Welcome to The Linguistics Department at Rice University!

Department Overview

The Rice Linguistics Department is the home of an active community of scholars with a wide range of interests. Broadly defined, the department adopts a functional, usage-based approach to language and linguistic theory. A number of recurrent themes emerge in faculty research and the degree programs offered: in-depth investigation of languages, coupled with the search for cross-linguistic generalization; the effects of semantics, language-in-use, sociocultural factors, and other functional influences that motivate and constrain linguistic form; grounding of theories in solid empirical data of many sorts; an interest in the relation between language and mind; and interest in discourse and social/communicative interaction more generally. These interests lead to intensive research activity in empirically well-supported theoretical and descriptive linguistics:

• cognitive/functional linguistics
• typology and language universals
• field studies in American Indian, Australian, Austronesian, African, and other languages
• sociolinguistics
• discourse studies
• phonetics and speech processing
• laboratory phonology
• corpus linguistics
• second language acquisition
• neurolinguistics
• language change and grammaticization.

Department History

Linguistics faculty have been present in various departments at Rice since the early 1960's, and the B.A. program in Linguistics was established in 1968. In the 60's and 70's, Ph.D.s in the Linguistics of particular languages and cultural groups were awarded through the language departments and Anthropology. In 1982, the Department of Linguistics was officially founded, with the concurrent establishment of the Ph.D. program. Since then, graduates from the department have successfullly gone on to careers in linguistics and related areas. The current rigorous intellectual climate, coupled with high-powered faculty and graduate students pursuing cutting-edge research in a diverse variety of areas, ensures that Rice Linguistics will remain a vibrant community of scholars and a world-class department for years to come.

Department Location

The Department of Linguistics is located on the second floor of Herring Hall, on the east side of the building. Click here for a map. The departmental facilities include:

• Herring 201: graduate computing lab equipped with PC's, Mac's, a scanner and laser printer.
• Herring 202: Department Lounge/Library (with balcony) for a quiet place to read, or for a not-so-quiet space for departmental get-togethers.
• Herring 210: photocopy and kitchen facilities (with balcony!).
• Herring 213: state-of-the-art Sound Lab with a sound booth, eyetracking equipment for experimental research, computers, and DAT, Cassette, and Minidisc decks.
• Faculty offices.
• Grad student offices.

To contact individual faculty or graduate students, refer to the information on the people page.

For general department information and questions, contact Rita Riley, the department coordinator: e-mail ling (@rice.edu), by phone at 713-348-6010, or stop by her office Herring 212 weekdays during regular business hours (8a.m.-12p.m. or 1p.m.-4p.m.).

The physical address for mail is:

Dept. of Linguistics, MS 23
Rice University
6100 Main St.
Houston, TX 77005
USA

The above physical address should be used for packages sent via United Parcel Service or international express or courier services that do not deliver to post office boxes. For ordinary mail, you can use the university's post office box, which is a little quicker:

Dept. of Linguistics, MS 23
Rice University
P.O. Box 1892
Houston, TX 77251-1892
USA