If language is humanity's most useful tool, then applied linguistics, as the study of language, puts that tool to work. The focus of applied linguistics is on trying to resolve language-based issues that people encounter in the real world (Grabe 2002). This dissertation-based degree allows students to customize their coursework and research around such areas as second language studies, teaching and assessment of language skills, corpus linguistics, grammar and discourse, pragmatics, psycholinguistics, and speech perception and production.