The Master's Programme in Linguistic Diversity and Digital Humanities (LingDig) is an interdisciplinary programme that combines five fields of study that interact on all levels: cognitive science, digital humanities, general linguistics, language technology, and phonetics.

During your studies, you get an understanding of the nature and diversity of human language and the theoretical and digital tools for working with language and speech. You may also focus on digital methods in other fields within humanities or on human cognition and artificial intelligence. Take a look at what our students say!

Your journey will begin with an introductory course common to all students that bring together the perspectives of all five study tracks, and along the way, taking courses from different tracks is made easy. Your teachers are leading scientists in their field, dividing their time between research and teaching. Courses are heavily integrated with current research topics in your field.

Why Linguistic Diversity and Digital Humanities?

The Master's Programme in Linguistic Diversity and Digital Humanities is for you if you want to:

• deepen your understanding of language in general, or
• become an expert in linguistic diversity at a local or global scale, or
• learn how humans perceive the world and process information, or
• learn how to create artificial systems that resemble language, speech and human cognition, or
• know how to use digital methods to study aspects of human life such as history and social development.

During your studies, you will:

• gain an in-depth understanding of the basic structure of language, its subsystems (phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics) and their interrelationships
• learn the fundamentals of linguistic analysis and language description
• familiarise yourself with linguistic concepts, theories, descriptive models and the associated research methods
• learn how language is related to cognition, speech and interaction as well as to social structures, culture and society
• learn to use various methods and technical tools in order to manage and analyse language data
• gain a good understanding of linguistic variation and diversity: what is common to the world's languages and how they differ, how language changes over time, how languages influence each another, how individuals cope with multilingual situations and how communities speaking endangered languages can be supported.

Structure, content and study tracks

The scope of the Master of Arts degree is 120 credits (ECTS), to be completed in two years of full-time studies. The language of instruction in the LingDig programme is English and it contains the following studies:

• Studies common to all students in the programme (30 credits); this includes a 10-credit introductory course and 20 credits chosen from a common list of courses.
• Advanced studies in your study track (30 credits)
• Elective studies (30 credits)
• MA thesis (30 credits)

As a student in the programme you choose amongst five study tracks: (1) Cognitive Science, (2) Digital Humanities, (3) General Linguistics, (4) Language Technology and (5) Phonetics.

Your elective studies may include modules offered either by the other study tracks within this Master's programme or by other programmes within the University of Helsinki. Examples of modules offered by other programmes include Indigenous studies and computer science. Courses offered by other universities can also be included here.

The studies in your own study track, as well as the other studies, can include study abroad (e.g. student exchange) and work practice or other working life oriented study units. Working life and career development perspectives are integrated into many of the courses.