Today@Dal

ICPLA VP Sharynne McLeod, Dalhousie VP Research Dr. Martha Crago, Dr. Ellen Bialystok and Human Communication Disorders’ Professors Dr. Michael Kiefte, Dr. Elizabeth Kay-Raining Bird and Dr. Patricia Cleave.

The Dalhousie School of Human Communications Disorders wrapped up a successful conference this weekend. The 16th International Clinical Phonetics and Linguistics Association (ICPLA) Conference drew nearly 200 attendees from 24 countries.

Hosted in the new Collaborative Health Education Building (CHEB), the Conference drew an interdisciplinary crowd of experts working on the application of clinical linguistics and phonetics to speech and language disorders. The attendees, including linguists, psychologists and speech-language pathologists, heard from a slate of well-known plenary speakers.

The Conference kicked off with a presentation from linguistics professor Dr. Sally Rice on the revitalization of indigenous languages, particularly aboriginal. Over the following four days, attendees heard from psychologist Dr. Janet Werker on child language development from infant perception to language, fellow psychologist Dr. Ellen Bialystok on the advantages of bilingualism in age-related cognitive impairment and clinical psychologist Dr. Ingrid Johnsrude on language in noisy environments.

The Conference explored a broad range of topics pertaining to typical and atypical speech and language with sessions on speech sound disorders, child language, acquired speech and language impairment, multilingualism, reading and writing and many other topics.

Special thanks to Dalhousie Research Services and the Faculty of Health Professions for their support and to Dr. Michael Kiefte and the members of the conference planning committee.