Welcome to the Linguistics section of the Department of Linguistics and Germanic, Slavic, Asian and African Languages at Michigan State University. Our faculty members have interests in the major areas of theoretical linguistics as well as in various languages. We offer programs of study leading to the B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees.
Linguistics is the scientific study of language. As a student in the Linguistics program, you will become adept at noticing what people say, aware of the unconscious choices implicit in this, and able to provide a rigorous explanation of how such choices are made. Linguistics is one of the principal areas of cognitive science and is closely allied with many other fields of study, including cognitive psychology, speech and language pathology, the social sciences, education, computer science, philosophy, and the study of particular languages.