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Distinguished Lecturers
The ISCA Distinguished Lecturer (DL) Program is one of ISCA’s most prestigious honors, recognizing outstanding scientists who have made significant contributions to speech communication science and technology and who are committed to sharing their knowledge with the world.
As global ambassadors of the field, ISCA Distinguished Lecturers deliver inspiring talks and share their expertise with the international speech communication community. Through online lectures and seminars, the program broadens access to their insights and promotes knowledge exchange worldwide.
2026 Online Distinguished Lecture Series
The ISCA Distinguished Lecturers for the 2026–2027 term are Joseph Keshet, Kong Aik Lee, and Kai Yu. Each will give a two-hour online lecture, including Q&A, in October 2026.
Registration
Please register using our Google Form to attend one or more sessions. Full talk abstracts and speaker biographies are also available in the form.Zoom links will be emailed to the address you provide; they are not sent automatically when you submit this form. We will begin sending links three days before each lecture. Please register by the deadline listed for each lecture to ensure that we send you its Zoom link.
Kai Yu
Shanghai Jiao Tong University; AISpeech
Towards Reliable Task-oriented LLM Agents
5 October 2026 | 13:00–15:00 UTC (Register by 2 October 2026, 13:00 UTC to ensure that we send you the Zoom link.)
Joseph Keshet
Technion—Israel Institute of Technology
Speech AI in the real world: noise, latency, and the languages we left behind
14 October 2026 | 13:00–15:00 UTC (Register by 11 October 2026, 13:00 UTC to ensure that we send you the Zoom link.)
Kong Aik Lee
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Speaker Recognition and Anti-Spoofing: State of the Art, Metrics, and Ethics
30 October 2026 | 13:00–15:00 UTC (Register by 27 October 2026, 13:00 UTC to ensure that we send you the Zoom link.)
All times are listed in UTC.
An Online Format from 2026
At its meeting on 12 March 2026, the ISCA Board decided to move the Distinguished Lecturer program to an online format, beginning with the 2026 cohort. Future DL activities will therefore take the form of online lectures or seminars, replacing the previous in-person lecture tours.
The former procedures for soliciting hosts, arranging travel, and funding lecture tours no longer apply to the new format. For details of the previous ISCA Distinguished Lecturer program format and selection rules, please refer to the previous program guidelines.
Nominations and Selection
Nominations
The DL Program recognizes researchers for their scientific achievements, contributions to academia or industry, teaching or mentoring experience, and commitment to sharing knowledge.
Any ISCA member other than a current ISCA Board member is eligible for nomination. ISCA Fellows are strongly encouraged to be nominated, and self-nominations are welcome.
Nominations must include:
- A completed Nomination Form.
- Two references from senior members of the ISCA community, submitted using the official Reference Form.
Nomination materials should be sent to education@isca-speech.org.
Selection Process
Nominations are reviewed by a selection committee composed of former ISCA Distinguished Lecturers. The committee considers the nomination materials and supporting references, focusing on three main criteria:
- Scientific prominence: The originality and impact of the nominee’s research, including scholarly influence, awards, and leadership within the community.
- Presentation experience: The nominee’s teaching record, experience delivering tutorials and keynote lectures, and ability to communicate effectively.
- Topic appeal: The potential of the proposed lecture topics to engage a broad audience.
Committee members provide written evaluations and rankings for each criterion, together with an overall ranking. These assessments are submitted to the ISCA Board to inform the final selection.
For the 2026 selection, the committee members were John Hansen, Shrikanth Narayanan, Rita Singh, and Mariapaola D’Imperio. Following the committee’s review and a Board vote, Joseph Keshet, Kong Aik Lee, and Kai Yu were selected as the ISCA Distinguished Lecturers for the 2026–2027 term.
ISCA gratefully acknowledges the committee members for their time, expertise, and contributions to the selection process.
Contact
The DL Program is coordinated by ISCA Board member Hung-yi Lee, with support from the ISCA Secretariat.
For general enquiries, please contact education@isca-speech.org. The program coordinator can also be reached at hungyilee@ntu.edu.tw.
Distinguished Lecturers Through the Years
The following list celebrates the researchers who have served as ISCA Distinguished Lecturers and includes available lecture information and reports.
2026-2027
The ISCA Distinguished Lecturers are listed below in alphabetical order:
2025-2026Prof Mariapaola D'Imperio, Department of Linguistics of the Aix Marseille University and the Laboratoire Parole et Langage (UMR 7309, CNRS) in Aix-en-Provence, DL Report2024-2025Prof Rita Singh, School of Computer Science, Carnegie-Mellon University, DL Report
2023-2024
Professor Visar Berisha, School of Electrical Computer and Energy Engineering, Arizona State University, USA (for details, please click on his name and here for lecture information)
(note term extended due to COVID-19) Professor Reinhold Haeb-Umbach, Communications Engineering, Paderborn University, Paderborn, Germany (for details, please click on his name and here for lecture information, DL Report)
2020-2022
| 2015-2016
(1) Prof. Helen Meng, Chairman & Professor, the Department of Systems Engineering and Engineering Management, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (Interim Report) (2) Prof. Shrikanth Narayanan, Andrew J Viterbi Professor of Engineering, University of Southern California, USA (interim Report) 2014-2015
(1) Dr. Catherine Best, Professor and Chair in Psycholinguistic Research, the University of Western Sydney (DL Reports: Taiwan, West Indies 1, 2) (2) Dr. Roger Moore, Professor, University of Sheffield, UK (DL Reports , India, Puerto Rico and China slides) 2013-2014
(1) Prof. Hynek Hermansky, Johns Hopkins University, USA (DL Reports: India, Lecture Notes 1, 2, 3, 4) (2) Dr. Michael Riley, Google, USA (DL Reports: Thailand, Lecture Notes; Brazil, Lecture Notes 1, 2) 2012-2013
(1) Prof. Sadaoki Furui, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan (DL Reports: India (Jan 2013), India (Dec 2013), Thailand and South Africa) (2) Prof. Hermann Ney, RWTH Aachen, Germany (DL Reports: Slovenia and Hong Kong, Lecture Notes at Hong Kong, Report 2012) 2011-2012(1) Prof. Jeff Bilmes, University of Washington, Seattle WA (DL Reports: India) (2) Prof. John Hansen, University of Texas at Dallas, Dallas TX (DL Reports: India and Argentina) 2010-2011
(1) Dr. Li Deng, Microsoft Research, One Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052, USA (DL Reports: Taiwan 2011, Xi'An 2011) (2) Professor Thierry DUTOIT, Faculté Polytechnique de Mons, Belgium 2009-2010
2 Distinguished Lecturers have been selected for 2009-2010: (1) Professor Abeer Alwan, University of California at Los Angeles, USA: Trip report 1 - 2010 2007-2008
2 Distinguished Lecturers have been selected for 2007-2008: (1) Professor Chin-Hui Lee, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA: Trip report 1 - 2007, Trip report 2 - 2008 (2) Professor Marc Swerts, Tilburg University, the Netherlands: Trip report 1 - 2007, Trip report 2 - 2008 - Picture of trip 2- 2008 |