Language and Learning
mercator.uni-koeln.deIn 2016, Melanie Fuchs obtained a teaching degree from the University of Cologne (1st State Examination; equivalent to a Master’s degree). In her final thesis, she investigated how children of different ages interpret (ambiguous) personal and demonstrative pronouns. Her thesis was awarded a Faculty of Arts and Humanities Prize. During her studies, she also worked as a student assistant for the rector’s office.
After her studies, she worked in a collaborative research centre and did a PhD in empirical linguistics. In her PhD thesis, she focused on sentence processing and referential relations in discourse and used different methodologies such as text continuation studies and event-related potentials. In February 2021, she joined the department Language and Learning at the Mercator Institute where she is responsible for a project investigating the development of vocabulary knowledge of immigrant secondary school students.
Research
Topics:
Vocabulary Acquisition
Language Processing
Referential Relations
Research experience and professional career
Since February 2021
Research assistant (wiss. Mitarbeiterin) in the department Language and Learning at the Mercator Institute, University of Cologne
April 2017 - January 2021
Doctoral studies in empirical linguistics, a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School for the Humanities Cologne, University of Cologne
January 2017 - December 2020
Research assistant (wiss. Mitarbeiterin) in the collaborative research centre “Prominence in Language”, University of Cologne
July 2016 - December 2016
Student assistant (WHK) with Prof Dr Petra Schumacher, Institute of German Language and Linguistics I, University of Cologne
November 2014 - June 2016
Student assistant in the rector’s office, University of Cologne
June 2016
1st State Examination, University of Cologne (Final thesis: Eine empirische Studie zur Pronomenresolution im Vorschulalter ‘An empirical investigation of pronoun interpretation in German pre-school children’; awarded a Faculty of Arts and Humanities Prize)
September 2011 - June 2012
Erasmus Programme, University College London, UK
Publications
Fuchs, M., & Schumacher, P.B. (2020). Referential Shift Potential of Demonstrative Pronouns - Evidence from Text Continuation. In: Å. Næss, A. Margetts, Y. Treis (Eds.). Demonstratives in Discourse (Topics at the Grammar-Discourse Interface) (pp.185-213). Language Science Press.
Lectures
Fuchs, Melanie & Barberio, Teresa, Wortschatzkenntnisse neu zugewanderter Schüler:innen im Deutschen und Englischen (mit Teresa Barberio), „Sprache als Schlüssel – wozu? Bildungserfolg im Fokus“, University of Bamberg, 17.-18. March 2022
Fuchs, Melanie & Schumacher, Petra B., Demonstrative Pronouns as Attention-Orienting Devices, “SFB-Networking Köln - Potsdam - Saarbrücken”, University Potsdam, 14.-15. February 2019.
Fuchs, Melanie & Schumacher, Petra B., Demonstrative Pronouns as Attention-Orienting Devices (poster presentation), “Second International Conference Prominence in Language”, University of Cologne, 11.-13. July 2018.
Fuchs, Melanie & Schumacher, Petra B., Topic Shift Potential of German Demonstrative Pronouns, “Workshop: Discourse Functions of Demonstratives”, University of Oslo, 14.-15. June 2018.
Fuchs, Melanie & Schumacher, Petra B., Neural Correlates of Attentional (Re-) Orientation: The Case of German Demonstratives, “31st Annual CUNY Sentence Processing Conference”, UC Davis: University of California, 15.-17. March 2018.
Fuchs, Melanie & Schumacher, Petra B., German Pre-Schoolers’ Comprehension of Personal and Demonstrative Pronouns, “Anaphora Resolution in Sign and Spoken Languages - Theoretical and Experimental Dimensions (ARISAS)”, Workshop, Georg-August-University Göttingen, 20.-21. February 2017.
