The BA in Romance Philology (in Spanish: Grado en Lenguas, Literaturas y Culturas Romanicas: BA in Romance Languages, Literatures and Cultures) takes on and renews the study field and the methodology of the former BA in Romance Philology. Let’s see what the we are inviting you to study mean exactly:

The root of the word ‘philology’ comes from old Greek and literally means “love for knowledge”. The Dictionario de Autoridades defines it as a “science composed of and adorned with grammar, rhetoric, history, poetry, antiquity and, generally speaking, critique and having a keen for the rest of the sciences. Derived from Greek., Lat. Philologia.” Which is to say, for the creators of this 18th century dictionary, philology is the science of sciences, but overall the science of human sciences. In reality, the term ‘philology’ is applied most certainly to the critical study of language and
literature.

Usually, the noun ‘philology’ is preceded by one of the adjectives: ‘Romance’, ‘German’, ‘Classic’, ‘Semitic’, ‘Slavic’, ‘Hispanic’, ‘French’, ‘English’ etc. The qualifier in the title refers to the languages that make the object of dedicated study.

The adjectives ‘Romance’, ‘Germanic’ or ‘Classic’ direct to a model of study and teaching which is denominated in comparison. In Classic Philology, Greek shares the field with Latin, in addition with Indo-European, which is the main trunk from which they both derive. Romance Philology is interrelated with Classic Philology because it studies the languages and literatures which spring and evolve directly from Latin until they convert in the native languages used by populations across Europe and in other parts of the world, that were exposed to the contact with Europeans speaking Romance languages.

The BA in Romance Philology is dedicated to the study of the linguistic, literary and cultural use of these languages – from a comparative and historic perspective.