As a postgraduate research student of Italian studies, you will be exposed to an environment that celebrates both language and culture, through rigorous research and vibrant social events.
Studied informally here at Edinburgh since the late 16th century, Italian was formally added to the curriculum in 1919. Since then it has developed into a broad area of study that engages with both contemporary culture and historical times, when Italy shaped our civilisation.
Postgraduates are an integral part of our research community. We can offer you supervision in:
Your place in our graduate school will see you taking part in a thriving research community, attending regular seminars, publishing papers, presenting your research at national and international conferences, and participating in interdisciplinary research clusters across the School of Literatures, Languages & Cultures.
Just a few minutes away from our base in George Square is the Italian Cultural Institute, where you will receive a warm welcome and the opportunity to mix with Scotland’s wider Italian academic community.
You will also have access to its extensive library and programme of events. Also extending cultural and academic networks is the Edinburgh Journal of Gadda Studies, which is produced here at the School and offers opportunities for you to contribute to the editorial team as a research or editorial assistant. Through our membership of this network we also host the Edinburgh Gadda Prize, presented biennially.
This MSc gives students all of the intellectual and practical skills to engage in linguistics research, either for its own sake, or as part of cross-disciplinary research.
Students graduating from our programme will understand how to analyse key data in syntax, semantics, phonology, and morphology, how to theorise such data, and how to exploit empirical methods to test their theories.
The key aims of the programme are to:
We offer a strong focus on theoretical understanding: students will learn how to analyse data in the context of current theoretical understanding of linguistic structure at all levels, drawing on the expertise of the department, which is particularly strong in theory development, and will be well placed to compare and evaluate competing proposals, both from within the same theoretical model, and from competing models. Additionally, students will acquire the necessary data-elicitation skills, and skills in naturally occurring data in corpora.
All of these skills provide a firm foundation for further PhD study, either in Linguistics or in a related discipline that makes heavy use of core Linguistics (e.g. Developmental Linguistics, Sociolinguistics, etc.).
The programme is best suited to applicants whose academic background is in Linguistics, English Language, Philology or Cognitive Science.
The programme (a total of 180 credit points) requires students without a background in Linguistics to take the following five core courses totalling 50 credits:
Students with a background in Linguistics may be exempted from any or all of the courses at the Programme Director’s discretion.
Students will also need to choose, under the guidance of the programme director, additional course options (totalling 70 credits for students with no background) from an approved list of level 11 courses; students who are exempted from any of the courses listed will have to choose courses to ensure that their total number of credits excluding the dissertation comes to 120.
All students are expected to take Introduction to Language Research.
It is possible for students to take up to 20 credits of their optional courses from other MSc options offered within the School subject to the Programme Director’s approval.
All students will be required to write a dissertation of approximately 8,000-10,000 words.
Students graduating from this new programme will understand how contemporary research approaches the study of language.
Students will acquire and enhance the following professional/subject-specific/practical skills:
The master’s programme in Classics and Ancient Civilizations at Leiden University covers the entire range of present-day research on the civilisations of Greece and Rome, Egypt and the Ancient Near East.
This master's programme distinguishes itself from similar programmes by consistently integrating Greek and Roman Antiquity, the world of the Hebrew Bible, ancient Judaism, emerging Christianity, Egypt (ancient, antique and late-antique) and the cuneiform cultures of Ancient Mesopotamia, into their broader context. The number of specialisations on offer at Leiden University is unparalleled.
The programme makes creative use of a wide range of research methods, all of them well-represented at Leiden University. Traditional philology with its intimate knowledge of languages and texts, while still indispensable, is enriched by literary studies, cultural history, and the analysis of material culture.
At Leiden, our master’s students are considered valued members of a close-knit academic community. Small classes, regular individual mentoring, and an informal, open-door policy create an environment that is ideal for the exchange of ideas and the development of your knowledge and intellectual abilities.
An important goal of the programme is to develop your ability to conduct high-quality scientific research using a wide variety of research methods. This is a particularly exciting field in which to conduct research, with different research sources opening up the possibility of completely fresh interpretations of the past. Many students conduct field research in a country abroad, visiting excavation sites, or participate in one of our department’s own research projects including excavations at Saqqara and the Dakhla Oasis.
