Wecome to the Department of Linguistics!
Close to one-half of the world’s six thousand languages are spoken in the Pacific and Asia — the particular geographic focus of our department. A large portion of these languages are either underdocumented or entirely undocumented, and many have small speaker populations. Several of our faculty enjoy international renown for their research on the languages of the Pacific and Asia, and we are currently the only institution in the United States that offers a graduate program in language documentation and conservation. One of our M.A. programs is specifically designed to prepare students for leadership roles in conservation and documentation efforts, and our Ph.D. program offers similar opportunities at a more advanced level. We also offer a B.A. in Linguistics, which can be completed with or without a Concentration in American Sign Language, as well as a minor in Linguistics. American Sign Language classes, which fulfill the Hawaiian or Second Language general education requirement, are also delivered in the Department of Linguistics.
Our department contributes to the interdisciplinary effort to understand the workings of the human mind through its experimental work on the language faculty, centered around the College’s Language Analysis and Experimentation Laboratories. We have well known and established specialists in the areas of language acquisition, psycholinguistics, experimental syntax, and sociophonetics.
Two special strengths of the department include its focus on the issue of language sustainability and diversity in the Pacific and Asia, and its commitment to the study of language through the tools of contemporary cognitive science in addition to more traditional analytic techniques.
A current initiative within the department is engaging with generative artificial intelligence across theoretical, practical, and ethical dimensions. We are particularly committed to ensuring that Pacific languages and their speakers have a voice in the ongoing development of AI technologies.
Career Paths
Training in linguistics provides a foundation for many academic and non-academic career paths, including ones that draw on skills such as language analysis, sociolinguistic analysis, use of audio and video technology, quantitative and experimental methods, data science, and community outreach and organization.
Learn more about career paths
