At this point in time, linguistic theory is diverse, highly technical, and often rather abstruse. The goal of this course is not to develop technical ability in any one theoretical approach to language, but rather to reach an understanding of the philosophical and theoretical underpinnings of different approaches. We will begin by identifying the kinds of questions which linguistic theory seeks to answer, and will go on to examine the fundamental assumptions which underlie some of the theories which have been proposed to answer them. The course will be based primarily on readings from the linguistic and philosophical literature, through which we will examine foundational issues in generative grammar, functional grammar, and formal semantics. The course is appropriate for graduate students and for advanced undergraduates with a significant background in linguistics or in philosophy.