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What's the difference between linguistics and English language?

I'm currently in the process of choosing courses and I'm certain I'd like to do linguistics. I'm just not sure if I'd want to do language as well.

I'm doing English language at A2 right now, and I really enjoy it, especially the nitty gritty parts, just not the history side of things. Would an English language degree have more historical elements? This is something I'd want to avoid.

Also does sociolinguistics fall under linguistics or English language? It's been the part of my A-Level that I've enjoyed the most.

Thanks!

Reply 1

The Empire Odyssey

Original post by ellavanderbilt

English Language is more about society; so you'd be looking at language in accents and dialects, language in the media, and learning how to use language; i.e for different purposes of communication. You could have a module on persuasive language for example. It's all about how we use language in our everyday lives.

Linguistics is a lot more theoretical. It's usually about how language is formed, rather than how it's used. So for example, you could be studying the history of English and how it's been formed and changed over time, psycholinguistics which is all about where are words and language stored in the brain, how do we picture language, memory of language - basically language and the brain. You'll learn all sorts of things like CLA; how children learn to read, write and talk; complications like learning difficulties or speech anomalies. It's just more sciencey and technical. Whereas, Language is just more general can be easily applied to everyday use; how we communicate in everyday life essentially.