News
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August 25, 2022Member Spotlight: Dr. Nancy Hermiston
Nancy Hermiston is chair of the UBC School of Music’s Voice and Opera Divisions and also serves as University Marshal. In 2014, she was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada for her achievements as an opera singer, stage director and educator. Her operatic career has taken…
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August 25, 2022Language Sciences Welcomes Dr. Christine Schreyer as Interim Co-Director
The Language Sciences Institute is excited to announce that Dr. Christine Schreyer will be joining the institute as Interim Co-Director! Dr. Christine Schreyer is an associate professor of anthropology at the University of British Columbia, Okanagan campus, where she teaches a range of courses…
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August 3, 2022A Future With AI Writing Companions: Changing The Landscape for Writers
Modern language models now have the capability to generate written text that approaches human-level writing, foreshadowing the eventual advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) writing companions. However, while this new technology boasts increased productivity and support for writers, it also…
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August 2, 2022Is There a Correlation Between the Use of Representational Gestures and Self-Adaptors? Q&A with Dr. Elena Nicoladis
In the study, 'Is There a Correlation Between the Use of Representational Gestures and Self-Adaptors?' the research team tested the hypothesis that people who produce more representational gestures also produce more self-adaptors. A secondary purpose of the study was to test whether there were…
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July 27, 2022Member Spotlight: Xing (Ezra) Yu
Language Sciences member, Xing (Ezra) Yu, is a Masters' Student in the School of Population and Public Health at UBC. What are your current research interests? I have always been interested in public health issues caused by urbanization and how they can be studied using advanced health…
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July 7, 2022Introducing Turjuman: A Public Tool For Neural Arabic Machine Translation
Recent progress in artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming lives. In particular, advances in deep learning, a subfield of AI that loosely mimics information processing in the brain, has enabled innovations across a wide range of domains. One area where rapid progress is taking place is machine…
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June 23, 2022Member Spotlight: Dr. Mark Turin
Language Sciences member, Dr. Mark Turin, is an anthropologist, linguist and radio presenter. At the University of British Columbia, Mark currently serves as an Associate Professor of Anthropology. He previously served as Chair of the First Nations and Endangered Languages…
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June 16, 2022Member Feature: Denitza Dramkin
Language Sciences member, Denitza Dramkin, is currently pursuing her PhD in Developmental Psychology working with Dr. Darko Odic in the Centre for Cognitive Development. Don't miss her upcoming Language Sciences Talk, 'Exploring the link between language and perception through number words and…
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June 2, 2022Dr. Abdul-Mageed named Canada Research Chair in Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning
Congratulations to Dr. Muhammad Abdul-Mageed for being named a Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning in the 2022 round of CRC appointments! Dr. Abdul-Mageed is an Assistant Professor in the School of Information and Department of Linguistics and an…
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June 1, 2022Digital Media: Providing opportunities for language and literacy learning for youth from refugee backgrounds
The world of digital media is providing new pedagogical opportunities for authentic and engaging language and digital literacy learning for culturally and linguistically diverse youth from refugee backgrounds. Dr. Maureen Kendrick, Dr. Margaret Early, Amir Michalovich and Meena Mangat developed…