The Department of World Languages and Literatures helps students communicate effectively and thrive in a global context. Our programs are multilingual, our faculty and students are multicultural, and our curriculum is international.

We offer majors in four of the most widely spoken languages in the world: Chinese, Japanese, French, and Spanish, and M.A. programs in Spanish and French. We also offer language minors in International Business, Italian, Portuguese and Latin American Studies, and a single subject teaching credential program in French, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese and Spanish.

We offer language and culture courses in Arabic, Hebrew, Persian and Vietnamese, and classes in Greek and Latin. Our graduates work as teachers, executives, translators, interpreters, civil servants, journalists, and hold many other occupations in global business and finance.

1. Ability to effectively use grammatical structures in Spanish and to express oneself orally and in writing in different sociolinguistic milieus including formal and academic presentations.

2. Ability to appreciate literary texts of the Spanish-speaking world (Spain, Spanish America and the Hispanic U.S.) and to recognize stylistic elements in the literature.

3. Ability to develop and carry out research projects in Spanish, including term papers and bibliographical research.

4. Ability to analyze and develop texts other than literary: for example, informal and formal correspondence, (applications for school or jobs, a résumé, brochures, etc.) and to understand the use of appropriate academic and technical terminology.

5. Ability to produce, analyze and rationalize the sounds of Spanish (phonology) as compared and contrasted with the sounds of English.

6. Ability to analyze morphological, syntactic and semantic components of Spanish