Susan Guion

Ph.D., University of Texas (1996)
Email: guion@uoregon.edu
Phone: (541) 346-3682
Office: 220 Straub Hall
Website: darkwing.uoregon.edu/~guion/guion.htm

Susan Guion's main research goal is to understand why phonological (sound) systems have the properties they do. She is of the opinion that typologically regular aspects of phonological systems have their origin in physical and cognitive constraints on language use and learning. One of her major interests lies in exploration of constraints on phonological structure and representation through empirical methods focused on sound change and language acquisition. Some specific areas of interest are: (1) the effect of the perceptual and production constraints on phonological systems as evidenced in sound change and bilingual systems (2) the effect of age of acquisition on phonological learning and representation and (3) the mechanisms for learning new phonological categories and their cognitive representations. In addition, Susan Guion is committed to the collection of primary language data from a variety of languages to inform our understanding of phonological systems.