About this course

With this BA Spanish and Linguistics degree, you’ll develop strong Spanish language skills and a comprehensive understanding of Hispanic culture, while exploring how language works through the study of linguistics. You’ll improve your fluency, cultural understanding and employability skills by spending a year living and working abroad.

Following our unique system of language development you’ll start at a level that matches your ability. This means we can personalise your learning so you make the best progress.

In your year abroad you can choose to:

work as an English assistant in a school
study at a university
take a work placement

We have a range of links abroad, including our innovative scheme in Mexico, developed in partnership with the Mexican Education Ministry.

During this year you'll be tasked with the creation of your Period Abroad Portfolio (PAP).

This course has a strong focus on employability. You’ll have the option to take practical modules looking at teaching, you could take advantage of our vacation work placement schemes and you’ll develop a wide range of transferable skills.

Course lead

Your course lead is Dr Michael Kranert.

His research interests range from comparative discourse analysis to language ideologies, with a particular focus on English and German speaking countries.

Find out more on his staff profile.

Course location

This course is based at Avenue.

Awarding body

This qualification is awarded by the University of Southampton.

Entry requirements

A-levels

ABB including Spanish

A-levels additional information

Offers typically exclude General Studies and Critical Thinking.

More information about A-levels

A-levels with Extended Project Qualification

If you are taking an EPQ in addition to 3 A levels, you will receive the following offer in addition to the standard A level offer: BBB including Spanish and grade A in the EPQ

A-levels contextual offer

We are committed to ensuring that all applicants with the potential to succeed, regardless of their background, are encouraged to apply to study with us. The additional information gained through contextual data allows us to recognise an applicant's potential to succeed in the context of their background and experience. Applicants who are highlighted in this way will be made an offer which is lower than the typical offer for that programme, as follows: BBB including Spanish

International Baccalaureate Diploma

Pass, with 32 points overall with 16 points at Higher Level, including 5 at Higher Level in Spanish.

More information about International Baccalaureate Diploma

BTEC

Distinction, Distinction in the BTEC National Extended Diploma plus B in A level Spanish Distinction, Distinction in the BTEC National Diploma plus B in A level Spanish Distinction in the BTEC National Extended Certificate plus AB in A level Spanish and one further A level

Additional information

The University aims to recruit students from a wide range of backgrounds who we believe have the potential and motivation to succeed on our challenging programmes. We are committed to fair admissions and strive to ensure we give equal consideration to all applicants who possess the necessary knowledge and skills.

More information about BTEC

Other requirements

UK students

International students

Other ways to qualify

GCSE requirements

Applicants must hold GCSE English language (or GCSE English) (minimum grade 4/C) and mathematics (minimum grade 4/C)

Got a question?

Please contact our enquiries team if you're not sure that you have the right experience or qualifications to get onto this course.

Email: enquiries@southampton.ac.uk
Tel: +44(0)23 8059 5000

Course structure

Each year combines compulsory modules to build your mastery of Spanish and your understanding of Linguistics. You will have a wide range of options to choose from, allowing you to tailor your learning to suit your interests and ambitions.

You can also take modules from different subject areas, or learn another language. If you find a subject you love, you even have the option to make it an official part of your degree as a minor subject.

To give you the best possible start, we use our system of 7 language levels to work out your proficiency in Spanish. We can then make sure our teaching develops your skills as effectively as possible.

Year 1 overview

We’ll introduce you to the study skills you’ll need as a Modern Languages and Linguistics student and you’ll take a core Spanish language module to develop your speaking, listening, reading and writing skills.

Other compulsory modules cover topics like linguistics and language ideology, whilst your optional choices cover culture and elements of history and society.

Year 2 overview

You’ll continue to develop your Spanish language skills and you’ll take a module that prepares you for your year abroad, including the research project that you’ll do while you’re away. You’ll also study Spanish Linguistics.

You’ll be able to choose from a wide range of optional modules to tailor your degree to areas that interest you. Topics might include:

syntax
sound and voice
myths and realities
power and discourse
psycholinguistics
teaching English as a foreign language

Year 3 overview

In year 3 you'll undertake your period abroad, in which you'll complete an assessed portfolio of work which counts as a double module and is used to determine progression to year 4.

You'll work independently on focused tasks as you acquire more knowledge of the target language, culture and society.

This will be your opportunity to get to know a foreign culture at first hand, either as a student or in a work placement. As well as the daily opportunities you will have to practise using the foreign language, you're also ideally placed to get to know the people, and many lifelong friendships are made during this period.

We aim to support you, mainly by frequent email contact/Skype sessions.

Reasonable adjustments will be made for individual students who are unable to spend a period abroad. Part 3 contributes to the final degree classification.

Year 4 overview

We will support you in your return to university from your year abroad and we’ll help you to talk about your experiences in a way that enhances your employability. You’ll continue to develop your written and spoken Spanish and you’ll explore linguistic variations between the Iberian peninsula and Latin America.

You’ll be able to choose from a wide range of optional modules to tailor your degree to areas that interest you. These might include:

a Modern Languages dissertation.
public service interpreting
language teaching
representations of women in the Hispanic World
advanced syntax
English as a global language
documenting displacement in contemporary Spain

Want more detail? See all the modules in the course.

Modules

Changes due to COVID-19

Although the COVID-19 situation is improving, any future restrictions could mean we might have to change the way parts of our teaching and learning take place in 2022 to 2023. This means that some of the information on this course page may be subject to change.

Find out more on our COVID advice page.

For entry in Academic Year 2022-23

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

You must study the following modules in year 1:

Academic Skills for Modern languages and Linguistics students

This module is designed to ease the transition from A-level to the first year of a single or combined honours degree programme by setting out clearly what we expect of you at undergraduate level and equipping you with the resources to be able to operate a...

Applications of Linguistics

This unit will introduce you to the main areas relevant to applied language studies.

Elements of Linguistics - Sound, Structure and Meaning

This module provides an introduction to linguistic approaches to sound, structure and meaning in the branches of linguistics known as phonetics and phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics.

Introduction to Spanish and Latin America Studies

This module is designed to provide you with a broad introduction to the culture, history and language of Spain, Latin America and the Spanish speaking World. By studying various types of primary and secondary sources, you will become familiar with a wide...

Language Acquisition

You may have asked yourself how children learn their first language or whether some animals can speak just like humans do. People often wonder whether there are any lifelong benefits of bilingualism as well. This module introduces you to the field of lang...

Language, Ideologies and Attitudes

This module explores language in its social context. The main aim of this module is to introduce you to key research approaches to the study of language attitudes and ideologies and to encourage you to reflect on how attitudes and beliefs about language e...

Spanish Language Stage 4

The aim of every language course at the University is to enable you to communicate in your target language (TL) at that particular level and in your particular area of interest. We use the word ‘communicate’ in its widest sense, meaning that you will not ...

You must also choose from the following modules in year 1:

Understanding Culture

This introductory course will give you an overview of some approaches to, and topics within, cultural and literary studies. You will spend time on close textual reading, as well as on broader cultural analysis. It aims to encourage you to experiment in c...

Understanding History and Society

This module will introduce you to studying questions of history, society and culture through the prism of Southampton in order that you can apply those approaches to the study of cities in the French, Spanish and German-speaking world.

You must study the following module in year 2:

Managing Research and Learning

The module will clarify the links between the Year Abroad Portfolio and modules in years two and four.

You must also choose from the following modules in year 2:

Culture, Power and Resistance in the Portuguese-Speaking World

This course is designed to expand and deepen your knowledge of the cultures of the Portuguese-speaking world, bringing together written texts, visual and conceptual art, political materials, and cinema from twentieth-century Portugal, Brazil, and Portugu...

Gender, Race and Nation in Modern Latin America

The course examines major turning points in Spanish and Portuguese America from the middle nineteenth century to the present, with a focus on how these upheavals affected and reflected the politics of class, gender and race.

Discourse Analysis

This module highlights and analyses the link between language structure and its situation of occurrence.

Ethnography of Latin America

This module uses ethnographic approaches to understand the diversity of Latin America’s peoples and cultures. Emphasizing the emergence within Latin American anthropology of focuses on everyday life through topics such as kinship and family, ritual and re...

Exploring Spanish Linguistics

The module introduces you to relevant issues and topics of contemporary Spanish linguistics and establishes the basis for future application of linguistic principles.

High, Popular, Mass Culture: Cultural Hybridity and Globalization in Latin America and Spain

This module examines high, popular and mass cultural forms in twentieth century Spain and Latin America. Attention is particularly paid to the political uses made of those different forms. The module explores the function of popular culture in predominant...

Multilingualism

This module will introduce you to the notion of ‘Multilingualism’, how this is understood and represented in different ways, and why it matters to you. You will explore how people become multilingual, and whether it makes a difference if multilinguals are...

Psycholinguistics

This module examines three areas of psycholinguistics which help to understand what the relationship between language and the human mind might be.

Sound and Voice

This module builds on the basic concepts of articulatory phonetics introduced in the first year, and introduces theory and methodology of acoustic science for the study of the production and perception of speech sounds.

Syntax: Studying Language Structure

This module will provide introduce you to the study of syntax within current linguistic theory.

Teaching English as a Foreign Language

This module will introduce you to key issues, concepts and methods in teaching English as a second/foreign language.

You must study the following module in year 4:

Seeing and Being Seen. Period Abroad re-entry

This module is designed to accompany you as you resume your programme of studies in Southampton and grapple with the challenges of re-entry. We will support you as you reflect upon your experience of study abroad, enable you to articulate those experience...

You must also choose from the following modules in year 4:

English as a Global Language

This module explores the rise of English as a global language focusing on the factors that have led to, and the issues that have arisen from, its dominant status. You will learn about the interrelation between globalisation, standardisation and variabilit...

Exiles, Migrants and Citizens: Narrating and documenting displacement in contemporary Spain

Migration has been a recurrent theme that has characterized Spain’s social, political and cultural history since its emergence as a modern nation in 1492. By drawing on narrative inquiry, this module will focus on the most recent migration movements of th...

Barrios and Borders: Language and Identity amongst US Latinos

This module will introduce the main theoretical ideas of language and identity alongside tracing the historical, social and linguistic background to the presence of the so-called Latinos in the USA. By considering a range of texts, as well as cultural ou...

Encounters with Bodies in Lusophone Cultural Narrative

Based on written texts, films and visual materials from and about Portugal, Brazil, Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique, this course is intended to show you the cutting edge of cultural production and research from the Portuguese-speaking wo...

Historical Memory in Modern Latin America

Language Teaching Theory and Practice

This module examines the theory and practice of language teaching and explores 'reflective practice' as a set of skills that can be applied to your future working life.

Language Testing and Assessment in Society

This module develops awareness of how language testing and assessment have developed in educational and wider social contexts. It focusses on both purposes and processes of language testing and assessment, and critically examines applications in policy ar...

Modern Languages Dissertation

This unit will allow students to undertake independent research to produce an in-depth study of a specific topic located in one of the fields within Modern Languages. You will also have the option of producing a professional project. In that case, your d...

Second Language Acquisition

This module provides an insight into the cognitive processes involved in the acquisition of language. Different theories of first and second language acquisition will be examined and critically assessed in the light of empirical evidence. Various factors ...

Sex, Soap Operas and Female Dissidents: Representations of Women in the Hispanic World

This course will introduce you to a range of examples of Spanish American (e.g. may include Puerto Rican, Argentinean, and Mexican [American]) and Iberian cultural production from the period of the 1980s to the 21st century, in order to provide a sense o...

Sociophonetic Project Module

This final year module builds on the theoretical grounding students gain in LING 2011 Variation and Change in English and the instrumental analysis techniques from LING 2008 Sound and Voice. Through a series of computer, lab-based sessions, students test ...

Writing in a Second Language

The module will take you through the process, the product and the place of writing. Process will deal primarily with modelling cognitive operations, analysis of composing strategies, and individual differences and changes in processes over time. Product w...

Fees, costs and funding

Tuition fees

Fees for a year's study:

UK students pay £9,250.
EU and international students pay £19,300.

What your fees pay for

Your tuition fees pay for the full cost of tuition and all examinations.

Find out how to:

Accommodation and living costs, such as travel and food, are not included in your tuition fees. Explore:

Bursaries, scholarships and other funding

If you're a UK or EU student and your household income is under £25,000 a year, you may be able to get a University of Southampton bursary to help with your living costs. Find out about bursaries and other funding we offer at Southampton.

If you're a care leaver or estranged from your parents, you may be able to get a specific bursary.

Get in touch for advice about student money matters.

Scholarships and grants

You may be able to get a scholarship or grant to help fund your studies.

We award scholarships and grants for travel, academic excellence, or to students from under-represented backgrounds.

Support during your course

The Student Services Centre offers support and advice on money to students. You may be able to access our Student Support fund and other sources of financial support during your course.