Nov 14, 2024
OHIO University Undergraduate Catalog 2023-2024

LING 1000 - An Introduction to the Non-Indo-European Languages and Cultures of Africa and Asia


This course provides an overview and appreciation of Middle-Eastern, African, and Asian languages and their cultures, and allows students the opportunity to explore those languages and cultures they most wish to engage with. The course focuses mainly on Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and Swahili, the languages taught in the Linguistics Department. But the course also looks at other languages such as Hebrew, Wolof, Zulu, Thai, Vietnamese, Malay, Indonesian and Korean. As such, the course provides a taster of the languages that can be studied intensively at Ohio University and the belief systems that underlie them. At the same time, the course provides students who do not seek intensive language instruction, the chance to learn basic language and cultural skills and sensitivities needed for travel and work in Africa and Asia.

Credit Hours: 3
OHIO BRICKS Foundations: Intercultural Explorations
General Education Code (students who entered prior to Fall 2021-22): 2CP
Repeat/Retake Information: May be retaken two times excluding withdrawals, but only last course taken counts.
Lecture/Lab Hours: 3.0 lecture
Grades: Eligible Grades: A-F,WP,WF,WN,FN,AU,I
Learning Outcomes:
  • Students will be able to to recognize various non-alphabetic writing systems.
  • Students will be able to identify and describe variations in word order in Non-Indo European languages in comparison to Indo-European language families.
  • Students will be able to describe the differences in word order in Non-Indo European languages.
  • Students will be able to describe the major phonological differences of Non-Indo-European languages compared to Indo-European languages.
  • Students will be able to use basic greetings and explain their cultural origins.
  • Students will be able to enumerate the most common cognates, loan words, and false friends in the major Non-Indo-European languages.
  • Students will be able to name major language familes, which languages they comprise, and the historical context of their development.
  • Students will be able to use appropriate address terms in the major Non-Indo-European Languages and be able to distinguish male and female names.
  • Students will be able to identify and explain the major conceptual systems that underlie certain languages and language families.
  • Students will be able to compare and contrast the belief systems that underlie many of the non-Indo-European languages: Confucianism, Buddhism, Islam, Ubuntu, etc.
  • Students will be able to develop an awareness, appreciation and respect for Asian and African languages and cultures.
  • Students will be able to interpret intercultural experience from their own and others’ worldview and to act in a supportive manner that recognizes the feelings and attitudes of another linguistic and cultural group.


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