Department: Filología Inglesa, Francesa y Alemana

Area: English Philology

Research group: GRUPO DE LINGÜÍSTICA TEÓRICA DE LA UNIVERSIDAD DE OVIEDO

Email: villajulio@uniovi.es

Personal web: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1a0E8Od5pUzhSjVnsuB7j_3fz...

[BA (Hons) Oviedo '05; Dip. Kent '05; MA Essex '07; MA Connecticut '10; PhD Connecticut '12] KEYWORDS: linguistics, theoretical syntax, syntactic variation, applied linguistics, the acquisition of syntax, bilingualism, English, Spanish, Romance Dr J. Villa-García is a theoretical syntactician working (mostly) within the framework of Chomsky's Minimalism. He studied in Spain, the UK, and the USA and has also held permanent faculty positions in those three countries (see link to CV above for more information). In the course of his PhD at the University of Connecticut, Dr Villa-García was trained as a theoretical syntactician and as a language acquisitionist, working within Minimalism. His current interests lie in the area of syntax, with particular attention to its (micro-)variation. He has worked on English, Spanish and, to a lesser extent, the West Iberian Romance language Asturian. Other interests include child language acquisition, bilingualism and the application of theoretical linguistics research to foreign-/second-language pedagogy. Dr Villa-García's focus is theoretical and descriptive syntax and, to a lesser extent, monolingual and bilingual first language syntactic acquisition. His reserach outcomes have appeared in premiere professional journals, including (but not limited to) Glossa, Languages, The Linguistic Review, Probus, Journal of Linguistics, Isogloss, and Spanish Journal of Applied Linguistics, as well as in prestigious outlets, such as Cambridge University Press (CUP), Oxford University Press (OUP), De Gruyter Mouton, Akal, and John Benjamins. Dr Villa-García's research into syntax so far has been concerned with issues pertaining to: - syntactic variation, esp. microvariation (i.e., dialectal variation in syntax); - the syntax-phonology interface; - the structural geometry of the leftmost portion of (English and Spanish) clauses (i.e., the CP/left periphery) and its consequences for clausal structure and for syntactic theorising more generally; - complementiser systems (i.e., 'that'-like elements), esp. reduplicative complementisers (cf. recomplementation); - subjecthood (from any standpoint); - locality of movement (i.e., constraints on long-distance dependencies); - left-dislocations/topics, including topicalisations and hanging topics, questions, and exclamatives (and their implications for word order possibilities); - negative imperatives (i.e., commands); A summary of his professional record over the last two decades is provided below in reverse chronological order: Dec. 2024-present - Senior Lecturer in English Studies [English Linguistics] (Profesor Titular de Universidad I3/R3), Department of English, French and German Philology, University of Oviedo, Principality of Asturias, Spain (tenured; civil-service post) Jan. 2022-Dec. 2024 - «María Zambrano» International Talent Attraction Grant holder, Visiting Researcher, Theoretical Linguistics Group (LINGUO), Department of English, French and German Philology. University of Oviedo, Spain (EU-funded) 2020-2024 - Senior Lecturer in Spanish Linguistics and Syntax, Department of Linguistics & English Language, University of Manchester, UK 2015-2020 - Lecturer in Spanish Linguistics and Syntax (confirmed in post in 2017), Department of Linguistics & English Language, University of Manchester, UK 2012-2015 - Assistant Professor of Spanish Linguistics (tenure-track), Villanova University, USA 2007-2012 - PhD in Linguistics, University of Connecticut, USA 2007-2010 - MA in Linguistics, University of Connecticut, USA 2006-2007 - MA in Linguistics, University of Essex, UK 2005-2006 - Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Washington, DC, USA 2004-2005 - Diploma in European Culture and Languages, University of Kent, UK 2000-2005 - BA (Hons) in English Studies, University of Oviedo, Spain