English Language BA (Hons)

About This Course

By some measures English is the most widely understood language spoken in the world today, dominating the fields of trade, diplomacy, science and popular culture, a far cry from the million or so speakers of Early English a thousand years ago. But it is also the language your two-year-old brother or sister, nephew or niece, son or daughter is acquiring and it is the language being learnt as a second language by millions around the world. Our BA in English Language will introduce you to the tools and methods used to explore and describe all these aspects of English and more in a systematic and rigorous way.

On this English Language course you will have the opportunity to learn about the grammatical structure of English (e.g., how words and sentences are formed), how meaning is made, interpreted and extended across whole discourses, how sounds are formed, produced, and understood, and how language use varies across speakers and groups and how it changes over time. You will also explore the history of English, the development and emergence English dialects and World Englishes, how English is used in society (e.g., how socio-cultural variables shape the use of English) and the role of English in society, in education and as a global lingua franca. 

In addition, you will also will also have the opportunity to take specialized modules that will help to develop your awareness understanding of the more advanced and applied aspects of English language and linguistics. We offer modules in the following topics: child language acquisition, language and communication, discourse analysis, corpus linguistics, language and communication, psycholinguistics, language variation and change, historical linguistics, languages in contact, language technologies / NLP, bilingualism and multilingualism, TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language), an introductory module on speech and language therapy, as well as other subjects based on the expertise of our teaching staff.

Why choose Bangor University for this course?

• We are a vibrant, accessible, friendly department with staff committed to high-quality teaching, excellent student experience, strong pastoral support, and the integration of current cutting-edge research and topics into your lectures throughout the duration of your studies. We are also dedicated to ensuring that our English Language students develop excellent skills in critical thinking, data analysis, presentation and independent research to enhance their employability upon graduation.
• Our teaching staff are also active researchers in a range of applied and theoretical areas relating to the English Language - many have international reputations in the field.
• You will gain a sound and scientific insight into the structure and use of language, its history and the relationship between language and society.
• Our state-of-the-art learning facilities include a professional grade sound / recording studio (our Speech laboratory), an eye tracking laboratory, and an event-related potential (ERP) laboratory and a corpus-linguistics resource facility. We also have audio and video equipment that can be checked out for field work. Our facilities also include an extensive collection of books on Linguistics and English Language and a language library which is maintained by our undergraduate student association - the Bangor Linguistics Society (BLS). 

Course Content

This English Language course will be taught by a combination of lectures, tutorials and/or seminars, depending on the module and level. You will choose 120 credits of modules relating to the English Language each year, where you start by learning the foundational knowledge required to study in this field in the different subdisciplines (year 1), proceeding to more in-depth intermediate-level study (year 2), before choosing what areas to specialize in (year 3). Modules are assessed on the basis of different kinds of coursework, including essays, reports, oral presentations, tests, exams, data analysis, etc. You will do a dissertation in your final year which represents an original research project which you will undertake under the supervision of a research-active member of staff.