tanialeal

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tanialeal@arizona.edu
Office
Modern Languages 523
Leal, Tania
Assistant Professor

Home Department: Spanish and Portuguese

SLAT Areas of Specialization: Cognitive Dimensions of L2 Learning, Linguistic Dimensions of L2 Learning

Dr. Leal is a linguist who specializes in second language acquisition, particularly on the acquisition and processing (comprehension) of syntax and morphology. Her research explores bilingualism broadly construed and is is purposefully interdisciplinary, incorporating elements from applied linguistics, generative linguistics, and psycholinguistics. She's particularly interested in real-time language comprehension and in advancing the characterization of the underlying linguistic knowledge of second language learners and heritage speakers. She is also keenly interested in the current methodological and epistemological issues that have arisen in the field as a by-product of conducting research that integrates different approaches. Her current research investigates how second language learners and heritage speakers acquire and process morpho-syntactic elements such as clitics. Some of this work has appeared in journals such as Studies in Second Language Acquisition, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, Second Language Research, Lingua, Language Acquisition, Applied Linguistics and the International Journal of Bilingualism. She is currently serving as Associate Editor for the journal Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism and contribute to the editorial boards of Second Language Research and Languages.

Area of Specialization
Cognitive dimensions of L2 learning
Linguistic dimensions of L2 learning

Currently Teaching

SPAN 582B – Spanish Syntax II

This course introduces students to innovations in syntactic theory that have been proposed within the last decade. Students will move beyond the introductory-text level and extend their knowledge of Principles & Parameters approaches to syntax through discussion of the goals of Minimalist Syntax and its hypotheses about design aspects of the human faculty of language. The course explores in detail how postulated minimalist primitives and operations interact to generate the (complex) structures that are characteristic of natural language sentences.

SPAN 581A – Foreign Language Teaching Theory and Methodology

The goal of this course is to systematically examine methods, approaches, techniques and activities for the teaching of foreign languages and its use in the classroom. It will include an overview of learner strategies and cooperative learning, the use and adaptation of textbooks, and some of the journals available in the field. Participants will be introduced to second language acquisition theories, course design, lesson planning and testing, and have experience creating a cohesive instructional unit.