The Linguistics Department at KU offers a full range of degrees: B.A., M.A. and Ph.D. The first linguistics courses at KU were offered in 1957. In 1968, Linguistics became a department and was authorized to offer a Ph.D. degree. Today, the unique strength of the Linguistics department is the systematic pairing of theoretical and experimental investigations of linguistic knowledge. Its nucleus of full-time faculty members in Linguistics, plus several actively involved faculty members in other departments, serves a student body of about 35 graduate students, 80 undergraduate majors, and many non-majors taking introductory and intermediate courses each semester.
Areas of special strength in the graduate program include Phonetics, Phonology, Syntax, First and Second Language Acquisition, Psycholinguistics, Neurolinguistics, Semantics, and Indigenous Languages. The department also cooperates with other departments, such as Speech-Language-Hearing, Child Language, Indigenous Nations Studies, Anthropology, Education, and Psychology.
Student Awards 2021
CAROLYN J. ABEL UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT AWARDS
- Distinguished Senior Major - Amber Mikkelsen, Katharine Patz
- Distinguished Junior Major - Malena Schoeni, Beth Sharp
Student Awards 2020
CAROLYN J. ABEL UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT AWARDS
- Outstanding Undergraduate Senior Major - Jessica Grinage
- Distinguished Undergraduate Senior Major - Anna Holmes, Pearl Nelson-Greene, Matthew Reinhold, Emily Simmons, Elizabeth Zollner
- Distinguished Undergraduate Senior Minor - Hally Richlefs, Nathan Shapiro
- Distinguished Undergraduate Junior Major - Diego Acosta, Marilyn Curtis, Ben Gotto, Amber Mikkelsen, Chloe Noteboom, Katherine Patz, Savannah Price
- Outstanding Undergraduate Student Service - Amber Washington
FRANCES INGEMANN FELLOWSHIPS
- Excellence in the M.A. Program in Linguistics - Nathan Schellenberg
- Early Career Excellence in Linguistics - Sheyenne Fishero, Hyoju Kim
- Outstanding Achievement in Linguistics - Tingting Wang, Yuyu (Rustle) Zeng
FRANCES INGEMANN LINGUISTICS ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS
- Achievement Award M.A. - Sheyenne Fishero, Hyoju Kim
- Achievement Award Ph.D.- Tingting Wang
DEPARTMENT OF LINGUISTICS AWARDS
- Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant - Aron Finholt, Sheyenne Fishero
- Outstanding Graduate Student Service - Ruoqian (Lucy) Cheng, Shuxiao (Donald) Gong