What's your name? The names of people and of places encode a huge amount of historical, linguistic and social information, much of it unavailable from other sources. In this course we study the origins, development and uses of names, focusing particularly on Scotland and England.

1x1hr lecture; 1x1hr seminar per week over 10 weeks.

This is one of the Honours options in English Language and Linguistics and may not run every year. The options that are running this session are available on MyCampus.

None

None

Article review (500 words) - 10%

Portfolio of online technical exercises - 40%

Coursework essay (2500 words) - 50%

Reassessments are normally available for all courses, except those which contribute to the Honours classification. For non-Honours courses, students are offered reassessment in all or any of the components of assessment if the satisfactory (threshold) grade for the overall course is not achieved at the first attempt. This is normally grade D3 for undergraduate students and grade C3 for postgraduate students. Exceptionally it may not be possible to offer reassessment of some coursework items, in which case the mark achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade. Any such exceptions for this course are described below. 

The aim of this course is to:

■ provide an opportunity to develop the skills to investigate the origins and development of names of places and of people in Scotland and England;

■ familiarise students with the main types and structures of place-names, given names and surnames;

■ enable students to carry out an in-depth analysis of a selected group of names.

By the end of this course, students will be able to:

■ describe the characteristic structures of different types of personal names and place-names;

■ outline diachronically the main languages that have contributed to the personal names and place-names of Scotland and England;

■ evaluate different sources of evidence for the study of names.

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.