BeLing SS 07 (pdf, 958KB) - Institut für Sprachwissenschaft ...

Throughout semester
During semester break
Other:
Last week of semester
To be advised
Remarks: The test will take the form of an essay on any one of 15 topics from the
course.
BA Course Module:
Ling M5/II
Module Name:
Research Methods in Linguistics
BA partial module/Proseminar LIZ: Linguistics
Title:
Research Methods in Linguistics
Instructor:
R.J. Watts
Time: Tuesday 14-16
First Session: 20. 3.2007
Level:
BA: BA Major and Minor students in their 6th
semester.
Liz: Students in their Basic Studies. (Students
under the 1999 study plan: please see the
conditions for LING proseminars in HELP.)
Credit Points:
BA/MA: 2.5/Liz.:3
Open to students as Wahlbereich: Yes
No
Content: The final course in the BA programme focuses on the problems involved in
doing research generally, but in particular within the wide field of linguistics. We shall
consider what needs to be considered when carrying out research, beginning with
the motivations for doing so in the first place, the practical considerations of finding a
topic worth looking into in more detail, setting the goals of the research, planning a
research methodology, evaluating the results of the project embarked on and finding
practical applications from the results obtained. Linguistics is a very wide field
indeed, even when restricted to the English language, ranging from theoretical issues
involving the various levels of linguistic description (phonology, morphology, syntax,
semantics and pragmatics), the various areas in which linguistics plays an
interdisciplinary role with other academic disciplines (e.g. sociolinguistics,
psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, anthropological linguistics, historical
linguistics, conversation analysis, discourse analysis, etc.) and practical overlaps
such as language teaching and linguistics, literary criticism and linguistics, forensic
linguistics. In all these fields of interest the research goals, the theoretical
underpinning of the research and the methodology used will be different, sometimes
radically so. The course will be held like a lecture, but students will have the
opportunity to be active and are expected to complete different kinds of assignment
throughout the course.
Texts: No specific texts; texts to be used will be introduced as the occasion and the
opportunity permit.
Aims: To give students an idea of the wide field of research interests in English
linguistics and, more specifically, to prepare those wishing to continue with a Masters
programme in the subject with the necessary bases on which to develop their own
research interests.
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