Speech, Language and Sociolinguistics

University of Glasgow

Postgraduate MSc Full-time 12 Months English language

Speech, Language and Sociolinguistics MSc is a postgraduate degree at University of Glasgow, based in Glasgow, taught full-time over 12 months.

About this course

This Masters will enable you to explore the links between producing and processing speech and language as part of everyday social interaction. The range of courses available for this programme provide the key linguistic, technical, and research skills to investigate different aspects of spoken and written language, to carry out your own sociolinguistic studies, and to design and implement speech and language experiments of your own.

WHY THIS PROGRAMME

- This programme is suitable for students who have little or no background in linguistics and also for students with some background who wish to carry out more sophisticated independent research in a particular area.

- You'll be taught by expert academic staff who have directed and are currently directing research projects in speech, language and sociolinguistics (e.g. Seeing Speech, Sounds of the City, One Speaker Two Dialects, the Scots Syntax Atlas (SCOSYA), Scottish Corpus of Texts and Speech (SCOTS), and SPeech Across Dialects of English (SPADE)).

- Our facilities include the Glasgow University Laboratory of Phonetics (GULP), which includes a speech recording studio, eyetracker and portable ultrasound, and the Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities (SGSAH), providing you with relevant training courses for graduate students in speech, language and sociolinguistics.

- English Language and Linguistics is currently within the Linguistics pathway for the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Doctoral Training Partnership, which is based at the Scottish Graduate School of Social Science (SGSSS). The SGSSS offers excellent additional training courses for graduate students working in the social sciences in Scotland.

PROGRAMME STRUCTURE

You will take:
- Two core courses

- One topics course in Phonetics or Sociolinguistics

- One methods course in Phonetics or Sociolinguistics

- Two optional courses

You will also produce an independent, small-scale research project.

Semester 1: September to December

ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS - RESEARCH TRAINING (core course)

Topics course (choose one of the following):
INTRODUCTION TO PHONETICS (PGT)
INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLINGUISTICS (PGT)
TOPICS IN PHONETICS
TOPICS IN SOCIOLINGUISTICS

Optional course

Semester 2: January to March

EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN AND DATA ANALYSIS (core course)

Methods course (choose one of the following):
METHODS IN PHONETICS (PGT)
METHODS IN SOCIOLINGUISTICS (PGT)

Optional course

Summer: April to September

SPEECH, LANGUAGE & SOCIOLINGUISTICS DISSERTATION

Optional Courses

Recommended courses include:

Semester 1
INTRODUCTION TO PHONETICS (PGT)
INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLINGUISTICS (PGT)
TOPICS IN PHONETICS
TOPICS IN SOCIOLINGUISTICS
INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLINGUISTICS (PGT)
ONOMASTICS
SEMANTICS OF ENGLISH (PGT)

Semester 2
METHODS IN PHONETICS (PGT)
METHODS IN SOCIOLINGUISTICS (PGT)
CORPUS LINGUISTICS (PGT)
LANGUAGE AND THE GLOBAL CAMPUS: LINGUISTIC ISSUES IN THE INTERNATIONALISATION OF HIGHER EDUCATION
CRITICAL APPROACHES TO LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATION
METHODS IN WRITTEN TEXT ANALYSIS
MULTILINGUALISM: INDIVIDUALS, INSTITUTIONS AND SOCIETY

Study Options

This course is available in 2 study options:

Full-time Shown above

Duration: 12 Months

Qualification: MSc

Location: Glasgow

Part-time

Duration: 24 Months

Qualification: MSc

Location: Glasgow

Career Prospects

Graduates from this course typically go into the following occupations. Click through for salaries, employment rates and other UK degrees that lead there:

Related Courses

Course Details

Qualification
MSc
Study Mode
Full-time
Duration
12 Months
Start Date
2025

2025-entry data — 2026 offers may differ

Academic Year
2025
Campus / Location
Glasgow
Scheme
Postgraduate
Subjects
English language