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Language Courses at U of T

You don’t have to be able to fluently speak multiple languages to be a linguist. But for a linguistics student it is always good to learn about more languages as it can open up a lot of opportunities for you! Besides, if you are enrolled in the specialist program in linguistics, you are required to complete 2.0 FCEs (two years or equivalent) of courses in one non-Germanic, non-Romance language that have oral language components (which excludes most classical/ancient languages) and is not your first language. Here we composed a list of the language course offerings at U of T (incl. courses in UTM and UTSC) for your reference.

Notes: Course offerings are subject to change and not all courses are offered every year. This list is accurate as of March 2021.

1. Modern Non-Germanic Non-Romance Languages

This list is organized by the departments that offer courses in such languages, except for Uralic languages which are given by different departments but have their individual programs. The introductory courses of some languages are in 200-levels, which does not mean prior knowledge to the language is required.

You can reach out to the Associate Chair, Undergraduate of the Linguistics Department to confirm whether your language study plan could meet the language requirement for specialists. You have to email the Associate Chair, Undergraduate after your coursework is completed for the approval.

African Studies (New College)

  • Swahili (200 level intro -300 level courses, Bantu language)

Celtic Studies (St Michael’s College)

  • Modern Irish Language (100-300 level courses)
  • Scottish Gaelic (A 200 level intro course, second-year course currently not provided)
  • Modern Welsh (A 200 level intro course, second-year course currently not provided)
  • Course for Middle Welsh and Old and Middle Welsh also provided.

East Asian Studies

  • Chinese (Standard Mandarin, I-IV, Sinitic language)
  • Japanese (I-IV, Japonic language)
  • Korean (I-IV, Koreanic language)

European Studies

  • Modern Greek (100-300 level courses, Hellenic language)

Indigenous Studies

  • Anishinaabemowin (200 level intro -300 level courses, Algonquian language)
  • Kanien’kéha (Mohawk Language) (200 level intro -300 level courses, Iroquoian language)
  • Inuktitut (200 level intro courses, second-year course currently not provided, Inuit language)
  • INS215Y1: Introduction to an Indigenous Language of Canada

Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations

  • Arabic (100-400 level courses, Semitic language)
  • Coptic (200 level intro courses, no second-year courses, Afro-Asiatic language)
  • Hebrew (100-300 level courses, Semitic language)
  • Persian (200 level intro-300 level courses, Indo-Iranian language)
  • Turkish (200 level intro-400 level courses, Turkic language)
  • Courses for Aramaic, Ancient Egyptian, Biblical Hebrew, and many other historical languages are also offered.

Study of Religion

  • Modern Hebrew (100-300 level courses, Semitic language)
  • Tibetan (200 level intro-300 level courses, Tibetic language)
  • Pali (200 level intro courses only, Indo-Iranian language)
  • Courses for Sanskrit are also offered.

Slavic Languages and Literatures

  • Bosnian, Croatian & Serbian (100-300 level courses)
  • Czech & Slovak (100-200 level courses)
  • Macedonian (100-200 level, the second year course is a half course, please confirm the eligibility with the undergraduate coordinator of the linguistics department before you take it for the program requirement)
  • Polish (100-200 level courses)
  • Russian (100-300 level courses & SLA410H1 for heritage speakers)
  • Ukrainian (100-300 level courses)

Uralic Languages (Given by different departments)

UTM (Language Studies)

  • Arabic (Semitic language)
  • Chinese (Sinitic language)
  • Greek (Hellenic language)
  • Hindi (Indo-Iranian language)
  • Persian (Indo-Iranian language)
  • Urdu (Indo-Iranian language)
  • Also provides courses for Sanskrit

UTSC (Language Studies)

  • Chinese (Sinitic language)
  • Japanese (Japonic language)
  • Tamil (Dravidian language)

2. Modern Germanic or Romance languages

These languages usually has their own programs/departments, thus the list is organized by the language families.

Romance Languages

Germanic Languages

  • German
  • Swedish (Given by Finnish Studies)
  • Yiddish (Given by the Department of Germanic Language & Literatures)
  • UTM also provides language courses for German.

3. Ancient/Classical Languages

Under constructions