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	Studies in Heritage Languages and Language Processing What are the major cognitive constraints on the processing of language in real time? What makes one a fluent speaker of a language learned since birth? In our lab, we address these questions by studying how native speakers respond to the structure and meaning of their language. We also study the knowledge of language in heritage speakers—those who grew up hearing and even speaking a language other English but who are now more comfortable in English. According to recent statistics about one third of American college undergraduates are heritage speakers. This large demographic group has been virtually neglected until recently, but understanding what they know is crucial to our understanding of language acquisition in general. We use behavioral methods to study native and heritage speakers of a range of languages such as English, Russian, Korean, Mandarin, Spanish, Arabic, and Persian. Announcements: 05/20/08: The Second Heritage Language Summer Institute will take place at Harvard, June 23-27. For more information, please visit the institute's website. 05/12/08: Tomorrow, Dr. Donna Karen from Ohio State will talk about some experiments she did on anaphora resolution. 05/02/08: Next Tuesday, Sun-hee will talk about long distance reflexives in Korean; background reading: Sells, Peter. 1987. Aspects of Logophoricity. Linguistic Inquiry 18: 445-479. 04/21/08: Tomorrow's lab meeting would involve a discussion of new projects. 04/07/08: Congratulations to Ming Xiang who has accepted a tenure track position at the University of Victoria! Ming will be staying with us for another year and will leave for Victoria in July 2009.
The Polinsky Lab Harvard University Vanserg Building 10 Divinity Ave/ 29 Francis Ave, Rm 130 Cambridge MA 02138 617-496-5426
Copyright © 2007 The President and Fellows of Harvard College

Studies in Heritage Languages and Language Processing

What are the major cognitive constraints on the processing of language in real time? What makes one a fluent speaker of a language learned since birth? In our lab, we address these questions by studying how native speakers respond to the structure and meaning of their language. We also study the knowledge of language in heritage speakers—those who grew up hearing and even speaking a language other English but who are now more comfortable in English. According to recent statistics about one third of American college undergraduates are heritage speakers. This large demographic group has been virtually neglected until recently, but understanding what they know is crucial to our understanding of language acquisition in general.

We use behavioral methods to study native and heritage speakers of a range of languages such as English, Russian, Korean, Mandarin, Spanish, Arabic, and Persian.

Announcements:

05/20/08: The Second Heritage Language Summer Institute will take place at Harvard, June 23-27. For more information, please visit the institute's website.

05/12/08: Tomorrow, Dr. Donna Karen from Ohio State will talk about some experiments she did on anaphora resolution.

05/02/08: Next Tuesday, Sun-hee will talk about long distance reflexives in Korean; background reading: Sells, Peter. 1987. Aspects of Logophoricity. Linguistic Inquiry 18: 445-479.

04/21/08: Tomorrow's lab meeting would involve a discussion of new projects.

04/07/08: Congratulations to Ming Xiang who has accepted a tenure track position at the University of Victoria! Ming will be staying with us for another year and will leave for Victoria in July 2009.