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Welcome

The Department of European Languages at Aberystwyth University offers students the chance to study French, German, Italian and Spanish at both beginners' and advanced level, in a research-active academic environment.

We teach modules on the history, literature and linguistics of these languages - crucial, we believe, to gaining a full understanding of any language and its cultural context. Many of our courses pool our expertise in individual languages in order to offer a wider European perspective.

We take seriously our two major commitments: our teaching (our commitment to you, as students), and our research. You will be taught by top-flight research-active academics, from year one onwards.

Most of our teaching is done in small groups. Most staff are native-speakers of the languages they teach and so there is considerable exposure to the languages being studied, even outside formal language classes. It also makes for a strongly "European" atmosphere in the Department.


TEACHING HOURS AND CLASS SIZES
* At least 3 ½ hours of language classes per language per week (more for beginners).
* Weekly conversation classes below 10 students.
* Language classes not more than 20 students.
* Twenty-credit ‘content’ modules: 2 hours per week.
* Most class sizes 10-20 students.

In the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, we were ranked 8th/9th out of 27 units which submitted to European Studies. With 20% of our research graded 4* ('world-leading'), we had more than twice the panel average in this key category.

The Department is extensively involved in research activities at international level (see also News and Conferences). We have secured several times the sector average in prestigious (and competitive) external funding. Colleagues' research in literature and linguistics is regularly published in article and book form, often in the countries concerned. Staff are active as conference organizers, both here in Aberystwyth, and in events run elsewhere (Bristol, Paris, Tangiers, Innsbruck) and in giving papers in the UK and particularly, abroad.


Noticeboard ~ Noticeboard ~ Noticeboard ~ Noticeboard


bullet Congratulations

Professor David Trotter has been asked to join the scientific board of Quaderni di Filologia Romanza.


bullet Conférence

Lecture by Professor Georges KLEIBER (Strasbourg) on

 

"Histoire de personne(s) : qui est JE, qui est TU ?, qui est IL.

 

2 May at 13.10 in Hugh Owen A14.

 

All Welcome


 

bullet Conférence

« À travers vents et marées : la navigation et la sémantique »

 

L'École nationale des chartes accueillera M. David Trotter (université de Aberyswyth) comme professeur invité de la fin du mois de mars au milieu du mois d'avril.
M. David Trotter donnera une conférence publique de sémantique historique, le mardi 10 avril à 17h, dans la grande salle, intitulée « À travers vents et marées : la navigation et la sémantique ».

Ulisse

 

bullet Congratulations

Professor David Trotter will be professeur invité at the École nationale des Chartes, Paris, March/April 2012.

ecole-chartes

bullet Lecture

At 1.10 on Wednesday 2nd May, in A14 Hugh Owen Building, Professor Georges Kleiber (Université de Strasbourg), will lecture on:

"Histoire de personne(s) : qui est JE ? Qui est TU ? Qui est IL ?"

Professor Kleiber is one of the most distinguished French linguists of his generation.


bullet Lecture

Aberystwyth Linguistic Forum

Dr David Willis (Cambridge University), The Syntactic Atlas of Welsh Dialects: some preliminary findings.

Thursday 29 March 2012 at 6.15, Hugh Owen Building, Room A14

All Welcome


bullet Lecture

Professor Hans GOEBL, University of Salzburg
'Introduction aux problèmes et méthodes de l’« Ecole dialectométrique de Salzbourg »' (avec des exemples gallo‐, italo‐ et ibéroromans) on Wednesday 29th February, 5.00 p.m., Hugh Owen A14.

Professor Goebl is the creator of the ALD : Atlant linguistich dl ladin dolomitich y di dialec vejins I + II / Atlante linguistico del ladino dolomitico e dei dialetti limitrofi I + II / Linguistic Atlas of Dolomitic Ladinian and neighbouring dialects
(Hugh Owen Library: ATLAS G1989.22.D6E3.G5 , ex dono auctoris) and founder of the pioneering “Salzburg school” of dialectometry (which has developed a methodology for the mathematical measurement of dialectal distance).


bullet Lecture

'Consensus - the Parliament of Fools'

Professor David Wulstan will deliver a second lecture in the series "Research or re-search", on Consensus - the Parliament of Fools, on Wednesday 22nd February at 5 p.m. in Hugh Owen A14.

Professor Wulstan is a former Professor of Music in Aberystwyth, and Honorary Professor in the Department of European Languages.

All welcome.


bullet Congratulations

The Department of European Languages wishes to congratulate those graduating students listed below who have been rewarded for excellence in their studies. We wish them, and all of our graduating students, all the best for the future.

The André Barbier prize (awarded for the best year abroad dissertation in French, in memory of a previous Professor of French) was awarded to Rosemary Sillars.

Chris Smith, (BA European Languages, Spanish and French major with German minor), who has just won this year's Veritas Language Solutions translation contest, featuring students from the best universities all over Europe.

Distinctions in Oral Examinations

Celebrations

M’sa, Aicha (French)

Buraczynska, Joanna (Spanish)

Macleod, Shona (French)

Chambers, Arran (Spanish)

Sillars, Rosemary (French)

Kirkham, Julie (Spanish)

Szustak, Andrzej (French)

M’sa, Aicha (Spanish)

Toomer, Penelope (French)

Oates, Luke (Spanish)

Biggar, Nikolaj (German)

Roberts, Kyle (Spanish)

Buraczynska, Joanna (German)

 

First Class Degree

Buraczynska, Joanna

Oates, Luke

Chambers, Arran

Macleod, Shona

Edwards, Liam

Mears, Nathan

Gyllensten, Benedicte

Sillars, Rosemary

Other prizes

David & Margaret Evans Prize in German – awarded for proficiency in German:
Cecilia Burns (Level 1 Advanced) and Victoria Jazwiecka (Level 1 Beginners)
Tony Wrighton-Edwards Prize in Spanish – awarded for proficiency in Spanish:
Leanne Ruaux (Level 2) and Mateusz Mazzini (Level 2)


bullet Congratulations

The Anglo-Norman Dictionary, directed by Professor D.A. Trotter since 2001, has been awarded the Prix Honoré Chavée of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, founded in Paris in 1663. The PRIX Honorè CHAVÉE was established "to encourage linguistic studies and especially research relating to Romance languages”.

Academie

the AND

bulletCongratulations

Professor Trotter, D.A., has been invited to be member of comité scientifique of the Revue Internationale de Linguistique Française, published by the Institut de Linguistique Française.


bullet Conference

Holocaust Writing and Translation Workshop

A One-Day Conference (Venue: Institute of Germanic & Romance Studies, University of London (Rooms ST 274/275, Stewart House, 32 Russell Square, WC1) Co-Ordinators: Andrea Hammel (Aberystwyth) and Peter Davies (Edinburgh).


bullet Congratulations

to Professor Trotter on his election to the Vice-Presidency of the Société de Linguistique romane.


bullet Intern advertisement: Details >> here


bullet Lecture

Dr Wini Davies will be giving a guest lecture at the University of Basle Switzerland, on October 12, 2010, on the topic: 'Die Konstruktion von "gutem" und "schlechtem" Deutsch'.

bullet DAAD Award

Dr Wini Davies has been awarded by The German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) a study grant for senior academics which will enable her to spend two months in Germany (at the University of Duisburg-Essen) during her sabbatical in the winter semester of 2010-11.

bullet Invitation

Dr Wini Davies has been invited to speak at a symposium on Luxembourg Studies at the University of Sheffield in July to mark the retirement of Professor Gerald Newton.


bullet Aberystwyth Linguistic Forum (ALF)


bullet Grant

Professor David Trotter has been awarded £66,353 as the Aberystwyth element of a joint Heidelberg-Aberystwyth grant from the AHRC and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG). >> More


bullet Congratulations

Professor David Trotter has been invited by AERES (Agence de l'Evaluation de la Recherche et de l'Enseignement Supérieur), to be a member of a research evaluation committee that will assess the research output and future projects of a major research group, Sens, Informatique, Texte, Histoire (directed by Professor Olivier Soutet) at the Sorbonne (Université de Paris-IV). AERES, established in 2007, is the French equivalent of the UK's RAE and TQA.

aeres-logo


 


bullet The The Anglo-Norman Dictionary Project, directed by Professor David Trotter, in the news.

Prof Trotter

“The Anglo-Norman Dictionary, in its revised form, will make possible a comprehensive reassessment of this element of the impact of the Norman Conquest, and will make visible an aspect of the enduring influence of the Anglo-Normans which is every bit as important as the castles and cathedrals which they built. As a result, Clemenceau was not altogether wrong when he said that English was just badly-pronounced French”.

>> More on the press release, speaker BBC Radio 4 broadcast, speakerBBC World Service,speaker BBC Wales: Good Morning Wales (audio file), and BBC News website .

 

bullet Award
In November 2007, Professor Trotter attended the ‘Séance de rentrée solennelle sous la Coupole' of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres in Paris, on the occasion of the formal announcement of the award of the Prix de La Grange for his edition of Albucasis.
>> More 


bullet Grant
The Anglo-Norman Dictionary Project, directed by Professor David Trotter, has been awarded an AHRC Research Grant for £873,669, for the revision of letters I-M (2007-2012).
>> More 


 

bullet International partnership
The Department has recently been invited to join the Consortium for Corpora of Medieval French.
>> More



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