About GALA

We are pleased to announce the 16th Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition conference (GALA 16) to be held at the NOVA University of Lisbon – School of Social Sciences and Humanities  (NOVA FCSH), Portugal, on September 12-14, 2024.

GALA is a biennial conference that brings together researchers from across Europe and overseas, providing a forum for discussion of recent, high-quality research on first and second language acquisition, bi/multilingual acquisition, heritage language acquisition, language pathology and language impairment, acquisition of sign language and brain imaging research for acquisition and pathology.

The growing body of research in these areas testifies how language acquisition studies are central for our understanding of human language and how it develops in the brain, and offers novel insights to theoretical studies, as well as hints for practical outcomes for diagnosis, intervention and rehabilitation in the case of developmental language disorders.

Previous editions of GALA were held in Durham (1993), Groningen (1995), Edinburgh (1997), Potsdam (1999), Palmela (2001), Utrecht (2003), Siena (2005), Barcelona (2007), Lisbon (2009), Thessaloniki (2011) and, most recently, Oldenburg (2013),  Nantes (2015), Palma de Mallorca (2017), Milan (2019), and Frankfurt (2022).

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

We are very pleased to have the following keynote speakers:

Philippe Prévost (Université de Tours)

Ana Lúcia Santos (Universidade de Lisboa)

Roumyana Slabakova (University of Southampton and Norwegian University of Science and Technology)