McGill’s Graduate Program in Linguistics has an excellent track record in training graduate students to do cutting-edge research in theoretical and experimental linguistics. The program provides students with the opportunity to study with faculty members who are leading international researchers in their fields. Students also have access to an incredibly rich research landscape in cognitive science at McGill, one of the world’s top research universities, as well as in Montreal more generally, with its many universities and research institutes. For example, several members of the department are associated with the Centre for Research on Brain, Language and Music (CRBLM). Each year, about 6-8 students from diverse backgrounds enter our graduate program, at the Masters or Doctoral level. After a year of rigorous training in the foundations of the field, the program offers a range of directions for further course work and research. Our department provides a competitive funding package (covering living expenses, tuition and fees) throughout the program. The package includes 1-2 years of teaching experience. Last but not least, Montreal is one of the most exciting and culturally distinct cities in North America. Living costs are relatively low compared to other big cities in the USA or Canada, and living within walking distance of McGill’s downtown campus is very affordable. For more information about life at McGill and in Montreal check out the information pages for prospective graduate students.
Our Focus
The aim of the Graduate Program in Linguistics at McGill is to train researchers in theoretical and experimental linguistics. In experimental areas, emphasis is placed on combining research in one of the core areas of linguistic theory with evidence from another domain (computational linguistics, field work, language acquisition, language variation and change, neurolinguistics, processing). More information on on-going research in the department.
Based on past experience with admissions, we would like to note that we don't offer training or supervision in applied linguistics, educational linguistics, second or foreign language teaching, discourse analysis, language planning, text linguistics, or translation theory. Candidates interested in Applied Linguistics/TESL may find this website to be of interest.