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The Power of Language: Consequences of Bilingualism for Cognition, Language, and the Brain
28 March 2025, 5:00 pm–7:00 pm
Please join us for this PROLang event co-organised with the Institute for Languages Cultures and Societies
This event is free.
Event Information
Open to
- All
Availability
- Yes
Cost
- Free
Organiser
-
SSEES
Location
-
Masaryk roomUCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies16 Taviton streetLondonWC1H 0BW
Consequences of Bilingualism for Cognition, Language, and the Brain with author and Professor Viorica Marian in conversation with Professor Daniel Richardson and Dr Natalia Parker.
This event will take place in-person and will also be livestreamed online. The talk will be followed by a reception.
Bilingualism and multilingualism have profound consequences for individuals and societies. Learning multiple languages changes not only how we use language, but also how we perceive the world, what we remember, how we learn, our creativity, decision making, and identity. Professor Viorica Marian will present eye-tracking and neuroimaging evidence that multiple languages continuously interact in the mind. She will conclude with a call for placing the study of language-mind interaction in multilinguals among the core areas of scientific investigation if we are to gain an accurate understanding of humanity’s potential.
About the Speakers
Professor Dr. Viorica Marian
is a psycholinguist at Northwestern University, where she is the Sundin Endowed Professor of Communication and Director of the Bilingualism and Psycholinguistics Lab. She received her PhD in Psychology from Cornell University and previously served as Chair of the National Institutes of Health Study Section on Language and Communication and as Chair of the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. She is the recipient of the American Association for the Advancement of Science John McGovern Award, the Psychonomic Society Mid-Career Award, the Clarence Simon Award for Outstanding Teaching and Mentoring, and several best paper awards. Marian’s new popular science book “The Power of Language” has been translated into 12 languages.
Daniel C. Richardson
is a Professor of Experimental Psychology at University College London. Prior to that, he was an undergraduate at Magdalen College, Oxford, a graduate student at Cornell, a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford, and an assistant professor at UC Santa Cruz. His research examines how individuals' thought processes are related to the people around them. He is the author of Man versus Mind, and Social Psychology for Dummies, and has published more than 60 articles in international scientific journals. He has consulted for groups such as the BBC, Audible, Twitch, Google and Vue Cinemas. He has received three Provost Teaching Awards from UCL, and performed shows at the London Science Museum and Bloomsbury theatre combining science, music and live experiments on the group mind of the audience. He is a director of ACN Labs (https://www.acnlabs.co.uk/) helping companies gain insight through neuroscience and psychology.
Dr. Natalia V. Parker
born and first educated in Russia, Natalia holds a PhD from the University of Leeds. Her research synthesizes Second Language Acquisition, psycholinguistics and language pedagogy; it stems from over 20 years of teaching experience and focuses on cognitive processing in a language classroom. Natalia’s first teaching intervention investigated the processing and acquisition of Russian phonology and led to publishing her book “Russian in Plain English”, nominated for 2022 AATSEEL Book Award in Linguistics and Language Pedagogy (American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages). The second teaching intervention centred on case morphology and was funded by UK Research and Innovation. Since 2021, Natalia has been teaching at UCL.