Goals for Student Learning in the Linguistics Major

Develop appreciation of general properties of language, including
- systematicity of language
- how language can spread geographically; how languages change over time
- common cross-linguistic patterns; language universals
- scientific importance of all languages/dialects
- properties of signed as well as spoken languages
- understanding the potential effects of social factors
- value of describing language as a formal system
Learn ways to study language in a scientific way
- gathering data and making observations
- hypothesis formation and testing
- making predictions about possible vs. impossible patterns
- empirical advantages of working with large amounts of data
Develop competence in linguistic analysis, including
- analysis of sound, word, and sentence structures of individual languages
- modelling language as a formal system
Improve general academic skills
- writing skills
- reasoning skills
- ability to focus on/pinpoint a problem

Ways in which undergraduate learning is regularly assessed

Course-specific assessment
- Oral and/or written work by students
- Student self-evaluations of learning
- Peer evaluations of student work
Periodic surveys of majors
Honors theses (Ling majors), senior project (Roling majors)