Linguistics is the study of language. People who study language are called linguists.

There are five main parts of linguistics: the study of sounds (phonology), the study of parts of words, like "un-" and "-ing" (morphology), the study of word order and how sentences are made (syntax), the study of the meaning of words (semantics), and the study of the unspoken meaning of speech that is separate from the literal meaning of what is said (for example, saying "I'm cold" to get someone to turn off the fan (pragmatics).