Dr Andrew Smith

Lecturer - Language Studies

English Studies University of Stirling, Stirling, FK9 4LA

Dr Andrew Smith

Contact details

About me

I'm co-director of the Masters course in English Language and Linguistics, which provides a wide-ranging and extensive programme centered on the English language, covering both theoretical approaches to linguistics and their application in a broader context. I also teach undergraduate courses on Foundations of Language, Language and the Brain, Language and Society, and the History of the English Language.

I study the cognitive and cultural foundations of language, to investigate how language originated and became complex. My areas of research interest include grammaticalisation, the evolution of language, the cognitive origins of linguistic complexity, (socio-)cognitive linguistics and cultural evolution.

You can follow me on bluesky: Follow @AndrewDMSmith.bsky.social

My research explores the historical development and ongoing evolution of language through investigating the socio-pragmatic, cognitive and cultural foundations of linguistic communication. Key to my approach is the acknowledgment that language is: inherently inferential, in that meaning is reconstructed by hearers, not transmitted directly from speakers; a flexible set of negotiated cultural conventions, so the way in which language is acquired and used impacts on its structure.

I'm interested in a number of fundamental questions such as the motivations and mechanisms of language change and evolution; the nature of grammaticalisation and the emergence of complexity in language; the relationship between learning, regularisation and systematicity; the way in which learners work out the meanings of unfamiliar words through processes such as cross-situational learning.

Award

Most Inspiring Lecturer: RATE Teaching Awards 2012
University of Stirling

External Examiners and Validations

External Examiner
University of Edinburgh

I am External Examiner for the MSc Evolution of Language and Cognition programme at the University of Edinburgh

Research programmes