the words it contains, and how sentence meaning relates to the situation it describes. Students study the structure of the lexicon, lexical meaning relations, and the role of metaphor and metonymy in meaning extension. They also consider how context contributes to the resolution of lexical and structural ambiguity and the reduction of vagueness.
Joint Honours students
60 credits taken from:
◆ English Word and Sentence Structure
◇ The Sounds of Language
◇ Study of Meaning
KEY:
◆ Semester 1
◇ Semester 2
◈ Full Year
In Year 2, Linguistics can be a minor (40 credits), joint (60 credits) or major (80 credits) subject, with the remaining credits taken from the chosen language. Course units are 20 credits unless indicated.
Some of the course units have a one-word title, and some of these terms might be new to you. The brief explanatory notes below frame the main elements of the topic as it’s taught at Manchester.
Phonology studies the sounds of languages as representations in the minds of speakers and listeners.
Typology describes and analyses the diversity of structures found in the languages of the world and uncovers similarities between languages that cannot be explained by a shared history.
Psycholinguistics covers key concepts about language and cognition, and the psychological processes involved in speech perception, word recognition and sentence processing.
Societal Multilingualism covers language diversity in urban communities and its impact on public services, communities and civic identity, using Manchester as a case study.
When undertaking research, linguistics often work with large datasets and statistics. Students that choose Quantitative Methods in Language Sciences study distributions of data, basic principles of probability, describing and visualising quantitative data, and interpreting data through hypothesis testing.
Joint Honours students
20, 40 or 60 credits chosen from:
◆ Semantics: The Composition of Meaning
◇ Phonology
◇ Analysing Grammar
20 or 40 credits chosen from:
◆ Societal Multilingualism
◇ Typology
0 or 20 credits chosen from:
◆ Language, Mind and Brain
◆ From Text to Linguistic Evidence
◆ History and Varieties of English
0, 20 or 40 credits chosen from:
◆ Quantitative Methods in Language Sciences
◆ Stylistics of English
◆ Free choice units in the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures or University College for Interdisciplinary Learning (10 or 20 credits). Some free choice units are delivered in semester 1, some are delivered in semester 2.
◇ Pragmatics: Meaning, Context and Interaction
◇ Psycholinguistics
◇ Spanish Linguistics
KEY:
◆ Semester 1
◇ Semester 2
◈ Full Year
This is the Residence Abroad year and students live in a country where their chosen language is spoken. Opportunities vary from year to year, and some opportunities are selective.
Please see Residence Abroad for information about funding and finance, the support provided to students to find suitable study or work placements, and for videos and blog posts from current students.
In Year 4, Linguistics can be a minor (40 credits), joint (60 credits) or major (80 credits) subject, with the remaining credits taken from their chosen language. Course units are 20 credits unless indicated.
The Dissertation is an optional but popular choice. Students identify their own question/topic and undertake guided research leading to a dissertation of 10,000 words. Contact hours are low (9 hours) and independent study hours are high (391 hours).
For the avoidance of doubt, Romance Linguistics is the study of languages that are directly descended from Vulgar Latin. Students are encouraged to study smaller and lesser-studied Romance languages. For example, students with an interest in Italian can choose an Italo-Romance language or Sardinian.
Students have the option of choosing one 20-credit course unit from Year 2 provided that they have not studied it before. Students who took Quantitative Methods in Language Sciences in Year 2, cannot study it in Year 4.
Joint Honours students
40, 60 or 80 credits chosen from:
◈ Dissertation (40 credits)
◆ Cognitive Linguistics
◆ Topics in Child Language Development
◆ Romance Linguistics
◆ Quantitative Methods in Language Sciences
◆ Free choice units in the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures or University College for Interdisciplinary Learning (10 or 20 credits). Some free choice units are delivered in semester 1, some are delivered in semester 2.
◇ Language Policy and Planning
◇ Forensic Linguistics
◇ Experimental Phonetics
◇ Computational Linguistics
0 or 20 credits:
◆ Course units from Year 2 that students did not take in Year 2.
KEY:
◆ Semester 1
◇ Semester 2
◈ Full Year