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Spanish 440

SPAN 440: Spanish-English Contrastive Analysis

Prerequisites: SPAN 320

Credit Hours: (3)

This linguistics course compares/contrasts features or characteristics of both the English and the Spanish language. Aspects of contrast will include: English/Spanish language history, English/Spanish phonology, English/Spanish morphology, syntax, and semantics. Conducted in Spanish.

Detailed Description of Course

The following topics will be covered during the course:

1. Introduction to contrastive studies (linguistics)
2. Aspects of Spanish language background
3. Aspects of English language background (historical perspectives)
4. Phonology in general
5. English phonetics and phonemics
6. Spanish phonetics and phonemics
7. English morphology
8. Spanish morphology
9. Word order (syntax)
10. Lexicon and meaning (semantics)

Detailed Description of Conduct of Course

Handouts containing class content in both English and Spanish will be provided to student for the purpose of study and to supplement the main textbook. Practice activities are required in preparation for class; these include but are not limited to anticipating morphological changes by means of learned rules of transformation, the application of contrastive notions to sentence formation and transformation, etc. Course will include oral student presentations on discrete points in each of the course topics.

Goals and Objectives of the Course

Upon successful completion of this course, a student will be able to:

1. Highlight basic historical differences between the two languages
2. Contrast the main features of the sound systems of English and Spanish
3. Contrast the main characteristics of word formation of English and Spanish
4. Contrast the salient characteristics of sentence formations of English and Spanish
5. Contrast the salient features of English and Spanish lexicon with emphasis on meaning
6. Summarize the main morphological differences between the English and Spanish languages

Assessment Measures

Students may be evaluated on course content though quizzes, a midterm and a final examination, and on the timely completion of practice exercises along with participation in oral reports on specific aspects of contrast.

Other Course Information
None

Review and Approval

March, 2010