Introduction

How do we extract meaning from language and from the world around us? This question is fundamental but complex. We must consider how we combine words and sentences together into connected discourse, how we make use of our prior perceptual experience and knowledge, how we distinguish between what is functionally relevant and irrelevant in action, how we represent and generate constructs such as time, space and causation, and how we integrate language with our nonverbal world. Finally we must examine how these representations and processes are instantiated in the human brain. To address these questions, a group of twelve speakers (ten external and two internal to Tufts) have been carefully selected from several fields including Cognitive Psychology, Linguistics, Psycholinguistics, Computational Modeling, Primate Neuroscience and Cognitive Neuroscience. Click the Speakers tab to see our exciting line-up.