Basque
The Department of Spanish and Portuguese offers classes of Basque for undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Our classes of Basque are offered in partnership Etxepare Basque Institute.
Basque (Euskara) is the only pre-Roman, non-Indo-European language in Western Europe, which makes it distinct from other European languages and has sparked the interests of linguists for decades. It's spoken in the Basque Country of northern Spain, where it's co-official with Spanish, and in southern France and the Basque diaspora in Western US and elsewhere.
Typically, we offer BASQ 401: Beginner’s Basque in the fall semester and BASQ 402: Intermediate Basque in the spring. There are typically no pre-requisites for BASQ 402: students without prior experience with Basque are encouraged to enroll!
In the past, our department has also organized cultural events like the mini-Korrika, a relay-race around the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus to raise awareness of Basque language and culture.
Follow the Basque at the University of Illinois Facebook page.
Catalan
Students can enroll in Catalan language coursework at a partner institution through the Big Ten Academic Alliance CourseShare program.
Students interested in studying Catalan are encouraged to apply for the Alvaro Monserrat Llardén Scholarship in Catalan Studies to support their language learning or research on a field related to Catalan. More info here.
Less Commonly Taught Languages (LCTL) CourseShare
Through the Big Ten Academic Alliance CourseShare program, students from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign may enroll in Less Commonly Taught Languages (LCTL) like Catalan and Ladino at partner institutions in the Big Ten. More info here.