Mission

The scientific objective of the URPP Language and Space covers three areas: (i) constitution of research groups, (ii) development of linguistic research infrastructure, and (iii) initiation of concrete research projects.

(i) Constitution of research groups dedicated to particularly relevant fields of language-space-intersections. These fields are represented by the topics Language in Space, Space through Language, and Space in Language. Related to these topics there exist five focused research groups and three groups within the Language and Space Lab from which research projects and publications emerge.

(ii) Development of linguistic research infrastructure for the advancement of methodology and technology in language-space-research. In addition to the already existing linguistic laboratories at UZH (Phonetics Laboratory, Psycholinguistics Laboratory, and Phonogram Archives), three more units were set up: a corpuslinguistic unit (Text), an interdisciplinary unit conceived in coordination with colleagues from the Department of Geography (SDS/Spatial Data Science, formerly GIS), and a videoanalytical unit (Video).

(iii) Initiation of research projects within the three research topics of interest. Since 2013, several PhD and postdoctoral projects were initiated. Additional doctoral positions were created by means of co-financing and third party funding. One of the core responsibilities of the research groups is the preparation and supervision of these sub-projects. In doing so, they will support the advancement of early career researchers.