Linguistics and English Language

We have an outstanding international reputation in many areas of Linguistics and English Language research.

Linguistics & English Language is rated 3rd in the UK by Times Higher Education for the quality and breadth of the research using the latest Research Excellence Framework (REF 2021).

We can offer expert supervision across a wide range of topics, including:

- Applied Linguistics

- Developmental linguistics, including first and second language acquisition

- Discourse and conversation analysis

- Historical English linguistics, including the syntax, morphology, and phonology from the earliest periods to the present day

- Language evolution

- Linguistic fieldwork

- Morphology, including word formation

- Multilingualism

- Phonetics and phonology, including diachronic phonology and the phonology of varieties of English, Scots and their history

- Pragmatics

- Sociolinguistics

- Speech technology

- Syntax and semantics, including theoretical syntax, descriptive syntax of English, diachronic syntax and both lexical and formal semantics

- Varieties of English, both British and international

Research groups

Our expertise clusters in a number of research groups and research centres:

- Developmental Linguistics

- English Language

- Language Evolution & Computation (LEC)

- Language in Context

- Language Variation and Change (LVC)

- Meaning and Grammar

- Phonetics and Phonology

- Centre for Language Evolution

- Bilingualism Matters

Research in speech technology is carried out at the Centre for Speech Technology Research, a collaboration between the School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences and Informatics.