Language and Cognition

• The programme is flexible and research-focused: students can create their own track based on the specializations of our linguistics staff, for example in bilingualism, language processing, acquisition, and discourse analysis
• Our staff are internationally recognized experts in their fields
• A Research Training module offers the opportunity for hands-on research experience in the first year
• In the Research Internship in year two you can work alongside experts in your area of specializati

Please note that individual courses may possibly still change in the event of a programme change.

Students have the opportunity to choose an internship location abroad or at the University of Groningen. Students have followed their internship/courses at the following locations:

Boston Children's Hospital, USA: Data collection with MRI for research on language disorders

TEXTGAIN BV: working on the EU Project PANORAMA Developing hate speech monitoring technology for Greek and Albanian

Bilingualism and Aging Lab at the University of Groningen. The Netherlands: research on language learning in the third age, working with behavioral and neuroimaging data

Reading's Institute of Education, UK: collecting, processing and analyzing eye-tracking data

Paris Lodron University of Salzburg, Austria: Dynamic Analysis of Language Learning in the Third Age project

University of Leeds, Leeds Child Development Center: children's online adjective processing, processing in referential communication

University of Stellenbosch, Taalsentrum, South Africa: readability measurement of texts written in Afrikaans and IsiXhosa

University of Stockholm, Linguistics Department, Sweden: typology, evolution, and extended uses of temperature in language, data collection and analysis of Germanic languages

University of Bristol, UK, OPEN project: conversation analytic research on out-of-hours primary medical care

After graduation, you are well prepared for a career in research. In fact, this track is an ideal stepping stone to a PhD position at a university. You can conduct research in many sub-fields of Linguistics, such as Neuro- or Clinical Linguistics, Language Development, Sociolinguistics or Theoretical Linguistics. Other options are Speech Technology, Discourse and Communication and Computer Linguistics.

During the Research Master's programme in Linguistics you will acquire a wide-ranging set of skills useful in a wide range of domains.

Analytical skills involve the ability to recognize patterns and link these to theoretical explanations.

Communication skills, such as writing and giving oral presentations, are part of all coursework and you receive experience and feedback to hone your abilities in these areas.

Students in our programme further gain experience in working as a team, through course projects but also the required internship.

A final focus is on methodological skills; through required coursework in statistics and corpus analysis students learn how to analyze corpora of texts to make generalizations based on quantitative findings. Elective modules are also available which train students to design experiments and carry out research in laboratory environments.

The programme in Language and Cognition is tied to the Groningen Research Institute in Linguistics (CLCG) and is also affiliated with the Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics (LOT) and Research School of Behavioural and Cognitive Neurosciences (BCN).

Research institute CLCG

The Center for Language and Cognition Groningen (CLCG) is a research institute within the Faculty of Arts of the University of Groningen. It is the institutional home for all the linguistic research carried out within the faculty, and students have the opportunity to work with members of this center who specialize in their area of interest. Please see https://www.rug.nl/research/clcg/ to view the profiles of individual researchers. Within the CLCG there are four different research groups:

Computational Linguistics

Discourse and Communication

Neurolinguistics and Language Development

Theoretical and Empirical Linguistics

Publishing your own work

Students are encouraged to present their work at conferences and submit it for publication, often co-authoring with instructors who guide them through the process of research, compiling and reporting results, and academic writing. Having published during your studies is a big plus when applying for a PhD position. Every year at least four students of the Research Master publish their work somewhere.

LOT Research School

LOT is an acronym of Landelijke Onderzoekschool Taalwetenschap (National Graduate School of Linguistics). The research by the LOT institutes covers all major areas of linguistics as well as a wide range of methodological tools and theoretical frameworks. LOT organises the national graduate courses and offers a Winter School in January and a Summer School in June/July on various locations throughout the Netherlands and Belgium. As a Language and Cognition student you will attend at least two Summer or Winter schools (the cost of which is paid for by the university) and complete assignments about the courses in order to obtain 10 ECTS.

More info

EMLAR/conferences

For students interested in language acquisition, it is possible to get LOT credits for attending the EMLAR (Experimental Methods in Language Acquisition Research) conference.

More info

Other conferences

Language and Cognition students are encouraged to attend national and international conferences. The TABU DAG is an international linguistics conference organized at the University of Groningen and provides one opportunity for students to hear presentations or give their own!

Student/research-assistent

The university offers student assistant positions to a limited number of students. This paid position can have a duration up to a whole year and is usually for one day per week. The activities can be very diverse: teaching and educational support or assisting in a study or other projects. A researcher will usually ask you for these positions.