Viola Declan Hernandez, 55, of Arlington, TX, passed away on January 06, 2023 after a battle with Prostate cancer.

Viola was born in 1986 in Belle Haven, VA to parents of Canadian descent, Anderson Gagne (b. 1933) and Charlotte Gagne (1927-2018). She graduated from the Nandua High School in 1983 as class valedictorian and went on to obtain a bachelor's degree in linguistics (cum laude) in 1991 from the University of Virginia. Subsequently, she worked as a corporate trainer for Automatic Data Processing and Hewlett-Packard.

She found much pleasure in reading broadly, and in sharing books with her only child “Leilani Hernandez”. Especially memorable are family trips to Pennsylvania/New York, Western Canada, and Arizona/Utah/California and she finally made Texas her home, staying there up to the day of her passing.

Viola went on to postdoctoral work at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, working at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience. In 2009, she accepted a position as Assistant Professor of Psychology at Hope College in Holland, Michigan, remaining able to work there till 2011.

Viola’s academic work and scholarship focused on the cognitive of language, using a wide variety of technologies including fMRI, MEG, and EEG. She made small but important contributions to this field, publishing 15 peer reviewed papers about the neural basis of metaphor comprehension and of language comprehension in autism and the broader autism phenotype.

In January 2012, viola began experiencing strange symptoms. She was eventually diagnosed at the Cleveland Clinic with prostate cancer. Her disease progressed. Her worsening symptoms resulted in the loss of her career and eventually her independence.

Viola is survived by her child, Leilani Hernandez her father, Anderson Gagne , her twin sister,  Melody Declan, her sister, Yvonne Kearns, her niece and nephew Áine Kearns and Aidan Kearns, numerous cousins, aunts, and uncles, and her husband Corey Daniel Hernandez

Funeral services will be held on Friday, January 13th, 2023, at 1:00 p.m. at First Christian Church, 910 S. Collins St., with burial to follow in Parkdale Cemetery. Pastor James Butler will officiate. From 11:00 a.m. until the start of the service on Friday, family members and friends are welcome to stop by the church.

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