portrait

Farah Ali

Assistant Professor of Hispanic Studies

farahali@depauw.edu
(765) 658-4753

Teaching Interests

Sociolinguistics, migration and diaspora, border studies, media discourse, language and law, multilingualism, language policy and planning, language and identity, heritage and second language acquisition
    Courses regularly taught:
  • HISP 231/232: Migration, Diaspora, and the Linguistic De/Construction of Borders
  • HISP 231/232: The Sociopolitics of Language in the Spanish-Speaking World
  • HISP 231/232: Exploring History, Culture, and Language
  • HISP 333: Spanish as Heritage Language
  • HISP 390: Language and Identity in the Latinx Experience
  • HISP 390: Iberian-Maghrebi Contact: Linguistic and Cultural Legacies

Research, Scholarly, Creative Work

My primary fields of research are sociolinguistics and second/heritage language acquisition (S/HLA). While my work in these different areas extends over diverse themes, my research is grounded in one broader interest, namely, using qualitative approaches to examine the relationship between language and identity in multilingual contexts. As a sociolinguist, I am interested in how language interacts with the construction of identity in immigrant contexts. My first book, "Multilingualism and Gendered Immigrant Identity: Perspectives from Catalonia" (Multilingual Matters, 2022), which focuses on Muslim immigrant women in Catalonia, looks at how gendered, religious identity is brokered through language use and attitudes for multilingual speakers. This project became a springboard for not only expanding on my understanding of multilingualism in Catalonia, but also for exploring Arabic-Spanish contact in Spain, as well as migration in Spain. As I've delved further into my research on these topics, I've also developed a broader interest in text-based analyses (e.g. language policy and new media) as a medium for examining linguistic ideologies. This interest formed the basis of my second book, "Policy, Media, and the Shaping of Spain-Morocco Relations: Discursive Representations of Migration to Ceuta and Melilla" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2024). Here, I use sociolinguistic approaches to explore how media discourse on undocumented migration informs Morocco-Spain political relations. Using the cities of Ceuta and Melilla as a case study, I situate them within the wider context of both immigration-related policies and news articles in order to examine how migration is represented in Spain and Morocco.

    Recent book publications:
  • Policy, Media, and the Shaping of Spain-Morocco Relations: Discursive Representations of Migration to Ceuta and Melilla (Palgrave Macmillan, 2024)
  • Multilingualism and Gendered Immigrant Identity: Perspectives from Catalonia (Multilingual Matters, 2022)

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