Peter Sercombe research grant for project on language and perceptions

Peter SercombePeter Sercombe is a recent successful co-applicant to the Bank of Sweden’s Tercentenary Foundation for a grant of around  €1.25 million. The grant will fund a large project, involving universities from around Europe and led by Niclas Burenhult (Lund University, Sweden), entitled ‘Language as key to perceptual diversity: an interdisciplinary approach to the senses’.

Here is a description of the project:

This project situates field linguists at the center of an interdisciplinary research framework in which language expertise provides a crucial point of connection between researchers and lesser-known speech communities and knowledge systems, exploring human perception. To this end, the project brings together a team representing Linguistics, Cognitive Psychology, Geoscience and History of Religion to investigate language of perception in three diverse Language Observatories. Combining well-established methods with novel ones, research focuses on two fundamental and interrelated arenas of perception: landscape and ritual. Acknowledging that language can provide a window into both cognition and culture, the project bridges the gap between psychological and cultural approaches to the senses. The results will speak to a wide audience of perception specialists in different fields, as well as the general public. The program promises to establish the language sciences and humanities at large as key players in interdisciplinary initiatives involving diverse branches of science.

You can read more about the project from Niclas Burenhult here.

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