LINGUISTICS
(AS) {LING}
American Sign Language and Irish Gaelic courses are sponsored
by the Department of Linguistics and offered
through the Penn Language Center. Please see
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/plc/
Undergraduate Courses
010. Fundamentals of the Grammar
of Standard English. (L) Staff. Offered through CGS.
LING 010 uses a combination of traditional and modern approaches
to grammar to improve the student's knowledge
of the English language. The course covers
a wide range of topics, including traditional
grammar (parts of speech and sentence diagramming),
prescriptive grammar/stylistics (dangling participles,
split infinitives, etc.), modern generative syntax
(sentence structure, pronoun reference), discourse
structure, and composition. LING 010 is
of use to anyone who wishes to strengthen his
or her oral and written communication skills
as well as to those students who plan to teach
English or language arts.
SM 054. Bilingualism in History. (A) Sankoff. Freshman Seminar.
This course takes a historical approach to tracing (and reconstructing)
the nature of language contacts and bilingualism,
over the course of human history. Contacts
between groups of people speaking different languages,
motivated by trade, migration, conquest and intermarriage,
are documented from earliest records. At
the same time, differences in socio-historical
context have created different kinds of linguistic
outcomes. Some languages have been completely
lost; new languages have been created. In
still other cases, the nature and structure of
language has been radically altered. The
course introduces the basics of linguistic structure
through a discussion of which aspects of language
have proved to be relatively stable, and which
are readily altered, under conditions of bilingualism.
SM 057. Language and Popular Culture.
(A) Distribution
Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior
only. Staff.
The purpose of this course is to examine representations of
human (and non-human) language as they appear
in popular media such as the film, television,
cartoons, advertising, and other popular genres.
Popular (mis)conceptions of what human language
is like will be contrasted with more scientific
conceptions of language based on the knowledge
constructed in linguistics, psychology, cognitive
science, anthropology, and other disciplines.
SM 058. Language and Cognition. (B) Living World Sector. All classes.
Embick.
Because of its apparently species-specific nature, language
is central to the study of the human mind. We
will pursue an interdisciplinary approach to
such questions in this course, moving from the
structures of language as revealed by linguistic
theory to connections with a number of related
fields that are broadly referred to as the "cognitive
sciences". A number of specific topics
will be addressed from these related fields. The
structures of language and its role in human
cognition will be set against the background
of animal communication systems. We will
examine the question of how children acquire
extremely complex linguistic systems without
explicit instruction, drawing on psychological
work on the language abilities of children. Additional
attention will be focused on the question of
how language is represented and computed in the
brain, and, correspondingly, how this is studied
with brain-imaging techniques.
L/R 102. Introduction to Sociolinguistics.
(B) Society
Sector. All classes. Labov/Sankoff. Satisfies
Quantitative Data Analysis.
Human language viewed from a social and historical perspective. Students
will acquire the tools of linguistic analysis
through interactive computer programs, covering
phonetics, phonology and morphology, in English
and other languages. These techniques will
then be used to trace social differences in the
use of language, and changing patterns of social
stratification. The course will focus on
linguistic changes in progress in American society,
in both mainstream and minority communities,
and the social problems associated with them. Students
will engage in field projects to search for the
social correlates of linguistic behavior, and
use quantitative methods to analyze the results.
103. Introduction to Language:
Language Structure and Verbal Art. (A) Arts & Letters Sector. All Classes. Noyer.
The purpose of this course is to explore the relationship
between linguistic structure and the use of language
for artistic purposes. The syllabus is
organized as a sequence of units, each built
around a particular theme. These include
the sound structure of poetry (meter, rhyme,
and other linguistic patterns in Jabberwocky,
the Odyssey, Shakespeare, the Troubadours, and
others); how precise linguistic data can be used
to solve an outstanding literary problem (determining
the approximate date when Beowulf was composed);
and the structure of folktales of various cultures
and of narratives of everyday experience .
105. (CIS 140, COGS001, PHIL044,
PSYC107) Introduction to Cognitive Science.
(A) Richards/Ungar.
Cognitive Science is founded on the realization that many
problems in the analysis of human and artificial
intelligence require an interdisciplinary approach. The
course is intended to introduce undergraduates
from many areas to the problems and characteristic
concepts of Cognitive Science, drawing on formal
and empirical approaches from the parent disciplines
of computer science, linguistics, neuroscience,
philosophy and psychology. The topics covered
include Perception, Action, Learning, Language,
Knowledge Representation, and Inference, and
the relations and interactions between such modules. The
course shows how the different views from the
parent disciplines interact, and identifies some
common themes among the theories that have been
proposed. The course pays particular attention
to the distinctive role of computation in such
theories, and provides an introduction to some
of the main directions of current research in
the field.
L/R 106. Introduction to Formal Linguistics.
(A) Staff.
This course is intended as an introduction to the application
of formal language theory, automata theory, and
other computational models to the understanding
of natural human language. Topics include
regular languages and finite state automata;
context-free languages and pushdown automata;
recursive transition networks; augmented transition
networks; tree-adjoining grammars.
110. Introduction to Language Change.
(B) History
& Tradition Sector. All classes. Ringe.
This course covers the principles of language change and the
methods of historical linguistics on an elementary
level. The systematic regularity of change,
the reasons for that regularity, and the exploitation
of regularity in linguistic reconstruction are
especially emphasized.
Examples are drawn from a wide variety of languages,
both familiar and unfamiliar. Since there
are no prerequisites, the course includes mini-introductions
to articulatory phonetics, basic phonology (especially
the principle of contrast), and basic morphology
(especially inflection), all of which must be understood
in order to understand the ways in which they change.
L/R 115. Writing Systems. (A) History & Tradition Sector. All
classes. Buckley.
The historical origin of writing in Sumeria, Egypt, China,
and Mesoamerica; the transmission of writing
across languages and cultures, including the
route from Phoenician to Greek to Etruscan to
Latin to English; the development of individual
writing systems over time; the traditional classification
of written symbols (ideographic, logographic,
syllabic, alphabetic); methods of decipherment;
differences between spoken and written language;
how linguistic structure influences writing,
and is reflected by it; social and psychological
aspects of writing.
135. (PSYC135) Psychology of Language.
(M) Dahan.
Prerequisite(s): LING 001 or PSYC 001.
This course describes the nature of human language, how it
is used to speak and comprehend, and how it is
learned. Subtopics include animal communication,
language pathologies, second-language learning,
and language in special populations (such as
Down Syndrome and autistic children, and children
born deaf or blind).
160. (AFRC160) Introduction to
African American and Latino English. (A) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009
& prior only. Labov.
An introduction to the use and structure of dialects of English
used by the African American and Latino communities
in the United States. It is an academically
based service learning course. The field
work component involves the study of the language
and culture of everyday life and the application
of this knowledge to programs for raising the
reading levels of elementary school children.
SM 161. (AFRC161) The Sociolinguistics
of Reading: A Service Learning Seminar. (A) Distribution Course in Society. Class
of 2009 & prior only. Labov. Prerequisite(s):
LING/AFRC 160 or permission of instructor.
This course will be concerned with the application of current
knowledge of dialect differences to reduce the
minority differential in reading achievement. Members
will conduct projects and design computer programs
to reduce cultural distance between teachers
and students in local schools and to develop
knowledge of word and sound structure.
SM 202. (LING502) Introduction to
Field Linguistics. (M) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 001, 102 or 330, or permission
of instructor.
Instruction and practice in primary linguistic research, producing
a grammatical sketch and a lexicon through work
with native-speaker informants and some reference
materials. Informant work will be common
with LING 502.
240. (GRMN210) Structure of a Language. (M) Staff.
250. Introduction to Syntax. (B) Santorini. This course was formerly
numbered LING 150 and is identical in content.
This course is an introduction to current syntactic theory,
covering the principles that govern phrase structure
(the composition of phrases and sentences), movement
(dependencies between syntactic constituents),
and binding (the interpretation of different
types of noun phrases). Although much of
the evidence discussed in the class will come
from English, evidence from other languages will
also play an important role, in keeping with
the comparative and universalist perspective
of modern syntactic theory.
255. Formal Semantics and Cognitive
Science. (K) Staff.
This course introduces the components and formal mechanisms
underlying meaning in human language and uses
them as a window on the human mind, its psychological
development and adult cognitive processes. Topics
include what kinds of concepts a noun or a determiner
can encode; how children learn the meaning of
words; how these "atoms" of meaning
are combined in a mathematical procedure to yield
the meaning of sentences; how semantic ambiguities
are processed psychologically; and the development
of a theory of mind. Formal tools from
Set Theory and Predicate Logic will be introduced
and applied both to the linguistic and to the
cognitive characterization of meaning.
270. Language Acquisition. (M) Yang. An introduction to language
acquisition in children and the development of
related cognitive and perceptual systems. Topics
include the nature of speech perception and the
specialization to the native language; the structure
and acquisition of words; children's phonology;
the development of grammar; bilingualism and
second language acquisition; language learning
impairments; the biological basis of language
acquisition; the role in language learning in
language change.
Intended for any undergraduate interested in the
psychology and development of language.
SM 300. Tutorial in Linguistics. (A) Santorini. Prerequisite(s): Senior
status or permission of the instructor. Majors
only.
This tutorial allows students to deal in a concentrated manner
with selected major topics in linguistics by
means of extensive readings and research. Two
topics are studied during the semester, exposing
students to a range of sophisticated linguistic
questions.
301. Conference. (C)
An independent study for majors in linguistics.
310. History of the English Language.
(A) Ringe/Kroch.
This course traces the linguistic history of English from
its earliest reconstructable ancestor, Proto-Indo-European,
to the present. We focus especiallly on
significant large-scale changes, such as the
restructuring of the verb system in Proto-Germanic,
the intricate interaction of sound changes in
the immediate prehistory of Old English, syntactic
change in Middle English, and the diversification
of English dialects since 1750.
319. (LING519, SAST333) Topics
in Dravidian Linguistics. (M) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.
We will begin with an overview of the Dravidian family as
a whole (languages, speakers, history of research),
then followed by a general structural description
of a particular modern Dravidian language (such
as Tamil or Kannada), and concluding with a focus
on a number of topics of crucial interest in
the field (phonological, morphological, syntactic,
sociolinguistic, historical) including close
reading of recent scholarship in these areas.
Students will write a paper on a topic of their
own theoretical interest, using data from a selected
Dravidian language.
330. (LING503) Sound Structure
of Language. (B) Noyer.
An introduction to phonetics and phonology. Topics include
articulatory phonetics (the anatomy of the vocal
tract; how speech sounds are produced); transcription
(conventions for representing the sounds of the
world's languages); classification (how speech
sounds are classified and represented cognitively
through distinctive features); phonology (the
grammar of speech sounds in various languages:
their patterning and interaction); advanced issues
in phonological representation (syllables and
feature geometry); Optimality Theory (constraint-based
versus derivational phonological grammars).
398. Senior Thesis. (C) Staff.
404. Morphological Theory. (M) Embick.
This course will explore some issues concerning the internal
structure of words. After a brief introduction
to some basic terms and concepts, we will discuss
the interaction of morphology with phonology.
We will look both at how morphology conditions
phonological rules and how phonology conditions
morphology. Then we will turn to the interaction
of syntax and morphology. We will look at some
problems raised by inflectional morphology, clitics
and compounds. The main requirement for the
class will be a series of homework exercises in
morphological analysis.
SM 411. Old English. (M) Kroch.
The main purpose of this course is to teach students to read
Old English ("Anglo-Saxon"), chiefly
but not exclusively for research in linguistics.
Grammar will be heavily emphasized; there will
also be lectures on the immediate prehistory
of the language, since the morphology of Old
English was made unusually complex by interacting
sound changes. In the first eight weeks
we will work through Moore and Knott's "Elements
of Grammar" and learn the grammar; the remainder
of the term will be devoted to reading texts.
440. Pidgins and Creoles. (H) Sankoff.
The origins and development of pidgins (languages of intercommunication
that have evolved for practical reasons in situations
of trade, conquest, or colonization, and spoken
as second or auxiliary languages) and creoles
(languages with native speakers that have developed
from previous pidgins); relations between creoles
and other languages; implications of creole studies
for general theories of language and language
change.
450. Languages in Contact. (I) Sankoff.
Multilingualism from a societal, individual, and linguistic
point of view. The different types of contacts
between populations and between individuals which
give rise to multilingualism. Second-language
acquisition and the problem of the "critical
age." Cognitive and cultural aspects of
multilingualism; applications to the teaching
of languages.
"Bidialectalism." Code-switching (alternation), interference and
integration: the mutual influences of languages in contact. Political and social
aspects of multilingualism.
SM 470. (AFST260, ENGL260, LALS260)
Narrative Analysis. (M) Distribution Course in Arts & Letters. Class of 2009 & prior
only. Labov.
The course will develop our understanding of narrative structure
on the basis of oral narratives of personal experience,
told by speakers from a wide range of geographic
backgrounds and social classes.
It will link the principles governing oral narratives
to the narratological examination of myth, literature
and film by Propp, Greimas, Prince, Chatman, and
others.The principles that emerge from the study
of oral narrative will be re-examined in literary
narrative, including Scandinavian, Greek and Hebrew
epics, medieval romances, film, and modern novels,
with attention to the differences between vernacular,
literary and academic style. The class will
then consider the work of psychologists on how
narratives are remembered and understood, based
on the causal network theory of Trabasso, and apply
these principles to narratives written to teach
children to read, particularly those designed to
reflect the cultural and linguistic framework of
African American children.
Graduate Courses
501. Survey Sociolinguistics. (J) Sankoff. Prerequisite(s): LING 102
or equivalent.
Speech communities as a focus for the understanding of language
evolution and change: language variation in time
and space. The relationship between language
structure and language use; between language
change and social change. Populations as
differentiated by age, sex, social class, race,
and ethnicity, and the relationship of these
factors to linguistic differentiation.
SM 502. (LING202) Introduction to
Field Linguistics. (M) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 520, LING 530 or permission
of instructor.
Instruction and practice in primary linguistic research, combining
study of reference materials and work with native-speakers. The
emphasis will be on quickly building a grammatical
sketch and a lexicon adequate to support further
research. Each student will do a term project
investigating some phenomenon of general interest.
503. (LING330) Sound Structure
of Language. (B) Noyer.
An introduction to articulatory and acoustic phonetics; phonetic
transcription; basic concepts and methods of
phonological analysis. Term project required.
505. Research Topics. (C)
A reading course on specialized topics in linguistics.
Arranged by instructor.
SM 506. Dynamics of Language. (C) Yang.
This course introduces the tools, techniques, as well as current
research on the approach to language as a dynamical
system, which seeks to fruitfully integrate linguistic
theory, psycholinguistics, corpus linguistics,
and historical linguistics through the means
of mathematical modeling. Topics include:
string processing, dynamical systems and stability,
stochastic processes, mathematical models of
population dynamics, and dynamical models of
language learning, processing, and change.
510. Introduction to Historical
and Comparative Linguistics. (A) Ringe.
Synchronic and diachronic systems. Analogic processes. Semantic
change. Effects of contact. Internal reconstruction. Comparative
method and reconstruction.
519. (LING319, SAST333) Topics
in Dravidian Linguistics. (M) Staff.
After an overview of the Dravidian family as a whole (languages,
speakers, history of research), and a general
structural description on one particular language
(Tamil or Kannada), this course will then focus
on a number of topics of crucial interest in
the field. Most recently, this has been
grammaticalization, i.e. how languages recruit
and utilize lexical material as grammatical morphemes
over time. After a general review of this
topic, grammaticalization in Dravidian in particular
will be examined, especially how this works in
highly diglossic languages such as Tamil. Students
will write a paper on a topic of their own theoretical
interest, using data from a selected Dravidian
language, or a language with similar problems.
L/L 520. Introduction to Phonetics.
(A) Yuan.
Prerequisite(s): An introductory course in
linguistics, or consent of instructor.
Speech: its linguistic transcription, its quantitative physical
description, and its relationship to the categories
and dimensions of language structure and use. The
physical basis of speech: acoustics, vocal tract
anatomy and physiology, hearing and speech perception,
articulation and motor control. Phonetic variation
and change. Prosody: stress, intonation,
phrasing speech rate. Phonetic instrumentation,
the design and interpretation of phonetic experiments,
and the use of phonetic evidence in linguistic
research, with emphasis on computer techniques. Introduction
to speech signal processing. Speech technology:
introduction to speech recognition, text-to-speech
synthesis, speech coding. This course will
emphasize the phonetics of natural speech, and
its connections to issues in other areas of linguistics
and cognitive science.
L/L 521. Introduction to Phonetics II. (B) Yuan. Prerequisite(s): LING 520.
525. (CIS 558) Computer Analysis
and Modeling of Biological Signals and Systems.
(A) Liberman.
A hands-on signal and image processing course for non-EE graduate
students needing these skills. We will
go through all the fundamentals of signal and
image processing using computer exercises developed
in MATLAB. Examples will be drawn from
speech analysis and synthesis, computer vision,
and biological modeling.
530. Phonology I. (A) Noyer. Prerequisite(s): LING 503 or
equivalent.
First half of a year-long introduction to the formal study
of phonology. Basic concepts in articulatory
phonetics; the distribution of sounds (phonemes
and allophones); underlying and surface forms,
and how to relate them using both ordered-rule
and surface-constraint approaches.
The survey of theoretical topics in this term includes
distinctive features (context, organization, underspecification);
the autosegmental representation of tone; and the
theory of phonological domains and their interaction
with morphological and syntactic constituency. Emphasizes
hands-on analysis of a wide range of data.
531. Phonology II. (B) Buckley. Prerequisite(s): LING 530.
Second half of a year-long introduction; continues LING 530. Topics
to be surveyed include syllable structure and
moraic theory; the prosodic hierarchy; the properties
and representation of geminates; templatic and
prosodic morphology; reduplication and emergence
of the unmarked; and metrical phonology (properties
of stress, foot typology, and issues of constituency).
Emphasizes hands-on analysis of a wide range
of data.
535. Workshop in Phonetics and
Phonology. (M) Buckley,
Noyer. Prerequisite(s): LING 530-531, or equivalent.
This course is intended for students who have had at least
one year of graduate-level phonological theory
and are interested in developing a research paper
on a particular topic in phonology. Each
student will present his or her topic several
times during the semester as the analysis develops,
with feedback from the instructors and other
students to improve the organization and content
of the analysis. The goal is an end product
appropriate for delivery at a national conference
or submission to a journal.
540. (SAST537) Language Policy.
(M) Staff.
This course examines the sociolinguistic context of modern
multilingual states and the impact of their linguistic
policies on the cultural identity of linguistic
minorities. In the United States, the history
of multilingualism will be examined, tracing
the growth of linguistic assimilationism and
the rebirth of assertive bilingualism, and comparing
it with policies of other multilingual societies
in Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin America. Attention
is paid to typological aspects of bilingualism,
controversies surrounding intelligence and multilingualism,
as well as attitudes toward language loyalty
and ethno-linguistic identity in various societies.
Special cultural factors such as the role of religion,
immigrational recency, literacy, socio-economic
status, race, educational level and ethnic pride
will be surveyed in terms of their impact on maintenance
and/or assimilation.
Students will undertake a term project examining
some aspect of the above topics in a real or historical
community of their preference.
SM 548. Proof Theoretic Foundations
of Linguistic Structure. (A) Clark.
This course covers the fundamentals of proof theory and logic
as they apply to linguistics. The notion
of a well-formed derivation is fundamental to
all flavors of formal linguistics and all sub-disciplines
of linguistics-phonology, morphology, syntax
and semantics. It rests, ultimately, on
axiomatic systems developed by logicians to encode
the process of valid formal reasoning. We
will place a particular emphasis on constructive
methods and, where appropriate, develop connections
with parsing theory, automatic theorem proving
and computational semantics. Time permitting,
we will consider some introductory topics in
substructural logic-systems that encode some
proper sub-part of first order logic. These
systems have proven very important in planning,
theorem proving, dynamic logic and computational
linguistics. The course is intended as
a preparation for Linguistics 553 (Formal Semantics
I). It includes a review of the propositional
and predicate calculus before introducing tableaux
and resolution systems, unification, axiomatic
systems, natural deduction and sequent calculi. The
latter two systems are particularly relevant
for grammar formalisms like phrase structure
grammars, TAGs and Categorial Grammar.
549. (CIS 477) Mathematical Techniques
in Natural Language Processing. (A) Joshi.
Basic concepts of set theory, relations and functions, properties
of relations. Basic concepts of algebra. Grammars,
languages, and automata-finite state grammars,
regular expressions, finite state transducers,
context-free grammars and pushdown automata. Context-sensitive
grammars- string context sensitivity and structural
context-sensitivity.
Mildly context-sensitive grammars. Turingmachines. Grammars
ad deductive systems, parsing as deduction. Stochastic
grammars. The course will deal with these
topics in a very basic and introductory manner,
i.e., the key ideas of the proofs and not detailed
proofs will be presented. More importantly,
throughout the course plenty of linguistic examples
to bring out the linguistic relevance of these
topics will be discussed.
550. Syntax I. (A) Kroch.
A general introduction at the graduate level to the analysis
of sentence structure. The approach taken
is that of contemporary generative-transformational
grammar.
551. Syntax II. (B) Embick. Prerequisite(s): LING 550
or permission of instructor.
The second half of a year-long introduction to the formal
study of natural language syntax. Topics
to be covered include grammatical architecture;
derivational versus representational statement
of syntactic principles; movement and locality;
the interface of syntax and semantics; argument
structure; and other topics. The emphasis
is on reading primary literature and discussing
theoretical approaches, along with detailed case-studies
of specific syntactic phenomena in different
languages.
553. Formal Semantics I. (B) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 548.
Linguistics 553 will cover those elements of logic that are
fundamental to semantic theory. The course
will treat basic set theory, propositional logic
(formulas, truth-functional connectives, truth
tables), predicate logic (quantification, interpretation
relative to a model) and natural inference. Given
these foundations, we will then cover intensional
logic and type theory. The formal discussion
will be highlighted with semantic treatments
of some natural language phenomena (Montague's
analysis of a fragment of English, definite descriptions,
generalized quantifiers, reference in opaque
contexts, perception verbs).
554. Formal Semantics II. (A) Clark. Prerequisite(s): LING 550-553,
or equivalent.
An introduction to those aspects of mathematics relevant for
the formal analysis of linguistic meaning. Emphasis
is laid on the following areas: semantic automata,
type theory, combinatory logic, the lambda calculus,
proof theory, the lambeck calculus and update
logic.
SM 556. Historical Syntax. (M) Kroch. Prerequisite(s): LING 551 or
the equivalent.
Introduction to the study of the syntax of languages attested
only in historical corpora. The course
will cover methods and results in the grammatical
description of such languages and in the diachronic
study of syntactic change.
SM 560. The Study of the Speech Community:
Field Methods. (E) Labov/Sankoff.
For students who plan to carry out research in the speech
community. Techniques and theory derived from
sociolinguistic studies will be used to define
neighborhoods, enter the community, analyze social
networks, and obtain tape-recorded data from
face-to-face interviews. Students will work in
groups and study a single city block.
SM 562. Quantitative Study of Linguistic
Variation. (I) Labov. Prerequisite(s): LING 560.
Multivariate analysis of data gathered in continuing research
in the speech community; variable rule analysis
and use of Cedergren/Sankoff program; instrumental
analysis of speech signal; experimental techniques
for study of subjective correlates of linguistic
boundaries.
SM 563. Sound Change in Progress.
(M) Labov.
Prerequisite(s): LING 520.
The study of current sound changes in the speech community
through instrumental means. Causes of linguistic
diversity and consequences for speech recognition.
568. Dialect Geography. (M) Labov.
The principles, practices and findings of dialect geography
from the nineteenth century to the present. Computational
organization of dialect data. The study
of current dialect differentiation in American
English and other areas.
590. Linguistic Pragmatics I. (A) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 550 or
permission of instructor.
This course is the first of a two-term introduction to linguistic
pragmatics, the branch of linguistics whose goal
is to provide a formal characterization of discourse
competence, i.e. of what people know when they "know" how
to use (a) language. Among the topics investigated
are: The Cooperative Principle, conversational
and conventional implicature, speech acts, reference,
and presupposition.
SM 591. Linguistic Pragmatics II.
(B) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 590.
This course is the second of a two-term introduction to linguistic
pragmatics. Among the topics investigated are:
given/new information, definiteness/ indefiniteness,
topic/comment, Centering Theory, discourse structure,
and the functions of syntax.
SM 603. Topics in Phonology. (M) Buckley/Noyer. Prerequisite(s): LING
530-531, or permission of instructor.
Topics are chosen from such areas as featural representations;
syllable theory; metrical structure; tonal phonology;
prosodic morphology; interaction of phonology
with syntax and morphology.
SM 604. Topics in Discourse Analysis.
(C) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 550 and LING 590 or permission
of instructor.
Selected topics in discourse and pragmatics, e.g. reference,
presupposition, functions of syntax.
SM 610. (GRMN602) Seminar in Historical
and Comparative Linguistics. (C) Ringe.
Selected topics either in Indo-European comparative linguistics
or in historical and comparative method.
SM 615. Comparative Indo-European
Grammar. (E) Ringe.
A survey of phonology and grammar of major ancient Indo-European
languages and the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European.
A knowledge of at least one ancient Indo-European
language is required.
SM 620. Topics in Prosody. (M) Liberman/Yuan.
SM 630. Seminar in Morphology. (M) Noyer/Embick. Prerequisite(s): LING
530.
Readings in modern morphological theory and evaluation of
hypotheses in the light of synchronic and diachronic
evidence from various languages.
SM 640. Formal Semantics and Mathematical
Linguistics. (B) Clark.
Advanced readings in formal semantics and discrete and continuous
models of linguistic behavior.
SM 650. Topics in Natural-Language
Syntax. (C) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 551 or permission of
instructor.
Detailed study of topics in syntax and semantics, e.g., pronominalization,
negation, complementation. Topics vary
from term to term.
SM 653. Topics in the syntax-semantics
interface. (A)
Topics in the Syntax-Semantics Interface
SM 656. Seminar in Historical Syntax.
(M) Kroch.
This course analyzes several well documented syntactic changes
in the European languages with the tools of modern
grammatical and quantitative analysis. The
focus is on the competition between forms and
systems as in the loss of the verb-second constraint
in English and French and the competition between
head initial and head final word orders in the
several West Germanic languages.
SM 660. Research Seminar in Sociolinguistics.
(M) Sankoff.
This course will have different topics each
term.
Students approaching the dissertation level will explore with
faculty frontier areas of research on linguistic
change and variation.
Topics addressed in recent years include: experimental
investigation of the reliability of syntactic judgments;
the development of TMA systems in creoles; transmission
of linguistic change across generations. The
course may be audited by those who have finished
their course work or taken for credit in more than
one year.
999. Independent Study and Research. (C) Student must submit brief proposal
for approval. May be repeated for credit.
Language Courses
071. American Sign Language I.
(C) Staff.
Offered through the Penn Language Center.
Introduction to learning and understanding American Sign Language
( ASL ); cultural values and rules of behavior
of the Deaf community in the United States. Includes
receptive and expressive readiness activities;
sign vocabulary; grammatical structure; facial
expressive, body movement, gestures signs; receptive
and expressive fingerspelling; and deaf culture.
072. American Sign Language II.
(C) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 071 or Permission of
the Instructor. Offered through the Penn Language
Center.
Increased communication skill in American Sign Language (
ASL ); cultural values and behavioral rules of
the deaf community in the U.S.; receptive and
expressive activities; sign vocabulary; grammatical
structure; receptive and expressive fingerspelling
and aspects of Deaf culture.
073. American Sign Language III.
(C) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 072 or permission of
instructor. Offered through the Penn Language
Center.
Expanded instruction of American Sign Language (ASL).
Receptive and expressive activities; sign vocabulary;
grammatical structure; receptive and expressive
fingerspelling; narrative skills, cultural
bahviors; and aspects of Deaf culture. Abstract
and conversational approach.
074. American Sign Language IV.
(C) Staff.
Prerequisite(s): LING 073 or permission of
instructor. Offered through the Penn Language
Center.
Increases the emphasis on more abstract and challenging conversational
and narrative range. Includes receptive
and expressive readiness activities; sign vocabulary;
grammatical structure; receptive and expressive
fingerspelling; various aspects of Deaf culture
and cultural behavior rules.
075. American Sign Language V.
(C) Clark.
Prerequisite(s): LING 074 or permission of
instructor. Offered through the Penn Language
Center.
This course is an advanced ASL course in which students will
continue to expand their conversational and narrative
range. While receptive readiness activities
continue to be an important part of the class,
the emphasis moves toward honing expressive sign
skills. Various aspects of Deaf culture
and cultural behavior rules will be incorporated
into the course; a key component of the course
is a unit on Deaf history and famous Deaf people.
SM 078. Topics in Deaf Culture. (C) Clark. Prerequisite(s): LING 074 or
permission from coordinator. Offered through
Penn Language Center.
This course is an advanced/conversational ASL course that
explores several key topics related to Deaf Culture. Using
only ASL in class, students will read and discuss
books, articles, and films related to the following
topics: What is Deaf Culture?, The History of
the Deaf American, Communication Issues and Pathological
Perspectives on Deafness, Deafness and Education,
CODAs (Children of Deaf Adults), and Performing
Arts by the Deaf. Vocabulary, grammar,
and idioms related to the topics will be presented
through direct instruction as well as through
the course of class conversation.
081. Beginning Irish Gaelic I.
(D) Blyn-LaDrew.
Offered through the Penn Language Center.
Irish Gaelic, spoken primarily on the west coast of Ireland,
is rich in oral traditions, song, poetry and
literature. Knowledge of this language
provides a foundation to understanding Celtic
folklore and linguistics and also enhances the
study of Anglo-Irish literature and history. The
first-year course will include reading, conversation,
listening and speaking.
082. Beginning Irish Gaelic II. (C) Blyn-LaDrew. Prerequisite(s): LING
081 or permission from instructor. Offered through
Penn Language Center.
083. Intermediate Irish Gaelic I. (C) Blyn-LaDrew. Prerequisite(s): LING
082 or equivalent. Offered through the Penn Language
Center.
085. Advanced Irish Gaelic I. (C) Blyn-LaDrew. Prerequisite(s): LING
084 or equivalent. Offered through Penn Language
Center.
086. Advanced Irish Gaelic II.
(C) Blyn-LaDrew.
Prerequisite(s): LING 085 or equivalent. Offered
through the Penn Language Center.
This course will emphasize reading of literary texts, and
advanced aspects of grammar, composition, and
conversation.
088. History of the Irish Language.
(L) Blyn-LaDrew.
Offered through the Penn Language Center.
From
downloadable lists of computer terminology in
Irish to Ogam inscriptions chiseled in stone
in the 5th century, the history of the Irish
language reflects the history of the people themselves. This
course outlines the language's changes through
time and emergence from the unwritten Celtic,
proto-Celtic, and Indo-European speech of its
ancestors. Beginning in the modern period,
when the very status of Irish as a living language
has been hotly debated, the course will look
backwards at the Celtic cultural revival of the
late 19th century, the impact of the famine,
nationalism, colonialism, the arrival of Christianity
and the Roman alphabet, and the position of Irish
within the Celtic branch of the Indo-European
language family. Term papers may be based
on fieldwork in the Irish-American community,
or research. Audio and visual resources
will supplement the lectures.
Knowledge of Irish Gaelic is not required.