UNIVERSITE ALGER 2 « AboulkacemSaadallah »

Faculté des Langues Etrangères

Département d’Anglais

Intitulé de la licence : anglais

Intitulé de la matière : Theories of Linguistics, 2nd year

Course objectives:

By the end of the course, students should be able to:

- Understand the concepts underlying major linguistic theories, schools, and movements.
- Develop critical thinking, analyze and synthesize relevant linguistic information.
- Demonstrate a fairly good mastery of English .

Course Outline: semester 3

WEEKS Topics and activities

CLASSICAL PERIOD

WEEK 1 Philosophical debates about language

WEEK 2 The classical philosophers and the study of grammar
WEEK 3 The Alexandrian period
WEEK 4 The Roman period
PRE-MODERN PERIOD
WEEK 5 The Renaissance
WEEK 6 The Indian tradition
WEEK 7 Comparative philology (1)
WEEK 8 Comparative philology (2)
TEST
MODERN PERIOD: EUROPEAN SCHOOLS OF LINGUISTICS
WEEK 9 The foundation of modern Linguistics :Saussure’s view of linguistics

WEEK 10 The Structural school: Principles and foundation

WEEK11 Saussure’s dichotomies

WEEK 12 The Functional school: Principles and foundation

WEEK 13 Halliday’s view of language
WEEK 14
WEEK 15 REVISION
WEEK 16 EXAM
Course outline: Semester 4:

WEEKS Topics and activities

AMERICAN STRUCTURAL LINGUISTICS

 WEEK 1 The rise of Structuralism in America
WEEK 2 Aspects of Bloomfield’s theory
WEEK 3 Behaviourism
CHOMSKYAN GENERATIVISM
WEEK 4 Universal grammar
WEEK 5 Competence and performance
WEEK 6 Chomsky’s Syntax
WEEK 7
WEEK 8 Transformational rules
WEEK 9 Deep/surface structures
WEEK 10 Structural ambiguity
WEEK11 Chomsky’s influence
POST-CHOMSKYAN LINGUISTICS
WEEK 12 Communicative competence
WEEK 13 Sociolinguistics
WEEK 14 Language variation
WEEK 15 REVISION
WEEK 16 EXAM

Assessment Method:
Mid-term test and final examination
Basic Readings:
- Crystal, D (1971) Linguistics. London: The Penguin Group.
- Lyons, J. (1981) Language and Linguistics: An Introduction. Cambridge: CUP.
- Polsky, B (2012) Sociolinguistics. Oxford: OUP
- Robins, R.H (1967)A Short History of Linguistics. London: Longman Group Limited.
- Trudgill,P (2000) Sociolinguistics: An Introduction to language and Society. Penguin