Principal investigator: M. Teresa Turell

A) Variation and language contact (CICYT: SEC96-0627) ). Consideration of those internal and external factors (see Alturo and Turell 1990)) which constrain the occurrence of different language contact phenomena (lexical and grammatical code-switching, syntactic, semantic and pragmatic calque, borrowing, situational code-switching). Participation, together with Montserrat Forcadell, also a member of UVAL, in the European project LIPPS (Language Interaction in Plurilingual and Plurilectal Speakers (http://www.ling.lancs.ac.uk/staff/mark/LIPPS/lipps.htm), whose aim is to compile an international bilingual data base.

B) Language Variation and change (CICYT: PBS90-0580; SEC93:0725). Consideration of two interrelated topics: 1) the study of language variation in apparent/real time, and 2) the analysis of language change processes, involving mere internal variation (semantic change) or correlational variation, both internal and external within several speech communities

C) Variation in language acquisition s (MCT-DGI: BFF2001-0820). Analysis of the variable nature of language acquisition processes in a situation of English learning and acquisition at an advanced level (http://lara.fdtl.ac.uk/lara/index.htm). Measure of the effect of stay abroad on language competence.

D) Forensic linguistics (DGR: BEA2001-140007). Research on the use of linguistic evidence (oral, written; phonological, morphological, syntactic, semantic, pragmatic, discourse, terminology) for several forensic applications: speaker identification, authorship, plagiarism, legal language, court interpreting.