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Professor Ianthi Maria Tsimpli is Chair of English and Applied Linguistics at the Department of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics. 

She recently held the positions of Professor of Multilingualism and Cognition at the School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences, Reading and the position of Professor of Psycholinguistics and Director of the Language Development Lab, Thessaloniki, Greece.

Ianthi holds a BA from the University of Athens and a PhD in Linguistics from University College London (1992).

She teaches and researches in bilingualism/multilingualism, language development and impairment, and theoretical syntax. She has worked extensively on the case of Christopher, a polyglot-savant with severe communication difficulties and impairment in non-verbal skills but with impressive language-learning abilities. Ianthi’s two most recent EU co-funded research projects investigate child bilingualism and the effects of bilingual education on cognitive and linguistic abilities (THALES), as well as the role of individual differences in adult monolinguals on anaphora resolution (Excellence I).

She is currently Principal Investigator in the ESRC-DFID (2016-2020) project “Multilingualism and Multiliteracy: Raising learning outcomes in challenging contexts in primary schools across India”.