BA in Linguistics - Global Concentration in La Jolla United States | University of California, San Diego

When developing theories about language, researchers have observed that languages exhibit complex structures across multiple levels. Phonetics examines speech sounds, including their production and perception. Phonology explores how a language organizes its sounds into systems and combines them into syllables and larger structures. Morphology investigates how smaller meaningful units combine to form words. Syntax focuses on the rules governing word combinations into phrases and sentences. Semantics analyzes meaning—both of individual words and how they contribute to the meaning of larger units like phrases, sentences, and discourse. Linguists seek to determine how much these principles vary between languages and how many are universal. These concepts apply equally to spoken and signed languages. The Global Concentration in Linguistics offers a set of internationally focused courses that can complement any of the four linguistics majors.