LINGUISTICS

(AS) {LING}
American Sign Language and Irish Gaelic courses are sponsored by the Department of Linguistics and offered through the Penn
Language Center. Please see http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/plc/

Undergraduate Courses
L/R 001. Introduction to Linguistics. (C) Natural Science & Mathematics Sector. Class of 2010 and beyond.
Liberman/Schwarz.
A general introduction to the nature, history and use of human language, speech and writing. Topics include the biological basis
of human language, and analogous systems in other creatures; relations to cognition, communication, and social organization;
sounds, forms and meanings in the world s languages; the reconstruction of linguistic history and the family tree of languages;
dialect variation and language standardization; language and gender; language learning by children and adults; the neurology of
language and language disorders; the nature and history of writing systems. Intended for any undergraduate interested in
language or its use, this course is also recommended as an introduction for students who plan to major in linguistics.

010. Fundamentals of the Grammar of Standard English. (L) Staff. Offered through LPS.
LING 010 uses a combination of traditional and modern approaches to grammar to improve the student's knowledge of the
English language. The course covers a wide range of topics, including traditional grammar (parts of speech and sentence
diagramming), prescriptive grammar/stylistics (dangling participles, split infinitives, etc.), modern generative syntax (sentence
structure, pronoun reference), discourse structure, and composition. LING 010 is of use to anyone who wishes to strengthen his
or her oral and written communication skills as well as to those students who plan to teach English or language arts.

SM 051. Proto-Indo European Languages. (M) Noyer.

Most of the languages now spoken in Europe, along with some languages of Iran, India and central Asia, are thought to be
descended from a single language known as Proto-Indo-European, spoken at least six thousand years ago, probably in a region
extending from north of the Black Sea in modern Ukraine east through southern Russia. Speakers of Proto-Indo-European
eventually populated Europe in the Bronze Age, and their societies formed the basis of the classical civilizations of Greece and
Rome, as well as of the Celtic, Germanic and Slavic speaking peoples. What were the Proto-Indo-Europeans like? What did
they believe about the world and their gods? How do we know? Reconstruction of the Proto-Indo-European language, one of the
triumphs of comparative and historical linguistics in the 19th and 20th centuries, allows us a glimpse into the society of this
prehistoric people.
In this seminar students will, through comparison of modern and ancient languages, learn the basis of this reconstruction --
the comparative method of historical linguistics -- as well as explore the culture and society of the Proto-Indo-Europeans and
their immediate descendants. In addition, we will examine the pseudo-scientific basis of the myth of Aryan supremacy, and
study the contributions of archaeological findings in determining the "homeland" of the Indo-Europeans. No prior knowledge of
any particular language is necessary. This seminar should be of interest to students considering a major in linguistics,
anthropology and archaeology, ancient history or comparative religion. (Also fulfills Cross-Cultural Analysis.)

SM 054. Bilingualism in History. (A) Sankoff. Freshman Seminar.

This course takes a historical approach to tracing (and reconstructing) the nature of language contacts and bilingualism, over the
course of human history. Contacts between groups of people speaking different languages, motivated by trade, migration,
conquest and intermarriage, are documented from earliest records. At the same time, differences in socio-historical context have
created different kinds of linguistic outcomes. Some languages have been completely lost; new languages have been created. In
still other cases, the nature and structure of language has been radically altered. The course introduces the basics of linguistic
structure through a discussion of which aspects of language have proved to be relatively stable, and which are readily altered,
under conditions of bilingualism.

SM 058. Language and Cognition. (B) Living World Sector. All classes. Embick. Freshman Seminar.
Because of its apparently species-specific nature, language is central to the study of the human mind. We will pursue an
interdisciplinary approach to such questions in this course, moving from the structures of language as revealed by linguistic
theory to connections with a number of related fields that are broadly referred to as the "cognitive sciences". A number of
specific topics will be addressed from these related fields. The structures of language and its role in human cognition will be set
against the background of animal communication systems. We will examine the question of how children acquire extremely
complex linguistic systems without explicit instruction, drawing on psychological work on the language abilities of children.
Additional attention will be focused on the question of how language is represented and computed in the brain, and,
correspondingly, how this is studied with brain-imaging techniques.
L/R 102. Introduction to Sociolinguistics. (B) Society Sector. All classes. Labov/Sankoff. Satisfies Quantitative Data
Analysis.
Human language viewed from a social and historical perspective. Students will acquire the tools of linguistic analysis through
interactive computer programs, covering phonetics, phonology and morphology, in English and other languages. These
techniques will then be used to trace social differences in the use of language, and changing patterns of social stratification. The
course will focus on linguistic changes in progress in American society, in both mainstream and minority communities, and the
social problems associated with them. Students will engage in field projects to search for the social correlates of linguistic
behavior, and use quantitative methods to analyze the results.

103. Introduction to Language: Language Structure and Verbal Art. (A) Arts & Letters Sector. All Classes. Ringe.
The purpose of this course is to explore the relationship between linguistic structure and the use of language for artistic purposes.
The syllabus is organized as a sequence of units, each built around a particular theme. These include the sound structure of
poetry (meter, rhyme, and other linguistic patterns in Jabberwocky, the Odyssey, Shakespeare, the Troubadours, and others); how
precise linguistic data can be used to solve an outstanding literary problem (determining the approximate date when Beowulf was
composed); and the structure of folktales of various cultures and of narratives of everyday experience.

105. (CIS 140, COGS001, PHIL044, PSYC107) Introduction to Cognitive Science. (A) Brainard/Ungar. This is a
Formal Reasoning course.
Cognitive Science is founded on the realization that many problems in the analysis of human and artificial intelligence require an
interdisciplinary approach. The course is intended to introduce students to the problems and characteristic concepts of Cognitive
Science, drawing on formal and empirical approaches from the parent disciplines of computer science, linguistics, neuroscience,
philosophy and psychology. The topics covered include Perception, Action, Learning, Language, Knowledge Representation,
and Inference, and the relations and interactions between such modules. The course shows how the different views from the
parent disciplines interact, and identifies some common themes among the theories that have been proposed. The course pays
particular attention to the distinctive role of computation in such theories, and provides an introduction to some of the main
directions of current research in the field.

L/R 106. Introduction to Formal Linguistics. (A) Schwarz. This is a Formal Reasoning course.
This course is intended as an introduction to the application of formal language theory, automata theory, and other computational
models to the understanding of natural human language. Topics include regular languages and finite state automata; context-free
languages and pushdown automata; recursive transition networks; augmented transition networks; tree-adjoining grammars.

110. Introduction to Language Change. (B) History & Tradition Sector. All classes. Ringe.
This course covers the principles of language change and the methods of historical linguistics on an elementary level. The
systematic regularity of change, the reasons for that regularity, and the exploitation of regularity in linguistic reconstruction are
especially emphasized. Examples are drawn from a wide variety of languages, both familiar and unfamiliar. Since there are no
prerequisites, the course includes mini-introductions to articulatory phonetics, basic phonology (especially the principle of
contrast), and basic morphology (especially inflection), all of which must be understood in order to understand the ways in which
they change.

L/R 115. Writing Systems. (A) History & Tradition Sector. All classes. Buckley.
The historical origin of writing in Sumeria, Egypt, China, and Mesoamerica; the transmission of writing across languages and
cultures, including the route from Phoenician to Greek to Etruscan to Latin to English; the development of individual writing
systems over time; the traditional classification of written symbols (ideographic, logographic, syllabic, alphabetic); methods of
decipherment; differences between spoken and written language; how linguistic structure influences writing, and is reflected by
it; social and political aspects of writing; literacy and the acquisition of writing.

120. Introduction to Speech Analysis. (C) Yuan. Satisfies Quantitative Data Analysis.
This course focuses on experimental investigations of speech sounds. General contents include: the fundamentals of speech
production and perception; speech analysis tools and techniques; and topics in phonetic studies. The course consists of integrated
lectures and laboratory sessions in which students learn computer techniques for analyzing digital recordings.

135. (PSYC135) Psychology of Language. (M) Dahan. Prerequisite(s): LING 001 or PSYC 001.
This course describes the nature of human language, how it is used to speak and comprehend, and how it is learned. Subtopics
include animal communication, language pathologies, second-language learning, and language in special populations (such as
Down Syndrome and autistic children, and children born deaf or blind).

160. (AFRC160) Introduction to African American and Latino English. (A) Labov.
An introduction to the use and structure of dialects of English used by the African American and Latino communities in the
United States. It is an academically based service learning course. The field work component involves the study of the language
and culture of everyday life and the application of this knowledge to programs for raising the reading levels of elementary school
children.

SM 161. (AFRC161) The Sociolinguistics of Reading: A Service Learning Seminar. (B) Labov.
This course will be concerned with the application of current knowledge of dialect differences to reduce the minority differential
in reading achievement. Members will conduct projects and design computer programs to reduce cultural distance between
teachers and students in local schools and to develop knowledge of word and sound structure.

230. (LING503) Sound Structure of Language. (B) Noyer.

An introduction to phonetics and phonology. Topics include articulatory phonetics (the anatomy of the vocal tract; how speech
sounds are produced); transcription (conventions for representing the sounds of the world's languages); classification (how
speech sounds are classified and represented cognitively through distinctive features); phonology (the grammar of speech sounds
in various languages: their patterning and interaction) and syllable structure and its role in phonology.

240. (GRMN210) Structure of a Language. (M) Staff.

Designed to apply linguistic principles to the grammatical analysis of a particular language, this course focuses on a different
language each time it is given, according to the decision of the instructor. It may be taken by students with prior knowledge of
the language in question who have not taken previous courses in linguistics, and by students of linguistics who wish to explore a
new language. The selected language will be announced prior to pre-registration for any semester in which it is given.

241. Language in Native America. (M) Buckley.

This course is an introduction to linguistic perspectives on the languages native to the Americas (their nature and distribution,
typological similarities and differences), with an emphasis on North America. The diverse languages of this region will be
examined from the point of view of particular linguistic phenomena, such as phonology, morphology, and syntax; and in addition
we will study their historical development and their place in culture, society, and thought.

250. Introduction to Syntax. (B) Santorini. This course was formerly numbered LING 150 and is identical in content.
This course is an introduction to current syntactic theory, covering the principles that govern phrase structure (the composition of
phrases and sentences), movement (dependencies between syntactic constituents), and binding (the interpretation of different
types of noun phrases). Although much of the evidence discussed in the class will come from English, evidence from other
languages will also play an important role, in keeping with the comparative and universalist perspective of modern syntactic
theory.

252. Language and Information. (M) Clark.

Everyone seems to think that language and thought are somehow intimately related. But what, exactly, is the relationship? For
some people, language and thought are identical, so that pre-linguistic creatures are completely incapable of thought. This course
examines language as an instrument to send and receive information. In part I, we will start with a computational approach to the
problem of how an information agent would extract and use information from language. That is, we will take language to be an
encoding of a mental content. The course considers some of the classic position papers on artificial intelligence and then moves
on to develop a compositional account of computing meanings based on categorial grammar. We will, in addition, discuss some
of the leading ideas in the theory of artificial neural nets and concept formation, particularly prototype theory.
In part II, we will focus on compositional theories of meaning; we will pay particular attention to categorial grammar,
developing a strictly compositional theory of the encoding. In this section, we will develop some ideas from dynamic semantics
and pragmatic theories of presupposition and implicature. In part III, we will explore reasons for supposing that meaning is
largely social and not purely a question of mental content. This will lead us to a critical consideration of linguistic relativity, the
idea that language can influence thought.

255. Formal Semantics and Cognitive Science. (M) Schwarz. NOTE TO PSYCHOLOGY MAJORS: Ling 255 can be
counted towards the 'Additional Psych Courses', as specified in the Undergraduate Handbook. NOTE TO COGNITIVE
SCIENCE MAJORS: Ling 255 counts towards Concentration 3: Language and Mind.
This course provides an introduction to the study of meaning in natural language. The first part of the course introduces a formal
perspective on meaning in terms of truth conditions as well as the basic analytical tools necessary for this, primarily building on
set theory and logic. The main part of the course covers a range of empirical investigations of phenomena related to meaning
using experimental methods from psycholinguistics. Topics include a selection of issues on the semantics-pragmatics interface,
such as conversational implicatures, presuppositions, reference resolution and perspective taking, and quantifier scope. Students
will carry out a class project, possibly in groups, to develop (and, if possible, carry out) an experimental study of meaning-related
phenomena of their own. Relevant tools for experimental design and the implementation of such studies will be introduced along
the way. This provides students with the opportunity to engage in a scientific investigation of their own early on in their
undergraduate career in a domain that is easily accessible and yet central to the general enterprise of the cognitive sciences.
270. Language Acquisition. (M) Yang.
An introduction to language acquisition in children and the development of related cognitive and perceptual systems. Topics
include the nature of speech perception and the specialization to the native language; the structure and acquisition of words;
children's phonology; the development of grammar; bilingualism and second language acquisition; language learning
impairments; the biological basis of language acquisition; the role in language learning in language change. Intended for any
undergraduate interested in the psychology and development of language.

SM 300. Tutorial in Linguistics. (A) Santorini. Prerequisite(s): Senior status or permission of the instructor. Majors only.
This tutorial allows students to deal in a concentrated manner with selected major topics in linguistics by means of extensive
readings and research. Two topics are studied during the semester, exposing students to a range of sophisticated linguistic
questions.

301. Conference. (C)

An independent study for majors in linguistics.

SM 302. (LING502) Linguistic Field Methods. (M) Buckley/Legate. Prerequisite(s): Ling 230 and Ling 250.
Instruction and practice in primary linguistic research, producing a grammatical sketch and a lexicon through work with a native-
speaker consultant and some reference materials. Consultant work is shared with LING 502.

310. History of the English Language. (A) Ringe/Kroch.

This course traces the linguistic history of English from its earliest reconstructable ancestor, Proto-Indo-European, to the present.
We focus especially on significant large-scale changes, such as the restructuring of the verb system in Proto-Germanic, the
intricate interaction of sound changes in the immediate prehistory of Old English, syntactic change in Middle English, and the
diversification of English dialects since 1750.

354. Language and Game Theory. (M) Clark.

This course is an introduction to game-theoretic pragmatics. It focuses on aspects of meaning that follow from rational, strategic
decision making. The course covers an introduction to the theory of games with an emphasis on coordination games and
cooperation. We develop a game theoretic account of truth conditional semantics using zero-sum games. We then cover Gricean
implicature; focal points and coordination; polysemy vs homophony; and a game account of reference tracking and pronoun
interpretation.

398. Senior Thesis. (C) Staff.

404. Morphological Theory. (M) Embick.

This course will explore some issues concerning the internal structure of words. After a brief introduction to some basic terms
and concepts, we will discuss the interaction of morphology with phonology. We will look both at how morphology conditions
phonological rules and how phonology conditions morphology. Then we will turn to the interaction of syntax and morphology.
We will look at some problems raised by inflectional morphology, clitics and compounds. The main requirement for the class
will be a series of homework exercises in morphological analysis and a short paper at the end of the semester.

SM 411. Old English. (M) Kroch.

The main purpose of this course is to teach students to read Old English ("Anglo-Saxon"), chiefly but not exclusively for research
in linguistics. Grammar will be heavily emphasized; there will also be lectures on the immediate prehistory of the language, since
the morphology of Old English was made unusually complex by interacting sound changes. In the first eight weeks we will work
through Moore and Knott's "Elements of Grammar" and learn the grammar; the remainder of the term will be devoted to reading
texts.

440. Pidgins and Creoles. (H) Sankoff.

The origins and development of pidgins (languages of intercommunication that have evolved for practical reasons in situations of
trade, conquest, or colonization, and spoken as second or auxiliary languages) and creoles (languages with native speakers that
have developed from previous pidgins); relations between creoles and other languages; implications of creole studies for general
theories of language and language change.

450. Languages in Contact. (I) Sankoff.

Multilingualism from a societal, individual, and linguistic point of view. The different types of contacts between populations and
between individuals which give rise to multilingualism. Second-language acquisition and the problem of the "critical age."
Cognitive and cultural aspects of multilingualism; applications to the teaching of languages. "Bidialectalism." Code-switching
(alternation), interference and integration: the mutual influences of languages in contact. Political and social aspects of
multilingualism.
SM 470. (AFRC262, AFST260, ENGL260, FOLK470, LALS260) Narrative Analysis. (M) Labov.
The course will develop our understanding of narrative structure on the basis of oral narratives of personal experience, told by
speakers from a wide range of geographic backgrounds and social classes. It will link the principles governing oral narratives to
the narratological examination of myth, literature and film by Propp, Greimas, Prince, Chatman, and others.The principles that
emerge from the study of oral narrative will be re-examined in literary narrative, including Scandinavian, Greek and Hebrew
epics, medieval romances, film, and modern novels, with attention to the differences between vernacular, literary and academic
style. The class will then consider the work of psychologists on how narratives are remembered and understood, based on the
causal network theory of Trabasso, and apply these principles to narratives written to teach children to read, particularly those
designed to reflect the cultural and linguistic framework of African American children.

Graduate Courses
SM 500. Research Workshop. (A) Embick.
This course is intended for advanced graduate students who are interested in developing a research paper. Each student will
present his or her topic several times during the semester as the analysis develops, with feedback from the instructor and other
students to improve the organization and content of the analysis. The goal is an end product appropriate for delivery at a national
conference or submission to a journal.

501. Survey of Sociolinguistics. (J) Sankoff. Prerequisite(s): LING 102 or equivalent.

Speech communities as a focus for the understanding of language evolution and change: language variation in time and space.
The relationship between language structure and language use; between language change and social change. Populations as
differentiated by age, sex, social class, race, and ethnicity, and the relationship of these factors to linguistic differentiation.

SM 502. (LING302) Linguistic Field Methods. (M) Buckley/Legate. Prerequisite(s): LING 530 and Ling 550.
Instruction and practice in primary linguistic research, producing a grammatical sketch and a lexicon through work with a native-
speaker consultant and some reference materials. Consultant work is shared with LING 302. Each student will write a final
paper on some aspect of the language.

503. (LING230) Sound Structure of Language. (B) Noyer.

An introduction to articulatory and acoustic phonetics; phonetic transcription; basic concepts and methods of phonological
analysis.

505. Research Topics. (C)

A reading course on specialized topics in linguistics. Arranged by instructor.

510. Introduction to Historical and Comparative Linguistics. (A) Ringe.

Synchronic and diachronic systems. Analogic processes. Semantic change. Effects of contact. Internal reconstruction.
Comparative method and reconstruction.

SM 515. Dynamics of Language. (C) Yang. Prerequisite(s): Ling 510.

This course introduces the tools, techniques, as well as current research on the approach to language as a dynamical system,
which seeks to fruitfully integrate linguistic theory, psycholinguistics, corpus linguistics, and historical linguistics through the
means of mathematical modeling. Topics include: string processing, dynamical systems and stability, stochastic processes,
mathematical models of population dynamics, and dynamical models of language learning, processing, and change.

L/L 520. Introduction to Phonetics. (A) Yuan. Prerequisite(s): An introductory course in linguistics, or consent of instructor.
Speech: its linguistic transcription, its quantitative physical description, and its relationship to the categories and dimensions of
language structure and use. The physical basis of speech: acoustics, vocal tract anatomy and physiology, hearing and speech
perception, articulation and motor control. Phonetic variation and change. Prosody: stress, intonation, phrasing speech rate.
Phonetic instrumentation, the design and interpretation of phonetic experiments, and the use of phonetic evidence in linguistic
research, with emphasis on computer techniques. Introduction to speech signal processing. Speech technology: introduction to
speech recognition, text-to-speech synthesis, speech coding. This course will emphasize the phonetics of natural speech, and its
connections to issues in other areas of linguistics and cognitive science.

L/L 521. Introduction to Phonetics II. (B) Yuan. Prerequisite(s): LING 520.
This is a methodology course, which focuses on how to conduct phonetics research using very large speech corpora. Topics
include scripting and statistical techniques, automatic phonetic analysis, integration of speech technology in phonetics studies,
variation and invariability in large speech corpora, and revisiting classic phonetic and phonological problems from the
perspective of corpus phonetics.
525. (CIS 558) Computer Analysis and Modeling of Biological Signals and Systems. (A) Liberman.
A hands-on signal and image processing course for non-EE graduate students needing these skills. We will go through all the
fundamentals of signal and image processing using computer exercises developed in MATLAB. Examples will be drawn from
speech analysis and synthesis, computer vision, and biological modeling.

530. Phonology I. (A) Noyer. Prerequisite(s): LING 503 or equivalent.

First half of a year-long introduction to the formal study of phonology. Basic concepts in articulatory phonetics; the distribution
of sounds (phonemes and allophones); underlying and surface forms, and how to relate them using both ordered-rule and surface-
constraint approaches. The survey of theoretical topics in this term includes distinctive features (context, organization,
underspecification); the autosegmental representation of tone; and the theory of phonological domains and their interaction with
morphological and syntactic constituency. Emphasizes hands-on analysis of a wide range of data.

531. Phonology II. (B) Buckley. Prerequisite(s): LING 530.

Second half of a year-long introduction; continues LING 530. Topics to be surveyed include syllable structure and moraic
theory; the prosodic hierarchy; the properties and representation of geminates; templatic and prosodic morphology; reduplication
and emergence of the unmarked; and metrical phonology (properties of stress, foot typology, and issues of constituency).
Emphasizes hands-on analysis of a wide range of data.

SM 538. Computational Methods in Linguistic Research. (M) Staff.

This course aims to provide students with the knowledge and skills needed to use computational techniques to facilitate linguistic
research. It introduces the computer representation of linguistic data, the construction of linguistic databases, ways of searching
for and extracting information of interest, and ways of generating useful displays of the results. Topics covered include the
representation of text on computers (multilingual character encoding, mark-up schemes, means of converting among
representations); regular expressions and their use in searching; context free grammars; basic parsing techniques; properties and
uses of databases; approaches to annotation; and sorting as a tool for searching and organizing data.

545. (COGS501, PSYC501) Mathematical Foundations for Language and Communication Sciences I. (D)
Liberman.
This two-semester sequence will provide basic mathematical modeling and algorithmic tools for interdisciplinary research in
animal, human or machine communication, in association with the IRCS IGERT program. Topics include signal processing,
statistical modeling and machine learning, information theory, game theory, and formal language theory. The courses will be
taught in a laboratory setting, and will emphasize practical skills as well as basic concepts.

546. (PSYC646) Mathematical Foundations of Language Communication II. (D) Liberman.

This two-semester sequence will provide basic mathematical modeling and algorithmic tools for interdisciplinary research in
animal, human or machine communication, in association with the IRCS IGERT program. Topics include signal processing,
statistical modeling and machine learning, information theory, game theory, and formal language theory. The courses will be
taught in a laboratory setting, and will emphasize practical skills as well as basic concepts.

SM 548. Proof Theoretic Foundations of Linguistic Structure. (A) Clark.

This course covers the fundamentals of proof theory and logic as they apply to linguistics. The notion of a well-formed
derivation is fundamental to all flavors of formal linguistics and all sub-disciplines of linguistics-phonology, morphology, syntax
and semantics. It rests, ultimately, on axiomatic systems developed by logicians to encode the process of valid formal reasoning.
We will place a particular emphasis on constructive methods and, where appropriate, develop connections with parsing theory,
automatic theorem proving and computational semantics. Time permitting, we will consider some introductory topics in
substructural logic-systems that encode some proper sub-part of first order logic. These systems have proven very important in
planning, theorem proving, dynamic logic and computational linguistics. The course is intended as a preparation for Linguistics
553 (Formal Semantics I). It includes a review of the propositional and predicate calculus before introducing tableaux and
resolution systems, unification, axiomatic systems, natural deduction and sequent calculi. The latter two systems are particularly
relevant for grammar formalisms like phrase structure grammars, TAGs and Categorial Grammar.

549. (CIS 477) Mathematical Techniques in Natural Language Processing. (A) Joshi.
Basic concepts of set theory, relations and functions, properties of relations. Basic concepts of algebra. Grammars, languages,
and automata-finite state grammars, regular expressions, finite state transducers, context-free grammars and pushdown automata.
Context-sensitive grammars- string context sensitivity and structural context-sensitivity. Mildly context-sensitive grammars.
Turingmachines. Grammars ad deductive systems, parsing as deduction. Stochastic grammars. The course will deal with these
topics in a very basic and introductory manner, i.e., the key ideas of the proofs and not detailed proofs will be presented. More
importantly, throughout the course plenty of linguistic examples to bring out the linguistic relevance of these topics will be
discussed.
550. Syntax I. (A) Kroch.
A general introduction at the graduate level to the analysis of sentence structure. The approach taken is that of contemporary
generative-transformational grammar.

551. Syntax II. (B) Legate. Prerequisite(s): LING 550 or permission of instructor.
The second half of a year-long introduction to the formal study of natural language syntax. Topics to be covered include
grammatical architecture; derivational versus representational statement of syntactic principles; movement and locality; the
interface of syntax and semantics; argument structure; and other topics. The emphasis is on reading primary literature and
discussing theoretical approaches, along with detailed case-studies of specific syntactic phenomena in different languages.

SM 556. Historical Syntax. (M) Kroch. Prerequisite(s): LING 551 or the equivalent.
Introduction to the study of the syntax of languages attested only in historical corpora. The course will cover methods and results
in the grammatical description of such languages and in the diachronic study of syntactic change.

SM 560. The Study of the Speech Community: Field Methods. (E) Labov/Sankoff.
For students who plan to carry out research in the speech community. Techniques and theory derived from sociolinguistic studies
will be used to define neighborhoods, enter the community, analyze social networks, and obtain tape-recorded data from face-to-
face interviews. Students will work in groups and study a single city block.

SM 562. Quantitative Study of Linguistic Variation. (I) Labov. Prerequisite(s): LING 560.
Multivariate analysis of data gathered in continuing research in the speech community; variable rule analysis and use of
Cedergren/Sankoff program; instrumental analysis of speech signal; experimental techniques for study of subjective correlates of
linguistic boundaries.

SM 563. Sound Change in Progress. (M) Labov. Prerequisite(s): LING 520.

The study of current sound changes in the speech community through instrumental means. Causes of linguistic diversity and
consequences for speech recognition.

568. Dialect Geography. (M) Labov.

The principles, practices and findings of dialect geography from the nineteenth century to the present. Computational
organization of dialect data. The study of current dialect differentiation in American English and other areas.

SM 570. Developmental Psycholinguistics. (B) Yang.

The generative literature on language acquisition has produced many accurate and insightful descriptions of child language, but
relatively few explicit accounts of learning that incorporate the role of individual experience into the knowledge of specific
languages. Likewise, the experimental approach to language development has identified processes that could provide the bridge
between the data and the grammar, but questions remain whether laboratory findings can sufficiently generalize to the full range
of linguistic complexity. This course is an overview of research in language acquisition with particular focus on the important
connection between what children know and how they come to know it.

575. Mental Lexicon. (M) Yang.

An investigation of the psychological representations and processing of words. Topics include: the extraction of words from
speech; lexical access and production; the induction of morphological and phonological regularities in word learning;
decomposition of morphologically complex words; frequency effects in morphological processing; storage vs. computation in the
lexicon; the past tense debate; morphological change. This course makes extensive use of linguistic corpora. Students will also
be familiarized with experimental design issues in the psycholinguistic study of the lexicon.

580. (LING380) Semantics I. (A) Schwarz. Prerequisite(s): Ling 550. Corequisite(s): Ling 550.
This course provides an introduction to formal semantics for natural language. The main aim is to develop a semantic system that
provides a compositional interpretation of natural language sentences. We discuss various of the aspects central to meaning
composition, including function application, modification, quantification, and binding, as well as issues in the syntax-semantics
interface. The basic formal tools relevant for semantic analysis, including set theory, propositional logic, and predicate logic are
also introduced.

581. Semantics II. (B) Schwarz. Prerequisite(s): Ling 551. Corequisite(s): Ling 551.
The first part of the course expands the system from LING 580 to include intensional contexts. In particular, we discuss analyses
of modals, attitude verbs, and conditionals, as well as the scope of noun phrases in modal environments. The second part of the
course discusses a selection of topics from current work in semantics, such as the semantics of questions, tense and aspect,
donkey anaphora, indefinites, genericity, degree constructions, events and situations, domain restriction, plurality and focus.
590. Linguistic Pragmatics I. (A) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 550 or permission of instructor.
This course is the first of a two-term introduction to linguistic pragmatics, the branch of linguistics whose goal is to provide a
formal characterization of discourse competence, i.e. of what people know when they "know" how to use (a) language. Among
the topics investigated are: The Cooperative Principle, conversational and conventional implicature, speech acts, reference, and
presupposition.

SM 591. Linguistic Pragmatics II. (B) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 590.

This course is the second of a two-term introduction to linguistic pragmatics. Among the topics investigated are: given/new
information, definiteness/ indefiniteness, topic/comment, Centering Theory, discourse structure, and the functions of syntax.

595. Game Theoretic Pragmatics. (M) Clark.

A great deal of linguistic meaning can be explained if we conceive of language as being a signaling system used by rational
agents. Game theory provides an explicit mathematical account of rational, strategic interaction. This course will lay out the
fundamentals of game theory, evolutionary game theory and multi-agent systems necessary to develop a theory of "radical
pragmatics." We will discuss game theoretic models of implicature; presuppostion and accomodation; reference tracking; scalar
implicature as well as a number of other phenomena.

SM 603. Topics in Phonology. (M) Buckley/Noyer. Prerequisite(s): LING 530-531.

Topics are chosen from such areas as featural representations; syllable theory; metrical structure; tonal phonology; prosodic
morphology; interaction of phonology with syntax and morphology.

SM 604. Topics in Discourse Analysis. (C) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 550 and LING 590 or permission of instructor.
Selected topics in discourse and pragmatics, e.g. reference, presupposition, functions of syntax.

SM 610. (GRMN602) Seminar in Historical and Comparative Linguistics. (C) Ringe.

Selected topics either in Indo-European comparative linguistics or in historical and comparative method.

SM 615. Comparative Indo-European Grammar. (E) Ringe.

A survey of phonology and grammar of major ancient Indo-European languages and the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European.
A knowledge of at least one ancient Indo-European language is required.

SM 620. Topics in Prosody. (M) Liberman/Yuan.

SM 630. Seminar in Morphology. (M) Noyer/Embick. Prerequisite(s): LING 530.

Readings in modern morphological theory and evaluation of hypotheses in the light of synchronic and diachronic evidence from
various languages.

SM 640. Formal Semantics and Mathematical Linguistics. (B) Clark.

Advanced readings in formal semantics and discrete and continuous models of linguistic behavior.

SM 650. Topics in Natural-Language Syntax. (C) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 551 or permission of instructor.
Detailed study of topics in syntax and semantics, e.g., pronominalization, negation, complementation. Topics vary from term to
term.

SM 653. Topics in the Syntax-Semantics Interface. (A)

Topics in the Syntax-Semantics Interface

SM 656. Seminar in Historical Syntax. (M) Kroch.

This course analyzes several well documented syntactic changes in the European languages with the tools of modern grammatical
and quantitative analysis. The focus is on the competition between forms and systems as in the loss of the verb-second constraint
in English and French and the competition between head initial and head final word orders in the several West Germanic
languages.

SM 660. Research Seminar in Sociolinguistics. (M) Sankoff. This course will have different topics each term.
Students approaching the dissertation level will explore with faculty frontier areas of research on linguistic change and variation.
Topics addressed in recent years include: experimental investigation of the reliability of syntactic judgments; the development of
TMA systems in creoles; transmission of linguistic change across generations. The course may be audited by those who have
finished their course work or taken for credit in more than one year.

999. Independent Study and Research. (C) Student must submit brief proposal for approval. May be repeated for credit.
Language Courses
071. American Sign Language I. (C) Staff. Offered through the Penn Language Center.
Introduction to learning and understanding American Sign Language ( ASL ); cultural values and rules of behavior of the Deaf
community in the United States. Includes receptive and expressive readiness activities; sign vocabulary; grammatical structure;
facial expressive, body movement, gestures signs; receptive and expressive fingerspelling; and deaf culture.

072. American Sign Language II. (C) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 071 or Permission of the Instructor. Offered through the
Penn Language Center.
Increased communication skill in American Sign Language ( ASL ); cultural values and behavioral rules of the deaf community
in the U.S.; receptive and expressive activities; sign vocabulary; grammatical structure; receptive and expressive fingerspelling
and aspects of Deaf culture.

073. American Sign Language III. (C) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 072 or permission of instructor. Offered through the
Penn Language Center.
Expanded instruction of American Sign Language (ASL). Receptive and expressive activities; sign vocabulary; grammatical
structure; receptive and expressive fingerspelling; narrative skills, cultural bahviors; and aspects of Deaf culture. Abstract and
conversational approach.

074. American Sign Language IV. (C) Staff. Prerequisite(s): LING 073 or permission of instructor. Offered through the
Penn Language Center.
Increases the emphasis on more abstract and challenging conversational and narrative range. Includes receptive and expressive
readiness activities; sign vocabulary; grammatical structure; receptive and expressive fingerspelling; various aspects of Deaf
culture and cultural behavior rules.

075. American Sign Language V. (C) Fisher. Prerequisite(s): LING 074 or permission of instructor. Offered through the
Penn Language Center.
This is an advanced ASL course in which students expand their conversational and narrative range. While receptive readiness
activities continue to be an important part of the class, the emphasis moves toward honing expressive sign skills through narrative
presentation and ASL-only class discussions. Various aspects of Deaf culture and cultural behavior rules will be incorporated
into the course. A large component of the course is a unit on Deaf history in which students read and discuss major events and
famous deaf people via readings, film, class lectures and discussions, and other outside resources.

SM 078. Topics in Deaf Culture. (C) Fisher. Prerequisite(s): LING 074 or permission from coordinator. Offered through
Penn Language Center.
This course is an advanced/conversational ASL course that explores several key topics related to Deaf Culture. Using only ASL
in class, students will read and discuss books, articles, and films related to the following topics: What is Deaf Culture?, The
History of the Deaf American, Communication Issues and Pathological Perspectives on Deafness, Deafness and Education,
Deaf/Hearing Family Dynamics, and Deaf Theatre, Arts, and Poetry. Vocabulary, grammar, and idioms related to the topics will
be presented through direct instruction as well as through the course of class conversation.

SM 079. Linguistics of American Sign Language. (B) Draganac-Hawk. Prerequisite(s): Successful completion of Ling
073 or equivalent.
This course is an introduction to the basic concepts of linguistics as they relate to American Sign Language. Phonological,
morphological, syntactic, semantic, and sociolinguistic principles of ASL will be examined and discussed. Successful
completion of LING 073/ASL III or having the equivalent signing skills is required. An Introduction to Linguistics course (or
the equivalent) is preferred but not required for this course. This course is taught in American Sign Language and is not voice
interpreted.

081. Beginning Irish Gaelic I. (D) Blyn-LaDrew. Offered through the Penn Language Center.
Irish Gaelic, spoken primarily on the west coast of Ireland, is rich in oral traditions, song, poetry and literature. Knowledge of
this language provides a foundation to understanding Celtic folklore and linguistics and also enhances the study of Anglo-Irish
literature and history. The first-year course will include reading, conversation, listening and speaking.

082. Beginning Irish Gaelic II. (C) Blyn-LaDrew. Prerequisite(s): LING 081 or permission from instructor. Offered through
Penn Language Center.

083. Intermediate Irish Gaelic I. (C) Blyn-LaDrew. Prerequisite(s): LING 082 or equivalent. Offered through the Penn
Language Center.
085. Advanced Irish Gaelic I. (C) Blyn-LaDrew. Prerequisite(s): LING 084 or equivalent. Offered through Penn Language
Center.

086. Advanced Irish Gaelic II. (C) Blyn-LaDrew. Prerequisite(s): LING 085 or equivalent. Offered through the Penn
Language Center.
This course will emphasize reading of literary texts, and advanced aspects of grammar, composition, and conversation.

088. History of the Irish Language. (L) Blyn-LaDrew. Offered through the Penn Language Center.
From downloadable lists of computer terminology in Irish to Ogam inscriptions chiseled in stone in the 5th century, the history of
the Irish language reflects the history of the people themselves. This course outlines the language's changes through time and
emergence from the unwritten Celtic, proto-Celtic, and Indo-European speech of its ancestors. Beginning in the modern period,
when the very status of Irish as a living language has been hotly debated, the course will look backwards at the Celtic cultural
revival of the late 19th century, the impact of the famine, nationalism, colonialism, the arrival of Christianity and the Roman
alphabet, and the position of Irish within the Celtic branch of the Indo-European language family. Term papers may be based on
fieldwork in the Irish-American community, or research. Audio and visual resources will supplement the lectures. Knowledge
of Irish Gaelic is not required.