"The temptation to form premature theories upon insufficient data is the bane of our profession." Sherlock Holmes in The Valley of Fear, Arthur C. Doyle.
Research & Scholarship. I consider myself an experimental, laboratory phonologist. Experimental phonologists employ the auxiliary theories and methods of instrumental phonetics and experimental psycholinguistics to investigate phonological knowledge, the mental representation of sounds and sound patterns. Within laboratory phonology, my main area of expertise comprises bilingual and second-language phonological competence, which I study by analyzing the production, perception, and processing of the sounds and (the phonological structure of) words in (emergent) bilinguals. A second area of expertise of mine is phonetic and phonological variation and change, with a focus on Iberian Romance (in particular, Spanish, Catalan, and Portuguese). My publications have appeared in journals such as the Journal of Phonetics, the Journal of the International Phonetic Association, Language and Speech, Studies in Second Language Acquisition, Second Language Research, the International Journal of Bilingualism, Phonetica, Laboratory Phonology, Linguistics, Probus, Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, and Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics. See Faculty Profile > Scholarly Contributions for a list of publications and Google Scholar for approximate citation impact.
Graduate Advising. (Please, note that I cannot take any new doctoral advisees until, at least, Fall 2027. Those who may be interested in working with me for their PhD dissertation are discouraged to apply until then.) At present, I am working with four PhD students in Hispanic Linguistics and two PhD students in SLAT. My advisees are asked to join the Arizona Applied Phonetics and Psycholinguistics Lab (AAPPL), which meets regularly (weekly or bi-weekly, depending on the semester). As part of the AAPPL, I have been working on an online platform, delivered via the learning management system, with tutorial videos and readings that helps students develop the necessary basic expertise to conduct laboratory phonology research: data analysis, writing tips, project management, etc. I welcome inquiries from prospective students who would like to write their doctoral dissertation on phonological variation and change in Iberian Romance, Ibero-Romance laboratory phonology, or second language phonetics and phonological processing. I can supervise student researchers in both the PhD Program in Hispanic Linguistics (Dept. of Spanish and Portuguese) and the PhD Program in SLAT (Graduate College GIDP). I will only consider advising dissertators who, by the time they advance to candidacy, have taken at least two graduate courses with me (SPAN 583A, and SPAN 583C or SPAN 599). Ideally, they would have also taken at least one graduate course in statistics (e.g., LING 507) and phonetics/phonology or psycholinguistics courses in the Department of Linguistics (e.g., LING 515).
Professional Service. I currently serve as Associate Editor of Journal of Phonetics (2022-2027) and used to serve as Associate Editor of Applied Psycholinguistics (2018-2021). I serve on the editorial boards of the journals Second Language Research, Applied Psycholinguistics, and Laboratory Phonology. Between January 2019 and July 2022, I was Director of Graduate Studies in Spanish & Portuguese, and I served as main graduate advisor for students in Hispanic Linguistics until May 2024. Between 2018 and 2023, I chaired the Cognitive Dimensions concentration in the Second Language Acquisition and Teaching (SLAT) interdepartmental doctoral program and served on the Executive Committee of SLAT. Since August 2021, I serve as the COH IRB Liaison, which means that, among other things, I support my colleagues in COH regarding the IRB process. I am also member of the graduate faculty in the Department of Linguistics.
Vita. I graduated with a PhD in Romance Linguistics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2008). My doctoral advisor was José I. Hualde. The other members of my dissertation committee were Jennifer Cole, Ana M. Escobar, and Zsuzsanna Fagyal. I have been at the University of Arizona since 2008, was promoted to the rank of Associate Professor with tenure in 2015, and to (full) Professor in 2023. I was born and raised on the island of Majorca, on the western Mediterranean, and my native language is (Majorcan) Catalan. My personal interests include literature (classic and literary fiction, and creative nonfiction), landscapes (contemplating and photographing them), and photography (monochrome landscapes, plein air still life, and architectural).