Graduate
L.A.L.S. Current Ph.D Students
Current graduate students in the Linguistics and Applied Language Studies (LALS) Ph.D program at the ßÙßÇÂþ».
Melike Akay
Melike received her BA from Bogazici (Bosphorus) University and completed her MA in
Foreign Language Education. Melike has experience teaching EFL courses at the university
level, as well as working as a research assistant in the Department of ELT in Turkey.
Her research interests include pragmalinguistics, digital discourse analysis, and
multimodal communication.
Email
Nafla Alshahrani
Nafla received her MA in Applied Linguistics from Southern Illinois University. She
is a lecturer in English department at Jazan University, Saudi Arabia. Her research
interests include sociolinguistics, culture, discourse analysis, and SLA.
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Savannah Cayson Prior to joining the LALS program, Savannah earned her MA in TESOL from Florida State University. Savannah has experience teaching EFL in Colombia as well as teaching ESL and Spanish in the United States. Her research interests include translanguaging, negotiation of meaning strategies, and CALL. Email
Kübra Çekmegeli
Kübra earned her bachelor's degree in English Language Teaching (ELT) from Hacettepe
University in Ankara in 2018. After completing her bachelor's degree, Kübra taught
English at the post-secondary level for two years. Prior to joining the LALS program,
Kübra received her master's degree in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages
(TESOL) from Teachers College, Columbia University in 2022. Her research interests
are classroom discourse, conversation analysis, L2 interaction, and language teacher
education.
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Sean has both an M.A. in English and a Graduate Certificate in TESOL from the University of Texas at Arlington. He has extensive undergraduate teaching experience and has also taught English abroad in Japan. Sean's current research interests include language assessment, second language writing, and English as a lingua franca.
Tania Ferronato
Tania received her MA in Linguistics from the University of Padua, Italy, and she
was a Fulbright FLTA scholar in 2020. She has previous experience in teaching ESL
and Italian as a foreign language. Her research interests include Second Language
Acquisition and Teaching, L2 phonology, and CALL.
Email
Rikiya Kawano Rikiya received his MA in Applied Linguistics / TESOL from the ßÙßÇÂþ». He possesses extensive experience teaching Japanese as a foreign language at the undergraduate and middle school levels. His research interests include sociolinguistics, SLA, heritage languages, and CALL. Email
Jihye Kim
Jihye received her MA in English Linguistics from Hannam University in South Korea.
She has experience as a Teaching and Research Assistant at Hannam University and ACCESSS
(Academic Center for Corpus-based English Studies and Statistical Solutions). Her
research interests include social issues that can be examined through linguistic research.
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Francesca Marino
Prior to joining the LALS program in 2021, Francesca Marino received her M.A. in Languages
and Intercultural Communication in the Euro-Mediterranean Area in 2018 from the University
of Naples L’Orientale, Italy. Her research interests include Multimodal Discourse,
Sociolinguistics, and Discursive Identity Construction (particularly sexual and gender
identity).
Email
Yuxuan Mu
Before joining in the LALS program, Yuxuan Mu received his MA in Applied Linguistics
from University College London in 2021. His research interests include translanguaging,
language and social media, and identity studies.
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Benjamin Puterbaugh
Benjamin received his BA from Oberlin College and his MA in Spanish from Middlebury
College. His research explores the links between language and social identities, especially
in relation to race and socio-economic class. He is particularly interested in critical
approaches in Sociolinguistics and Discourse Analysis. His research also focuses
on Spanish and Haitian Creole.
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Sarah Rahman Having received her BA from The Ohio State University, Sarah completed her MA in TESOL at the University of South Florida before joining the LALS program. She has previously tutored students in French and Linguistics. Sarah’s research interests include academic writing, digital discourse, and SLA. Email
Memry Rasch Memry received her BA in French from the ßÙßÇÂþ» and her MA in French and Francophone Studies with a specialization in French Linguistics from the University of Florida. She taught French at the high school level for five years. Her research interests include SLA, individual differences/motivation, and CALL. Email
Juan M. Rostrán Valle
Juan received his BA in TEFL from Universidad Centroamericana (Nicaragua) and his
MA in TESOL from the SIT-Graduate Institute in Vermont. He has experience teaching
EFL/ESL and Spanish in different academic settings, both in the USA and Nicaragua.
His research interests include second language teaching methodology, L2 writing, and
error treatment in the L2 classroom.
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MarÃa José Torres Centurion
MarÃa received her MA in TESOL from Kent State University and her MA in Linguistics
from Ball State University. She has experience teaching EFL in Argentina. She has
also taught ESL and Spanish classes at the university-level in the United States.
Her research interests include bilingualism and direct applications of translanguaging
in the classroom.
Email
Luoxiangyu Zhang
Prior to joining the LALS program, Xiangyu received her MA in TESOL from Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool
University. Xiangyu's research areas fall broadly into sociolinguistics, gender studies,
and how these topics are reflected in online discourse and pedagogical materials.
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