Professor Ianthi Tsimpli elected to British Academy

Many congratulations to Professor Ianthi Tsimpli on her election to the Fellowship of the British Academy.

Professor Tsimpli, Professor of English and Applied Linguistics, Fellow of Fitzwilliam College, is a former co-Director of Cambridge Language Sciences (CLS) and currently sits on the CLS Management Committee.

She works on multilingualism, first and second language development in children and adults, language impairment, attrition and processing, and the effects of socioeconomic challenges on multilingual children’s language, cognition and school skills.

She has been elected to the Fellowship of the British Academy in recognition of her contribution to the humanities and social sciences

She said “I’m deeply honoured to have been elected and look forward to being part of this community of researchers.”

This year a total of 84 Fellows have been elected to the Fellowship, of which five are Cambridge academics:

• Professor Duncan Bell, Professor of Political Thought and International Relations, Fellow of Christ’s College
• Professor Sarah Franklin, Chair of Sociology, Fellow of Christ's College
• Professor Richard Holton, Professor of Philosophy, Fellow of Peterhouse
• Professor Samuel Lieu, President of the International Union of Academies, Bye Fellow of Robinson College
• Professor Ianthi Tsimpli, Professor of English and Applied Linguistics, Fellow of Fitzwilliam College 

Founded in 1902, the British Academy is the UK’s national academy for the humanities and social sciences. It is a Fellowship of over 1400 of the leading minds in these subjects from the UK and overseas. The Academy is also a funding body for research, nationally and internationally, and a forum for debate and engagement.

Welcoming the Fellows, the new President of the British Academy, Professor Julia Black, said: 

“As the new President of the British Academy, it gives me great pleasure to welcome this new cohort of Fellows, who are as impressive as ever and remind us of the rich and diverse scholarship and research undertaken within the SHAPE disciplines – the social sciences, humanities and the arts. I am very much looking forward to working with them on our shared interests.  

“The need for SHAPE subjects has never been greater. As Britain recovers from the pandemic and seeks to build back better, the insights from our diverse disciplines will be vital to ensure the health, wellbeing and prosperity of the UK and will continue to provide the cultural and societal enrichment that has sustained us over the last eighteen months. Our new Fellows embody the value of their subjects and I congratulate them warmly for their achievement.”