Samantha is a certified practising speech pathologist and academic with over 20 years experience as a clinician, tertiary educator and researcher. Samantha is passionate about exploring and encouraging the synergies between culture, language, health and wellbeing and currently leads Sympatico Research Group. Read more about Samantha's work here.

Frances Cochrane is a certified practicing speech pathologist and senior lecturer at James Cook University.  Fran's PhD focused on exploring speech pathology services for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults with acquired neurogenic communication disorders.  She has particular interests in acquired communication disorders in adult populations as well as culturally responsive speech pathology practice.  Read more about Fran’s work here.

Vishnu is a Lecturer in the School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences at University of Reading (UoR). He is trained as a speech and language therapist and has worked in universities across four different countries: India, Australia, USA, and the UK. He completed a PhD in cognitive science from Macquarie University, Sydney and a post-doctoral fellowship in communication sciences and disorders from New York University. He co-leads the health theme of the Centre of Literacy and Multilingualism at UoR. His recent research draws from critical, decolonial and Black feminist theories in understanding the intersections between language, standardisation, and race and how boundaries between these intersectional categories are blurred in constructing disorders in speech and language therapy.  Read more about Vishnu's work here.

Zheng is a researcher and applied linguist by background. He has worked in academia (Netherlands, Australia) and a not-for-profit setting (United Kingdom). His work mainly centres around health and care service provision for individuals and families, including with and without communication difficulties/disability, in the early years to older age. He has a keen interest in working with multilingual/multicultural families, their service engagement, and cultural responsiveness in health programs, services, and systems. Read more about Zheng’s work here.