History of the prize
The award was established in 2013 by Professor Neil Smith, elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 1999 and Emeritus Professor of Linguistics at University College London. This prize was first awarded in 2014.
Eligibility
a) Eligible nominations can be for a linguist of any nationality whose career has demonstrated the highest standards of achievement and scholarship
b) Preference will be given to theoretical linguists, though all linguists will be eligible
How to nominate
Nominations for this award are open from 1 December to 31 January and may only be made by Fellows of the British Academy. Entries should be submitted electronically to [email protected].
In the body of the email, clearly state:
- Name of the prize or medal
- Name of nominee
- Nominee’s position/institution and email address
- Nominee’s principal area of academic distinction
- Supporting statement (250 words)
- Nominator’s name and your British Academy section
- Declaration of any institutional or personal interest
The deadline for submissions is 31 January each year. Nominations will be reviewed, and the winner selected, by the relevant panel.
If you have any queries submitting a nomination, please email [email protected].
2024 winner
Professor Paula Fikkert is awarded the 2024 Neil and Saras Smith Medal for Linguistics for her research into phonological change over time, both in language acquisition (first and second) and historical change. She uses a variety of methods, from studying old manuscripts to eye tracking and electroencephalogram (EEG) studies to investigate children’s perception of phonological contrasts. She is a principal investigator in the Baby and Child Research Center, where much of her acquisition work is conducted.
Paula Fikkert, born 26 February 1965, has been a professor of linguistics, specialising in language acquisition, at the Centre for Language Studies of the Faculty of Arts of the Radboud University (Nijmegen, The Netherlands) since 2007. She graduated in Dutch Language and Culture at the University of Groningen and got her PhD at Leiden University (both with the highest degree). Her dissertation ‘On the acquisition of prosodic structures’ was awarded the prize for the best dissertation in linguistics in 1995. She had several postdoctoral positions, first in Konstanz, where she extended her domain of research to include historical linguistics, in particular phonology, investigating prosodic phenomena in the Middle Dutch manuscript ‘Het leven van Sinte Lutgart’ (the life of St. Lutgart), and into changes in prosodic structure from Old Germanic to the modern languages, and subsequently at Radboud University. She received several prestigious grants from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) and Dutch Science Foundation (NWO).
She co-authored articles and books with researchers from, among others, Oxford, Cambridge, Toronto, Ottawa, Lisbon, São Paolo, Riken Brain Science Institute and Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS, Paris), Austin (Texas), PennState University. She has given keynotes, invited talks and summer school courses in Europe, the USA (Linguistic Institute at MIT), and Brazil.
Professor Fikkert has been a guest professor at the University of Tromsø (Norway), Macquarie (Sydney, Australia), and Oxford University. She is a member of several editorial boards of international journals (The Linguistic Review, Language Acquisition, Nederlandse Taalkunde (Dutch Linguistics), Journal of Portuguese Linguistics, Linguistics in the Netherlands).
Finally, Professor Fikkert was the CLS research director from 2011-2015. She is an elected member of the Royal Dutch Society of Science (KHMW) since 2014. She currently is dean of the Faculty of Arts (since March 2024).
"It is an incredible honour and privilege to be awarded the 2024 Neil and Saras Smith Medal for lifetime achievement in the scholarly study of linguistics. What makes it especially valuable to me is that the medal is installed by Neil Smith, whose wonderful, detailed and exquisite research on the acquisition of phonology – based on case studies first of his son (1973) and later of his grandson (2010) – has heavily influenced my work. He has inspired me throughout my career, and subsequently, many of my students. Neil Smith was way ahead of his time by studying the interaction between perception and production, and by publishing all data that he used for his research, long before Open Science became standard. Of course, he did much more than that, and whatever he did, he set an example. To be awarded this medal is a huge honour. It is humbling to see the list of previous award winners, who – each in their own right – are great examples of outstanding linguistic research. To be on this list means a lot to me."
- Professor Paula Fikkert, August 2024
Previous winners
2023 , Professor Eva Hajicova, Charles University, Prague
2022 Professor Sheila Blumstein, Brown University
2021 Professor Marianne Mithun, UC Santa Barbara
2020 Professor Paul Kiparsky FBA, Stanford University
2019 Professor Deirdre Wilson FBA, University College London
2018 Professor Barbara H. Partee FBA, University of Massachusetts Amherst
2017 Professor Bernard Comrie FBA, University of California, Santa Barbara
2016 Sir John Lyons FBA, University of Cambridge
2015 Professor William Labov, University of Pennsylvania
2014 Professor Noam Chomsky FBA, Massachusetts Institute of Technology