PhD Requirements

The doctoral program requires a minimum of 48 semester hours of graduate credit coursework in linguistics. This minimum requirement may include up to 30 hours of master's degree credit (including thesis). At least 18 hours must be coursework beyond the M.A. degree. In addition, the student must complete a minimum of 18 hours of Dissertation (Ling 699) credit.

Admission to the Ph.D. program is highly selective. The following criteria must be met:

  1. successful completion of coursework equivalent to the M.A. in Linguistics at UNM;
  2. a completed research paper of publishable quality and/or outstanding performance on the M.A. Comprehensive Examination in Linguistics at UNM; and
  3. willingness of a member of the department faculty to serve as the student's initial mentor.

At least 24 credit hours must be completed at UNM, and at least 18 hours must be completed after admission to the doctoral program at UNM. A minimum of 18 hours exclusive of dissertation must be earned in UNM courses numbered 500 or above. No more than 50% of the required course credits may be taken with a single faculty member; coursework completed for the master's degree is included in this limit.

Required Courses

Please note: the requirements have recently changed. Students have the option of using the catalogue year from which they began the program, or the current catalogue year.

  1. Two courses in Phonetics and Phonology, chosen from: Ling 502, 503, 505, or a seminar in phonetics or phonology. One of these courses must be either Ling 502 or Ling 503.
  2. Discourse/Syntax: Ling 523, Ling 529, or a seminar on a relevant topic
  3. Cognitive Linguistics: Ling 519, Ling 525, or a seminar on a relevant topic
  4. Sociolinguistics (LING 533, 534, or a seminar on a relevant topic);
  5. Typology/Field Linguistics: Ling 513, Ling 517, Ling 548, or a seminar on a relevant topic
  6. At least one methodology course appropriate to the field of specialization, e.g., Ling. 506 Experimental Phonetics, Ling. 513 Field Methods, Ling. 529 Discourse Analysis (subject to approval), Ling 569 Experimental Psycholinguistics, Spanish 546 Seminar in Hispanic Sociolinguistics, LLSS 502 Naturalistic Inquiry
  7. Three advanced seminars

A PhD in Linguistics with a concentration in Speech and Hearing Sciences is also available. The Linguistics Department also participates in the interdisciplinary PhD program in Educational Linguistics, housed in the College of Education.

More information can be found in the Graduate Student Manual.