LIFELANGS

Late last year, we invited young people from across Ireland to design an image that could be used as a logo for our Living Observatory. We were blown away by the entries, and we’re thrilled to announce that the winning design comes from Olivia McConaghy, aged 12. The beautiful and colourful design encapsulates the essence of the many stories that our project is setting out to record. Congratulations Olivia, your work will represent the spirit of our project! Olivia wins a framed reproduction of her logo and a hoodie which features her artwork.

Many languages are spoken and signed everyday across Northern Ireland. But how important are these languages in our lives? In this ARK (Access Research Knowledge) seminar at Queen’s University Belfast, Dr Aisling O’Boyle and Prof. Lorna Carson will highlight findings from the 2025 Northern Ireland Life and Times survey, exploring public attitudes to languages in Northern Ireland, as well as the complicated relationship between languages, cultures, and identities. They will highlight attitudes to, and knowledge of Irish and Ulster-Scots.

This free event will take place on Thursday 4 June 2026, 10.30 to 12.00, in the Great Hall, Lanyon Building, Queen’s University Belfast. Please register in advance. The seminar marks the launch of the findings of the 2025 Northern Ireland Life and Times survey 

I am from Cork but have spent a lot of time living outside of Ireland. I completed my Bachelors in University College Cork in World Languages with a focus on Japanese and German. I spent one year abroad at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies as part of the World Languages programme. I returned to Tokyo in 2020 to study for my Masters degree at Waseda University as a Japanese Ministry for Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) Scholar. My PhD research will investigate the Linguistic Landscape of the island of Ireland. I will be recording all forms of written language from road signs to graffiti. I am interested to discover how the environment around us reflects our society. Additionally, I have been a teacher of both English and Japanese for many years, and I have taught from ages 2 to 72. In my spare time, I am an avid crafter. I knit, crochet, and do all kinds of needlework. I am deeply committed to ethical and sustainable practices, and a lover of nature and animals. I also enjoy reading, poetry, and cultural exchange events.

I come from Greece, where I studied English Language and Literature at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. After being awarded a funded scholarship for postgraduate studies from Aristotle University, I moved to Dublin to complete an M.Phil. in Speech and Language Processing at Trinity College Dublin. My academic background includes work in phonetics, second language acquisition, and multilingualism. Through this work, I have developed a strong interest in how languages are learned and experienced in multilingual settings. My doctoral project focuses on the relationship between language and identity, exploring how people across the island of Ireland experience and express who they are through language. Teaching Modern Greek at the Department of Classics at Trinity has strongly influenced the way I think about language learning as a dynamic and shared process. Outside academia, I enjoy travelling to different parts of the world and learning languages, such as Spanish and Irish Sign Language.

Dr Minchen Liu (Min) is working in our ‘Shared Resources’ research stream, developing digitally mediated language and intercultural resources, shared educational tools and community-engaged research. Min is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and certified by the Taiwan Ministry of Education to teach Mandarin Chinese as a Second/Foreign Language. She also holds a certification from the Taiwan Hakka Affairs Council to teach Hakka as a heritage language. Min is a multilingual speaker whose academic background centres on language learning and teaching. Two important things to know about Min’s interests: heritage language learning has really captured her attention, and she is also fascinated by digital communication and digital literacy. She is especially interested by the processes through which individuals reconnect with their cultural and linguistic roots, embracing their heritage languages and preserving their cultural identity. And, as technology advances, her work sets out to understand how digital tools can enhance language acquisition and facilitate effective communication in our interconnected world