Department of General Linguistics, Saint-Petersburg State University

The programme «Anthropological linguistics and field research» was opened in 1999.

The goal of this programme is to train experts for conducting high-level linguistic field research. Besides, it is necessary to train researchers not only for collecting linguistic data, but also other kinds of data, such as ethnographic and folklore, traditionally considered to belong to disciplines adjacent to linguistics, such as ethnography and folklore studies, in order not to leave out a great deal of valuable field data as it happens if research is directed only towards collecting grammar material.

This programme is designed as a three-year course of study. It is supposed to take 6-8 academic hours a week. Students are to participate in summer linguistic expeditions. In summer 2001 the expedition was to the area of Azov Greeks.

The courses “Anthropological linguistics” and “Methods of field research” are designed each for two semesters (The course “Anthropological linguistics” consists of a lecture course “Linguistic Anthropology” and a series of seminars on “Language and Culture”). These are the basic courses for the programme.

A great deal of attention is also paid to language contacts studies, as well as collecting and processing language data, pertaining to this domain. The study of language contacts has become one of the main areas in contemporary linguistics, and the programme of this programme directs students to studying it. It gives them an opportunity to conduct their own research in the area. A separate task may be a study of language shift in both sociolinguistic as well as linguistic perspective.

Field research can and must be conducted in the cities, too, and the work is under way. Within the boundaries of the programme “Linguistic study of the city” a 7-day expedition to the town of Myshkin, Jaroslavl was accomplished in autumn of 2001.

Another important course, included in the list of subjects for future field linguists, is “Oral tradition and folklore” (by Yuri A. Kleiner) which is intended to acquaint students with oral tradition and folklore they will have to deal with while collecting linguistic data. Language data is always represented by certain texts which definitely have a value beyond linguistics.

It is essential for future linguists to get a knowledge of differencies in language structure. The course of the “Practical basis for linguistic typology” is devoted to this problem. Students learn languages of different structure (Irish, Eskimo, Aleutian, Gipsy and other languages). Each language is studied for two semesters. Students get acquainted with its phonetic and grammar systems and learn to read simple texts. As a result, students get a clear idea of the structure of a language. Our programme offers a scheme, according to which students will learn languages with different structures. The list of languages varies.

Interchangeable courses and seminars are devoted to various additional disciplines among which students may choose any. In 2001-2002 students were offered the courses of “Introduction to the study of Native American languages” (by Elena V. Perekhvalskaya), “Principles of nomination of people in different languages” (by Olga I. Foniakova), “Theory of cliche” (by Pavel A. Klubkov), “Ethnoetiquette” (by Natalia S. Moroz and Alexandre A. Novik).