SEOANE, ELENA

Elena Seoane completed her MA degree in English Language and Literature at the University of Santiago de Compostela in 1990 and her PhD in 1996, with a dissertation, supervised by Teresa Fanego, on the passive voice in Early Modern English. In October 1992 she was awarded an FPU research grant from the Spanish Ministry for Education and Science; between October 1993 and September 1999 she worked as an Assistant Lecturer, first at the University of A Coruña (1993-1994) and then again at Santiago de Compostela, where she obtained a permanent position as Senior Lecturer in October 1999. In January 2011 she moved to the neighbouring University of Vigo.

In the Autumn of 2006 (1 October-31 December) Elena held a visiting professorship at the University of Osnabrück, to lecture on English historical linguistics. She has also taught for briefer periods, or carried out research, at the Universities of Aachen, Helsinki, Manchester, Oulu, Tampere, Leuven and Vienna.

Elena serves on the editorial board of Atlantis, the official journal of the Spanish Association for English and American Studies (AEDEAN), and is the convenor of the Historical Linguistics section at its annual conferences. She also has experience in the organization of research meetings, such as the 26th International Conference of AEDEAN (Santiago de Compostela, December 2002) and the Third International Conference 'New Reflections on Grammaticalization' (NRG3) (Santiago de Compostela, July 2005), which she co-chaired with María José López-Couso.

Elena supervised the PhD dissertation of Lucía Loureiro-Porto (2005) and is supervising the PhDs of Eduardo Coto-Villalibre (jointly with Teresa Fanego and Paloma Núñez-Pertejo) and Emma Lezcano (jointly with Teresa Fanego). Her main research interests are grammaticalization processes in the history of English, the active-passive variation in early and late Modern English, word order changes in early English and the development of scientific discourse.

Elena has given invited talks and plenary lectures in Aachen, Bamberg, Freiburg (FRIAS), Helsinki, Northwestern University, Osnabrück, Paderborn, Palma de Mallorca (University of the Balearic Islands), and Tampere. This year she teaches English Morphosyntax (undergraduate, 2nd year) and History of the English Language (undergraduate, 5th year).

Contact information:

Department of English, French and German
Facultad de Filología y Traducción
Universidad de Vigo
Campus Universitario
E-36310 Vigo, SPAIN
E-mail: elena.seoane@uvigo.es
Phone: +34 986 812337
Office: B34

Publications:

(Forthcoming). "Effects of social change and interaction: Democratisation". In Handbook of English historical linguistics, ed. by Terttu Nevalainen & Elizabeth Closs Traugott. Oxford: Oxford University Press [joint paper with Michael Farrelly].

(Forthcoming). "Corpus retrieval and categorization of constructions: A case study on the long passive". In Variation and change in English: Methods and case studies, synchronic and diachronic, ed. by Manfred Krug & Julia Schlüter. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [joint paper with Nicholas Smith].

(2013). "On the conventionalisation of the passive voice in Late Modern English scientific discourse". Journal of Historical Pragmatics 14.1.

(2012). "Givenness and word order: A study of long passives in Modern and Present-Day English". In Information structure and syntactic change in the history of English, ed. by Anneli Meurman-Solin, María José López-Couso & Bettelou Los. (Oxford Studies in the History of English 1). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

(2012). “Early Modern English syntax”. In Historical Linguistics of English: An international handbook. Volume I, ed. by Alexander Bergs & Laurel J. Brinton. (Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science [HSK] 34.1). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 621-637.

(2011). Review of Maurizio Gotti, Marina Dossena & Richard Dury (eds.) English Historical Linguistics 2006. Volume I: Syntax and Morphology. (Amsterdam: John Benjamins 2008). Journal of Historical Pragmatics 12/1-2: 283-293.

(2011). "A transnational approach to south-east Asian Englishes: The case of Singapore and Hong Kong". In A view from the South: Contemporary English and American studies, ed. by José R. Ibáñez Ibáñez & José Francisco Fernández Sánchez. Almería: Editorial Universidad de Almería, 404-411 [joint chapter with Cristina Suárez-Gómez].

(2010). "The effect of prominence hierarchies on Modern English long passives: Pragmatic vs. syntactic factors". Miscelánea. A Journal of English and American Studies 41: 93-106.

(2010). "I just come in Hong-Kong by myself: Tense in spoken Hong-Kong English". In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Corpus Linguistics (CILC10), ed. by Isabel Moskowich-Spiegel et al. A Coruña: Servizo de Publicacións da Universidade de A Coruña, pp. 817-828 [joint paper with Cristina Suárez-Gómez].

(2010). "El proyecto 'Variación, cambio lingüístico y gramaticalización': objetivos y líneas metodológicas". In Actas del XXXIX Simposio Internacional de la Sociedad Española de Lingüística (SEL), 1-4 Febrero, 2010 , ed. by Pablo Cano López, Soraya Cortiñas Ansoar, Beatriz Dieste Quiroga, Isabel Fernández López & Luz Zas Varela. Santiago de Compostela: Servizo de Publicacións da Universidade de Santiago de Compostela [joint paper with Teresa Fanego, María José López-Couso, Belén Méndez-Naya, Paloma Núñez-Pertejo & Carlos Prado-Alonso].

(2009). "Syntactic complexity, discourse status and animacy as determinants of grammatical variation in English". English Language and Linguistics 13.3: 365-384.

(2008), ed. Rethinking grammaticalization: New perspectives. (Typological Studies in Language 76). Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins [co-edited with María José López-Couso]. Reviewed in the Linguist List, issue 20.2282 (2009); Studies in Language 34.1 (2010): 195-204; Folia Linguistica 44.2 (2010): 555-568; eLanguage, issue December 2010.

(2008), ed. Theoretical and empirical issues in grammaticalization. (Typological Studies in Language 77). Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins [co-edited with María José López-Couso]. Reviewed in the Linguist List, issue 20.2282 (2009); Folia Linguistica 44.2 (2010): 555-568; Studies in Language 35.1 (2011): 228-237.

(2008). "Introduction: New perspectives on grammaticalization." In Rethinking grammaticalization: New perspectives, ed. by María José López-Couso & Elena Seoane. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins, pp. 1-13 [joint chapter with María José López-Couso].

(2008). "Introduction: Further reflections on grammaticalization." In Theoretical and empirical issues in grammaticalization, ed. by Elena Seoane & María José López-Couso. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins, pp. 1-14 [joint chapter with María José López-Couso].

(2008). "The conventionalization of the passive in Late Modern scientific English." In Proceedings of the 31st AEDEAN International Conference, ed. by María Jesús Lorenzo Modia. La Coruña: Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de La Coruña, pp. 291-301.

(2006). “Information structure and word order change: The passive as an information rearranging strategy in the history of English”. In The handbook of the history of English, ed. by Ans van Kemenade & Bettelou Los. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 360-391.

(2006). "Questions of style: Legal drafting manuals and scientific style manuals in contemporary English." Linguistica e Filologia 22:115-137 [with Christopher Williams].

(2006). "Changing the rules: A comparison of recent trends in English scientific discourse and prescriptive legal discourse." In Diachronic perspectives on domain-specific English, ed. by Marina Dossena & Irma Taavitsainen. Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 255-276 [with Christopher Williams].

(2006). “Changing styles: On the recent evolution of scientific British and American English.” In Syntax, style and grammatical norms: English from 1500-2000, ed. by Christiane Dalton-Puffer, Dieter Kastovsky, Nikolaus Ritt & Herbert Schendl. Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 191-211.

(2006). “The decay of passives in scientific British and American English: Is scientific discourse becoming more personal?". In 'These things write I vnto thee': Essays in honour of Bjorg Baekken, ed. by Leiv Egil Breivik, Sandra Halverson & Kari Haugland. Oslo: Novus Press, pp. 241-254.

(2005). "On the colloquialization of scientific British and American English". ESP Across Cultures 2: 106-118 [with Lucía Loureiro-Porto].

(2004). "Los estudios de gramaticalización: pasado, presente y futuro" [Grammaticalization studies: past, present and future]. In Proceedings of the 27th International AEDEAN Conference, ed. by Antonio R. Celada, Daniel Pastor García & Pedro Javier Pardo García. Salamanca: Universidad de Salamanca [with María José López-Couso, Belén Méndez-Naya & Paloma Núñez-Pertejo]. CD-ROM.

(2003). “The codification of indefinite agents in Early and Late Modern English”. In Insights into Late Modern English, ed. by Marina Dossena & Charles Jones. Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 221-237.

(2003), ed. Fifty years of English Studies in Spain 1952-2002: A commemorative volume. Universidad de Santiago: Servicio de Publicaciones [fourth editor, with Ignacio Palacios, María José López-Couso & Patricia Fra López].

(2002), ed. Sounds, words, texts and change. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 224). Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins [third editor, with Teresa Fanego & Belén Méndez-Naya]. Reviewed in English Language and Linguistics 8/2 (2004): 355-360; Language 80/1 (2004): 173-174; The Linguist List  January 27 2004 (Issue 15.300); The Year's Work in English Studies 83 (2002): 7ff.

(2002). “Multiple negation in Modern English”. In Proceedings of the 25th International Conference of the Spanish Association for Anglo-American Studies (AEDEAN), Granada, 13-15 December 2001, ed. by Marta Falces Sierra, Mercedes Díaz Dueñas & José María Pérez Fernández. Granada: Universidad de Granada [with Ignacio Palacios].

(2000). Aprendiendo y enseñando a traducir / Learning and teaching to translate / Aprendendo e ensinando a traducir. Universidade de Santiago de Compostela: Servicio de Publicacións [co-authored with Ignacio Palacios].

(2000). "The passive as an object foregrounding device in Early Modern English". In Generative theory and corpus studies: A dialogue from 10 ICEHL, ed. by Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero, Richard Hogg, David Denison & Chris B. McCully. Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 211-232.

(2000). "The passive as an information-rearranging device in Early Modern English". Studia Neophilologica 72: 24-33.

(2000). "The passive in Early Modern English: A preliminary approach". In AEDEAN: Select papers in language, literature and culture. Proceedings of the 17th International Conference (Córdoba, December 1993), ed. by Javier Pérez-Guerra. Vigo: AEDEAN, pp. 363-367.

(2000). "Impersonalising strategies in Early Modern English". English Studies 81.2: 102-116.

(1999). "The consolidation of the indirect and prepositional passive in Early Modern English: Evidence from the Helsinki Corpus". Estudios Ingleses de la Universidad Complutense 7: 119-139.

(1999). "Inherent topicality and object foregrounding in Early Modern English". ICAME Journal 23: 117-140.

(1999). Review of Félix Rodríguez González & Antonio Lillo Buades (eds.) Nuevo Diccionario de Anglicismos. (Madrid: Gredos, 1997). Revista Galega do Ensino 22: 203-205

(1998). “The passive as a style marker in Early Modern English: Evidence from the Helsinki Corpus”. Miscelánea. A Journal of English and American Studies 19: 155-172.

(1997). The Passive voice in Early Modern English: A corpus-based study. Universidade de Santiago de Compostela: Servicio de Publicacións. ISBN 848121596.

(1997). “English corpus linguistics and historical research”. In Some sundry wits gathered together, ed. by Santiago González Fernández-Corugedo. A Coruña: Universidade de A Coruña, pp. 73-98 [with Emma Lezcano González & Javier Pérez Guerra].

(1996).  “Los estudios y la enseñanza de la historia de la lengua inglesa en España” ['The history of the English language in Spanish universities: Teaching and research']. In Proceedings of the 19th International AEDEAN Conference, Vigo, December 1995, ed. by Javier Pérez-Guerra. Vigo: Universidade de Vigo, pp. 635-637 [with Luis Iglesias-Rábade, María José López-Couso & Belén Méndez-Naya].

(1996). “Scandinavian loans and processes of word-formation in ME: Some preliminary considerations”. In English Historical Linguistics 1994, ed. by Derek Britton. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp.185-197 [with Isabel Moskowich-Spiegel].

(1995). "The lexical Scandinavian element in Early Modern English". Neuphilologische Mitteilungen XCVI: 399-415 [with Isabel Moskowich-Spiegel].

(1994). "Apposition in The Great Gatsby". Revista Alicantina de Estudios Ingleses 7: 171-184.

(1993). "The passive in Early Modern English". Atlantis 15.2: 191-213.

Conference presentations:

See the entry Presentations on this website.