Research Assistant/Associate

Salary: 

Research Assistant Level - £33,002 to £34,610 per annum

Research Associate Level - £35,608 to £37,694 per annum

Newcastle University is a great place to work, with excellent benefits. We have a generous holiday package; plus the opportunity to buy more, great pension schemes and a number of health and wellbeing initiatives to support you.

Closing Date: 31 March 2026

The Role

We are seeking a Research Assistant/Associate to play a key role in the ESRC/NSF-funded project, “INvestigating and Treebanking Scots And Yiddish Together (InTSaYT),” based in the School of Psychology, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Newcastle University. The project will build syntactically annotated (parsed) corpora of modern and historical Yiddish and Scots, and use them to test novel hypotheses in the application of information theory to syntax and language processing. Thus, the role will involve syntax, diachronic linguistics, psycholinguistics and, to some extent, computational linguistics.

Under the guidance of project PI, Dr Joel C. Wallenberg, the researcher’s initial focus will be in creating a 1 million word syntactically parsed corpus of modern and historical Yiddish, by correcting the output of a statistical parser applied to Yiddish sentences (in accordance with the standards of the Penn Parsed Corpora of Historical English and the Icelandic Parsed Historical Corpus). In completing that task, the researcher will collaborate with the computational linguistics team at the University of Pennsylvania, as well as with the other UK Co-I, Dr Lisa Gotthard (University of Edinburgh). During the second half of the appointment, the role will shift to designing observational experiments using the resulting corpus, analyzing results, and preparing project publications.

The researcher will also be expected to engage in the general research life of the School of Psychology and in the cross-Faculty group, Cognition, Behaviour and Evolution (formerly Centre for Behaviour and Evolution).

The post is full-time for a period of 3 years, to begin in May 2026 (with some flexibility). You will report to Project Lead Dr Joel C. Wallenberg, and informal enqiries can be directed to him at joel.wallenberg@ncl.ac.uk.

To apply, please upload an up-to-date CV and letter of application outlining how you meet the requirements set out in ‘The Person’ section (available on the university's website, accessed by the 'Apply' button).

Key Accountabilities

• Correct the output of a syntactic parser on modern and historical Yiddish
• Meet regularly with and report to project lead
• Attend and contribute to fortnightly project meetings
• Quantitative and qualitative research using the completed Yiddish parsed corpus and other project datasets
• Contribution to project engagement and dissemination including presentations and written outputs (project reports, academic papers), in collaboration with Project Lead and team
• Serve as lead-author on at least one academic publication

The Person 

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

• Some knowledge of a Germanic language other than English, and/or ability to quickly learn Yiddish
• Strong knowledge of theoretical syntax, preferably with experience of analysing naturally occurring data
• Familiarity with R or comparable statistical programming language
• Demonstrable experience writing up research for publication
• Demonstrable experience with basic statistics and statistical modelling
• Ability to navigate UNIX/LINUX systems, or ability to rapidly learn

Desirable

• Proficiency in Yiddish 
• Knowledge of information theory is desirable, as is additional mathematical background
• Background using phrase-structure-parsed corpora (e.g. Penn Treebank-format) 
• Background in psycholinguistics, with knowledge of processing, production, and memory, is highly desirable
• Knowledge of diachronic / historical linguistics, particularly syntax and morpho-syntax 
• Familiarity with computational linguistics methods, particularly parsing and pos-tagging

Attributes and Behaviour

• Ability to work independently
• An interdisciplinary bent is a plus
• Ability to work as part of a team
• Collegial attitude towards project team, and interest in collaboration
• Excellent written and oral communication skills

Qualifications

• PhD in Psycholinguistics, Syntax, Computational Linguistics, or a Related Discipline (Associate Level)
• Nearing completion of a PhD in Psycholinguistics, Syntax, Computational Linguistics, or a Related Discipline (Assistant Level)

Newcastle University is a global University where everyone is treated with dignity and respect.  As a University of Sanctuary, we aim to provide a welcoming place of safety for all, offering opportunities to people fleeing violence and persecution.

We are committed to being a fully inclusive university which actively recruits, supports and retains colleagues from all sectors of society.  We value diversity as well as celebrate, support and thrive on the contributions of all of our employees and the communities they represent.  We are proud to be an equal opportunities employer and encourage applications from individuals who can complement our existing teams, we believe that success is built on having teams whose backgrounds and experiences reflect the diversity of our university and student population.

At Newcastle University we hold a Gold Athena Swan award in recognition of our good employment practices for the advancement of gender equality.  We also hold a Race Equality Charter Bronze award in recognition of our work towards tackling race inequality in higher education REC.  We are a Disability Confident employer and will offer an interview to disabled applicants who meet the essential criteria for the role as part of the offer and interview scheme.

In addition, we are a member of the Euraxess initiative supporting researchers in Europe. 

Requisition ID: 29142