Language Sciences (Placement Year)

Explore the uniquely human phenomenon of language from a scientific perspective. Examine the building blocks of language in sounds and structures, how language is acquired by both humans and machines, the relationship between language and thought, and the way language is investigated in forensic work.

Discover how language science intersects with cognitive science, psychology, computer science and forensic science in this rapidly developing field. Gain skills in experimental methods, computation and quantitative data analysis and open doors to careers in diverse areas including AI, computing, health, education and law enforcement.

Why Lancaster?

• Discover the fascinating science behind language. Choose from topics that explore language in the contexts of psychology, computing, the law and big data

• Open doors. Prepare yourself for a range of rewarding specialist careers – from forensic linguistics to speech and language therapy

• Study with the best. Linguistics at Lancaster University is ranked 2nd in the world by QS World University Rankings by Subject 2026

• Learn from experts. Our lecturers are world-leaders in fields like corpus linguistics, speech and language technology and forensic linguistics

• Benefit from state-of-the-art facilities. Use our labs to investigate language by monitoring eye movements or measuring electrical activity in the brain.

• Experience a supportive environment. Our friendly staff are here to support you throughout your studies. All students are assigned an academic adviser who is there to get to know you personally and provide guidance on a range of issues.

Discover new perspectives

Language is found in almost every aspect of human life, and in this course, we approach it through a scientific lens. You will learn how language is constructed and how it is used for communication and expression. You'll discover how studying language from a scientific perspective involves diverse scientific fields including linguistics but also cognitive science, psychology, computer science and forensic science.

• Drawing on research conducted by our academics, you’ll explore topics such as:

• The sounds and structures of the world’s languages and the features that unite them

• The cognitive marvel of how children acquire their first language

• Computational linguistics and how machines comprehend and produce language

• The relationship between language and mind and the effect our language has on the way we see reality

You may also choose to specialise in areas such as psycholinguistics (the study of how linguistic behaviour relates to psychological processes), forensic linguistics (the application of linguistic knowledge and methods to legal contexts) and corpus linguistics (the computer-based study of vast text databases).

A new era of languages

Generative AI marks a new era of language exploration. For the first time, digital technologies work with language data in ways that allow computers to analyse, reproduce and enter into interactions with humans in real time. Natural language and the capacity of computers to work with it are central to these changes. This exciting degree provides a gateway into these expanding worlds.

You’ll discover not only how languages are shaping the world today and the huge role that language sciences are playing in developing emerging technologies like speech recognition software, machine translation, and voice assistants, you’ll also discover how these technologies are changing both society and language itself.

Your Placement Year

Sometimes known as a year in industry, your placement year will take place between your second and final year of study and this will extend your degree to four years.