Welcome to the Department of European Languages and Cultures (DELC) at the University of Edinburgh.

We teach degree programmes in French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Norwegian, Danish, and Swedish, and offer courses in Basque, Catalan, Icelandic, Nynorsk and Old Norse.

Our undergraduate MA (Hons) programmes take four years to complete, including a full year studying or working abroad in Year 3. All programmes can be taken on a single honours basis, or as a joint honours programme combining a language with one of a range of other subjects in the arts, humanities and social sciences. Most can be taken with no prior knowledge of the language. 

Our interdisciplinary postgraduate environment brings together our expertise in European languages with teaching and research in film, literature, theatre, the other arts, and translation. Programmes span a range of eras and themes, from medieval literatures to gender.

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Open Language courses in French, German, Icelandic, Italian and Spanish are free to all University of Edinburgh students. You can take one at any stage of your undergraduate or postgraduate programme. Each course lasts one semester and can be taken for 20 credits or for extra credit, depending on your other study commitments. Foundation 1 classes are suitable for complete beginners.

Find out more about Open Language courses

Over the course of 2022, we were saddened to hear of the deaths of two former colleagues in European Languages and Cultures: Derek Wagg (Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies, formerly Hispanic Studies) in April; and Sheila Wagg (née Millar; German Studies) in September. Former student Susan Harrison pays tribute. 

Read Susan's tribute to Derek and Sheila