Head of Department Lect. Ona Laima Gudzineviciute P. Visinskio 38 76352 Siauliai Tel. +370 41 59 57 85 E-mail lkk@hu.su.lt

The department was founded in 1948. At first it was called The Department of Languages and Literature, since 1949 - The Department of the Lithuanian Language and Literature, since 1968 - The Department of the Lithuanian Language, since 2005 - The Department of Lithuanian Linguistics and Communication.

Study Programs: The Lithuanian Language and Literature (till 1997), Lithuanian Philology (BA; FT, extra-mural studies), Lithuanian Philology and Public Relations (BA; FT), Lithuanian Philology (BA; specializations: Librarianship, Publishing, Public Relations), Lithuanian Linguistics (MA; FT, extra-mural studies), journalism (graduate, specialized professional studies; extra-mural studies).

Research interests:

1. Text Linguistics, stylistics and poetics.
2. Phonetics of dialects, lexis and grammar.
3. The policy of language, sociolinguistics, ethno linguistics, language etiquette.
4. The parallels of the Lithuanian and Latvian languages.
5. Semantic categories: synchrony and diachrony.

Scientific work. The department has been organizing conferences since 1970 (the majority of them together with Department of the Russian Language and Department of Literature (now Department of Literature History and Theory): international conference On the Questions of Baltic and Slavic Anthroponomy (1970), intercollegiate conference On the questions of Lexis and Syntax (1973), republican conference On the Questions of Syntax and Semantics (1982) and others. Since 1991 the department together with the departments mentioned above started organizing scientific conferences on the questions of text theory and analysis. Ten conferences were held yearly and had different titles. Since 2001 traditional conference Text: Linguistics and Poetics has been held every second year. In 2001-2005 four conferences were organized (in 2004 the 13^th conference was organized by Vilnius Pedagogical university). The conferences are popular not only with the Lithuanian scientific institutions but with neighboring countries esp. Latvia as well.  The theses of the reports are published before the conferences and  according to the selection of the editorial staff the articles are published in the journal Philology. In 2000 thematic collection The Characteristics of Text was published (in 2001 the second issue supplemented with new articles was released). Since 1990 every fifth year the department has been organizing conferences The Day of Jonas Jablonskis in Šiauliai, the articles of which has been published. Since 1994 together with Department of the Russian Language ethno linguistic conferences have been organized, the articles have been published in the journal Philology.

The staff of the department goes to the secondments abroad and participates in Lituanistic projects. More than 500 scientific articles have been published in Lithuania and abroad.

The staff. Prof. habil. dr. Kazimieras Župerka, professors dr. Giedrė Čepaitienė, dr. Genovaitė Kačiuškienė, dr. Skirmantas Valentas, dr. Bronius Maskuliūnas, associate professors dr. Rūta Kazlauskaitė, dr. Regina Kvašytė, dr. Jurgita Macienė,  dr. Juozas Pabrėža, dr. Janina Švambarytė-Valužienė, dr. Stasys Tumėnas, dr. Jolanta Vaskelienė,  lecturer dr. Silvila Papaurėlytė-Klovienė, lecturers Ona Laima Gudzinevičiūtė, Algirdas Malakauskas, assistants Gintarė Galinienė, Robertas Gedrimas, Sigita Inčiūrienė. Department coordinator - Rima Babelytė.