Faces of Reading

The two disorders demonstrate intriguing differences in music, language, emotion, pitch, memory and cognitive processing that may provide us with a unique opportunity for examining the underlying mechanisms of normal music and language functioning.

I'll be delivering a Year 3 optional module on "Music, language and the brain", engaging students with cutting-edge research and encouraging them to design new experiments.

I have a lot of support at Reading. My Head of School and colleagues are all very supportive and helpful. I can ask them for help and advice whenever needed.

I'm originally from China and did my PhD at the University of Chicago, where I studied the differences and similarities in speech prosody between Mandarin and English.

I then worked at Goldsmiths, University of London, Stanford University, the Chinese University of Hong Kong and University College London as a postdoctoral researcher and at the University of Essex as a lecturer, before coming to Reading.

I really enjoy living in different countries, being exposed to different things and getting to know different people from different backgrounds. This has helped me develop both as a person and as a scientist.

Like any job the chaplaincy has its challenges. Our main challenge is financial as we would like to provide more for our students. Our highlights are Welcome Week and Open Days, especially being able to meet with parents of prospective students and to reassure them that the chaplaincy is there for their children. I find most parents particularly the international students find this reassuring as not all Universities have this provision. They are pleased to know that their children and wards are provided for in times of loneliness and moments of crisis.

My background is strategic financial management, I am a graduate of Kingston University and have several business qualifications, as well as football – I am an ardent supporter of Manchester United. Outside of work my hobbies are listening to gospel, jazz and country music, disc jockeying & presenting my own radio show. 

Since joining the chaplaincy I have felt very supported and protected as I work with very supportive and pleasant colleagues. I would recommend this University as an excellent place of study and a great place to work.

Collaboration was never something we planned, it was more of a way of doing things that seemed practical to us. But, when it came to finding institutional support for our work, particularly in academia, we found that it was quite difficult to square this way of working with existing frameworks. 

Few universities were willing to take us on as joint lecturers, so we were delighted to find the University of Reading more open-minded. Here, our collaborative approach is not only supported, but reflected in the teaching in the Department.

The Art Department offers many opportunities for students to work collaboratively and really fosters an engagement with practices that challenge the idea of individual authorship.

As well as working students in the studio, we have had several opportunities to run projects offsite as mini-residencies with students in collaboration with various venues both nationally and abroad, from the Merzbarn in Cumbria to Nova Perla on the outskirts of Prague. In these less formal environments, we have found group work to be particularly useful as a way of instilling the mutual support that we hope will serve our students as well when they graduate as our collaboration has done for us.

The thing I enjoy most about Reading is the School I work in, both the staff and the students. Everyone is supportive and friendly and will stop to have a chat – and that includes the Head of School. We do our work but we also do have time to catch-up as well. Because I’m the Programmes Director, I also get involved with the Reading University Construction Society (RUCS), as well as the University's Ghana Student Society.

I’ve been given the opportunity to grow in what I do, and I think Reading gives everyone that opportunity – you just have to be yourself, and take it. Regardless of where you come from, grasp the opportunity and go with it.