Charlotte Vaughn

Charlotte Vaughn, PhD, is an Assistant Research Professor at the University of Maryland, serving as Founder and Director of the NSF-funded Language Science Station at Planet Word Museum. Her work bridges sociolinguistics and cognitive science, focusing on how listeners perceive speech variability and its social implications. She employs interdisciplinary methods from phonetics, psycholinguistics, and social psychology to address issues of linguistic discrimination and public engagement in science.

Key Research Interests:

• Speech perception and social meaning
• Raciolinguistic ideologies in criminal justice contexts
• Development of language attitudes in children
• Ethnic and regional accent perception
• Public-facing science communication

Her recent projects include studying jury perceptions of dialectal codeswitching (Race & Justice, 2024), perceptual learning effects (Phonetica, 2019), and museum-based language science engagement. Collaborations involve institutions like Howard University, Gallaudet University, and Planet Word Museum. She has NSF funding for participatory research initiatives targeting underrepresented students.

Awards & Grants:

• NSF grant for Language Science Station public engagement project

Professional Activities:

• Advisory Board member for Planet Word Museum
• Former Science Communication Fellow at OMSI
• Lead on multiple sociolinguistic documentary films and museum exhibits

Her work emphasizes applied research to combat linguistic bias, with a focus on improving outcomes for marginalized language communities.