Hi, I'm Marc van Oostendorp.

This is Leiden University.

Welcome to this course on
the miracles of human language.

This is our studio where we prepared
a course full of surprises,

full of miracles of human language.

This course is all about diversity.

Well, it's all about diversity,
and it's also about similarity.

And that's because there are about
6,000 languages in the world.

And they're diverse,
they're all different,

but they are also similar in some way.

How is that possible?

That's one thing, an important thing that
we're going to explore in this course.

And we're going to explore
this in five modules.

In the first module, we talk about
questions like what makes language

so typically human,

or differentiates it from,
from animal languages, for instance.

And we're going to see how
linguists go about their work.

There are different kinds of linguists and
we're going to meet them.

In the second module,
we talk about sounds of language.

How do we produce sounds?

How do we distinguish sounds?

How do we organize sounds in our minds?

In the third module,
we talk about words and sentences.

How are languages different in
the way in which they create words?

How are they different in the way in
which they organize words into sentences?

In the fourth module
we talk about meaning.

How do we give meaning to words and
sentences in human language?

And how do languages differ in that?

And in the fifth module, we talk
about language in its social context.

We talk about how language is actually
used in, let's say, everyday life.

Since this course is all about diversity,

there's also diversity
within every module.

It's not just me explaining things to you.

We also have discussions with students

and we've interviews with experts, 
with linguists from the Netherlands

and other countries about linguistics,

about their job.

But most of all,
we have speakers of different languages.

We have found six speakers of
six very different languages.

And they will give examples of
how they speak of words and

sentences in their language.

And it will be up to you
to analyze those examples.

And if you're in an advanced track 
or if you just like that kind of thing

we also invite you to submit 
your own language,

to make videos in which you give 
those same words and sentences

in your own language.

And then,
other students can analyze those.

We also invite you to participate.

We have an online forum
on our course page

and if you like that kind of thing,

we also have a Facebook group in
which you can discuss these things.

But in any case, we hope to see you
very soon in the first module of

our course on the miracles
of human language.