The History

The Department of and the Degree Course in Communication Sciences were born as a project and idea shared by a group of university professors trained in Humanities, particularly in the fields of Linguistics and Computational Linguistics (continuing the legacy of the Institute of Linguistics, founded by Tullio de Mauro in Salerno during the 70s). That core has proven to be pioneering thanks to his particular sensitivity to those signals that would lead, within a decade or so, the field of communication and information, in its most varied fields of application, to be central in the economic, cultural and social scene, and subsequently to develop into the current scenario of New Economy and Society.

The project takes shape during the academic year 1990/91, when the University of Salerno establishes the first Italian Degree Course in Communication Sciences, with the presidency of Prof. Annibale Elia. In that year the lessons begin of the first year of the two-year statutory curriculum.

In terms of attention and interest and as for the areas of study and research, the start-up phase is experienced on the push of several feedback coming from the professional fields involved in communication (in particular, Journalism, Advertising, Cinema, and at that time a reduced component of Industrial Sector).

Currently, as a result of the reform which in Italy has led departments to merge, in 2010 in the Department of Political Science, Social and Communication (DSPSC) was born. Now this New Department has research centers, foundations, research laboratories and observatories, each with different but convergent purposes and areas of research. More specifically, one of the most active areas of research is the one of Language Sciences, and thanks to the Laboratory of Computational Linguistics "Maurice Gross" continues the tradition of studies on Lexicon-Grammar (LG), started by Prof. Maurice Gross in the 60s in Paris.