The major in Linguistics contributes to ICU’s Liberal Arts education by helping to illuminate the nature of human language through the scientific exploration of this uniquely human trait. Without language, where would we be? With it, what are we?

Using rigorous and systematic methodologies (including, but not limited to experimental methods), we seek understanding, not only of the central structures and systems of language, but also of some of the most fundamental and complex links between language and the life of the mind and the lives of humans as social and cultural beings. These interconnections include those of language with cognition, reasoning, the brain, culture, and society, language learning, and by extension, language teaching, and the historical dimension of language change. As such, the major provides not only for examination of the central systems of language (phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics), it also contributes to the interdisciplinary nature of ICU’s curriculum by supporting majors offered by the Media, Communication, and Culture and Language Education. In this way, there are both theoretical and applied dimensions to the majors’ offerings. Moreover, by judicious selection of courses, students of Linguistics can concentrate in a specific language, in particular, English, French, or Japanese. Through investigation of the details of more than one language, students will realize that while language does indeed vary from culture to culture, there are also essential universal dimensions common to users of all languages.

The mission of this major is to help students develop both responsible approaches to the acquisition of knowledge and better understanding of the nature of language and the role it plays in the inner and outer lives of our species.