LSURC 2023
Best Oral Presentation
First Place: Jaimie Muller (UBC) – “Measuring Brain Regions Involved in Infant Speech Processing: A Meta-Analysis”
Second Place: Farzana Ali (SFU) – “Environmental Entropy as a Means to Further Explore Bilingualism”
Third Place: Charys Russell (UCalgary) – “My Pronunciation is Éxcusable: A Diachronic Look at Stress Placement with English Derivational Suffices”
Best Poster Presentation
First Place: Madeline Maclean (UCalgary) – “The Role of Affective Prosody in the Perception of Emotional States”
Second Place: John Shahki (UBC) – “The Language Network in Task-Based fMRI”
Plenary Session:
- Dr. Qi Cheng (Neuroplasticity & Language Lab | UW, Department of Linguistics) Word Order or World Knowledge? The Role of Early Language On Resolving Conflicting Cues by Deaf Individuals
- Dr. Heather Bliss & Annette Fox-BruisedHead (SFU, Department of Linguistics) Aikamotsiipohtoo’p: Blackfoot Language Revitalization with Families and in the Home
- Professor Nigel Howard (UBC, Department of Linguistics) Social Perception and Evolution in the use of Signed Languages
The theme for our invited speakers for 2023 was Mediums of Communication:
Dynamic and ever-changing, communication is a ubiquitous force that shapes our understanding of ourselves and transcends the boundaries of our limited experiences to share our collective perceptions of the world. From the expansion of face-to-face meetings and phone calls to texting and Zoom meetings, one thing remains constant: these methods of communication connect humanity across space, time, and cultures. From individuals’ use of voice, body language, and expression to large-scale media networks, let us explore communication in its forms across all time.
Click here to view the 2023 Program Schedule
Click here to view the 2023 Program Booklet
LSURC 2022
Best Oral Presentation
First Place: Sarvenaz Oloomi (UBC) – “Exploring Mechanisms of Phonetic Category Learning Through Perceptual Attunement”
Second Place: Ama Murray (UBC) – “The effect of place of articulation on the extent of velopharyngeal opening in Quebecois French nasal consonants”
Third Place: Rebekah Wong (SFU) – “The Perception of Quantifier Raising in Japanese-English Bilinguals”
Best Poster Presentation
First Place: Charissa Purnomo (UBC) – “The Contextual Effects of Nasal Vowels on Velopharyngeal Opening in Quebecois French”
Second Place: Zoe Lin (UBC) – “Zero and Measurements in Mandarin Nominal Semantics”
Third Place: Nicole Ebbutt (UBC) – “Prosodic characteristics of English speakers with Alzheimer’s disease”
Plenary Session:
- Dr. Muhammad Abdul-Mageed (UBC, School of Information, Dept. of Linguistics and Computer Science) Neural Speech and Language Processing for the “Long Tail”
- Dr. Diana Carter & Ethan Benjamin (UBCO, Dept. of Languages and World Literatures) elle, ellx, ell@ and ell????: Spanish gender inclusive neopronouns and suffixes of the future
- Dr. Raheleh Saryazdi (UHN, KITE-Toronto Rehabilitation Institute) Using Technology to Explore Language in Aging
The theme for our invited speakers for 2022 was Language and the Future:
Language is constantly changing and evolving. Within our ongoing linguistic experiences, we have likely witnessed the creation of new words, important discourse, and many advancements in communication technology. Language will always be something that affects us throughout our lives and will never remain stagnant. While focusing on the future, it is also important that we acknowledge the history and past related to these changes and how they play a role in approaches within and outside of academia. In considering both the past and the future, across many areas of study will language and its changes continue to reveal more about human communication.
Click here to view the 2022 Program Schedule
Click here to view the 2022 Program Booklet
LSURC 2021
Best Oral Presentation
First Place: Nora Becker (UBC) – “Animal Metaphors for Women”
Second Place (2-way tie; winners announced in alphabetical order): Sarah Lafleur (UBC) – “Perceptions of English Spoken in Metro Vancouver’ / Will Alvarez Navarrete (UBC) – “Are Gender-Neutral Forms More Challenging Than Canonical Forms for Native Spanish Speakers? Comparing Speech Comprehension Under Normal Speech and Speech with Noise”
Best Poster Presentation
First Place (2-way tie; winners announced in alphabetical order): Jastinne Diaz (University of Alberta) – ‘“I can understand but I can’t speak”: The Effect of Conversation Clubs on Passive Bilingualism” / Tabatha Mason (SFU) – “The Incorporation of English Noun Loanwords into Japanese Syntax”
Second Place: Katherine Lee (UBC) – “The Effects of Auditory Imagery on Language Acquisition”
Plenary Session:
- Dr. Elise Stickles (UBC, Dept. of English Language & Literature) An Epidemic of Poverty, A Tsunami of Cases, and an Onslaught of Disease: The Metaphoric Construal of Social Issues as Physical Harm
- Dr. Ashley Rose Mehlenbacher (University of Waterloo, Dept. of English Language and Literature) Genre-ing Activities and Science Communication Online
- Dr. Maite Taboada (SFU Dept. of Linguistics) The Language of Harmful Online Content
The theme for our invited speakers for 2021 was The Language of Science:
Language and science work like a two-way street: they influence each other, shaping the way we think and forming our ideas which can be shared amongst others. This intellectual growth facilitates our ability to connect with individuals in various settings – institutions, clinical settings, even in mundane conversation. The different aspects of language play an integral role in communication, enabling us to gain insight and probe into the countless areas of academia and research. This coherence feeds accomplishments in knowledge dissemination, allowing us to learn and prosper in our fields of interest.
Click here to view the 2021 Program Schedule
Click here to view the 2021 Program Booklet
LSURC 2020
Best Oral Presentation
First place: Chloe Farr (UVic) – “Pitch variation in Umuahia Igbo”
Second place (3-way tie; winners announced in alphabetical order): Lauren Denusik – “Children’s perception of foreign accented consonant clusters” / Paris Gappmayr – “The development of the quantifier “some” in children”/ Charul Maheshka – “The interaction between perception and language: How we reason about quantities”
Best Poster Presentation
First place: Christina Sen – “Hearing accents in noisy environments”
Second place: Christine Song, Ivan Fong, Amanda Eliora – “Korean A-not-A questions: Is it neutral or not?”
Click here to view the 2020 Program Schedule
Click here to view the 2020 Conference Booklet
LSURC 2019
Best Oral Presentation
Yurika Aonuki – “Phonology of Adjective Intensification in American Sign Language”
Best Poster Presentation
Gracellia Purnomo – “Biomechanical Constraints on Signed Languages: Repetitive Motion in Two-Handed Alternating Signs”
Plenary Session:
- Oksana Tkachman (ABD) (UBC Dept. of Linguistics) How structure emerges in young languages: Insights from novel compounding in Israeli Sign Language and Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language
- Dr. Stefka Marinova-Todd (UBC School of Audiology and Speech Sciences) Where there’s a will, there’s a way: The Role of Motivation in Learning Languages
- Dr. Ryan C. Taylor (UBC Dept. of Linguistics) Simulated faces don’t perfectly represent the real speech that underlies them: how perceivers deal with imperfect information
The theme for our invited speakers for 2019 was #global:
We believe language is unique in that it both unites and diversifies the human race. Though there are innate ramifications due to language, affecting linguistic communities socially and politically, we acknowledge and stress the importance of sharing and gaining knowledge of language and communication through research. In celebrating these differences, we aim achieve to a better understanding of this intrinsic gift, through ourselves and others. Additionally, in an age where digitization and technology are rapidly advancing, our ability to communicate has been transformed to be both more efficient and widely accessible.
Click here to view the 2019 Program Schedule
Click here to view the 2019 Conference Program
LSURC 2018
Best Oral Presentation
Lydia Rhi – “Perception Study of Strong and Weak Imperatives in English”
Dimitri Prica – “”No” she said, nodding: Is there a multimodal advantage in cognitive control tasks?”
Best Poster Presentation
Erin Stadnyk – “The Role of Co-verbal Facial Gestures in Speech Segmentation and the Acquisition of Word Order”
Plenary Session:
- Dr. Molly Babel (UBC Dept. of Linguistics) Guess Who? The Language Familiarity Effect at UBC
- Dr. Muhammad Abdul-Mageed (UBC School of Library, Archival and Information Studies) Project Dialect: Deep Learning for Language Variation
- Dr. Neda Todorovic (UBC Dept. of Linguistics) How Do Languages Semantically Compensate for a Syntactic “loss”: The Case of Tense Phrase
The theme for our invited speakers for 2018 was Language as an insight into human nature:
The studies of language span diverse fields but are united by the common theme that human language provides unique insight into how we come to understand human nature. Language is cognitive and cultural, internal and external, personal and social; the diversity of approaches taken in studying language enriches our understanding of who we are. How can the perspective of your field enrich our understanding of language, as a uniquely human phenomenon?
Click here to view the 2018 Program Schedule
Click here to view the 2018 Conference Program
LSURC 2017
Plenary Session:
- Dr. Bryan Gick (UBC Dept. of Linguistics): Simulating Talking Bodies
- Dr. Bonny Norton (UBC Dept. of Language & Literacy Education): Digital Storytelling and Social Change in Classrooms and Communities
- Dr. Janet Werker (UBC Dept. of Psychology): Language Acquisition: First Steps in Infancy
Click here to view the 2017 Program Schedule
Click here to view the 2017 Conference Program