Dr María Elena Placencia

Overview

Biography

María Elena Placencia is Reader in Spanish Linguistics.  She joined Birkbeck in 1995 and teaches in the areas of (Spanish) Pragmatics,  (Digital) Discourse Analysis as well as Spanish as a foreign language. She has performed different administrative roles, including that of HoD/Assistant Dean, and is currently Programme Director of various undergraduate programmes within the Department of Cultures and Languages.

Her current research is in the areas of variational pragmatics (with a focus on e-service encounters), and digital discourse analysis, with a focus on social media interaction. Her latest project examines offensive language on Twitter in the context of interethnic interaction.

Past projects have looked at a range of topics including, among others, complimenting behaviour in social media, the discourse of bargaining in e-commerce, rapport management and small talk in service encounters, (im)politeness in familial contexts, addressing behaviour and discursive racism. María Elena has published extensively on these topics.

Highlights

• Placencia, M. E., & Eslami, Z. R. (Eds.). (2020). Complimenting Behavior and (Self-)Praise across Social Media: New Contexts and New Insights Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
  

• Placencia, M.E. & Padilla, X.A. (Eds) (2019) Guía práctica de pragmática del español. London: Routledge. 

  Review: "This is an excellent and most welcome addition to the range of teaching materials in Spanish linguistics. It is original in concept, being an overview of the principal areas of current interest in pragmatics using Spanish-language data, presented by twenty-two established specialists in succinct terms suitable for a student readership. It is very clearly written yet does not shy away from the use of technical terms, which are always clearly defined. Each chapter is accompanied by a selection of practical tasks which also encourage critical reflection on methodology; the last chapter, which gives training in how to set up a research project, is particularly valuable both for undergraduates and postgraduates. Quite apart from the sound instruction it affords as a coursebook for a dedicated course on Spanish pragmatics, it is approachable to anyone interested in its wealth of engaging examples of practical language use across the Spanish-speaking world."

  Christopher J. Pountain, Emeritus Professor of Spanish Linguistics, Queen Mary University of London　　

  Review by Carlos Alvarez

• Félix-Brasdefer, J.C. and Placencia, M. E. (Eds.) Pragmatic Variation in Service Encounters across the Spanish-Speaking World. London: Routledge. 

Qualifications

• PhD, University of Lancaster
• MA, University of Lancaster

Web profiles

• Academia.edu
• Researchgate
• Google Scholar

Administrative responsibilities

• Programme Director: BA Language and/with History
• Programme Director: BA Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies
• Programme Director: BA Language and/with History of Art

Visiting posts

• Visiting fellow , Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge, 04-2012 to 07-2012

Professional activities

Occasional reviewer for: 

Journal of Intercultural Studies, Hispania, Revista Internacional de Lingüística Iberoamericana (RILI), Lenguaje, Cultura y Representación, Spanish in Context, International Journal of Bilingualism, Sociolinguistic Studies, Language Teaching, Research on Language and Social Interaction, Ikala: Revista de Lenguaje y Cultura, Intercultural Pragmatics, Pragmatics, Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, Multilingua, Journal of Language Aggression and Conflict, Sintagma Revista de Lingüística, International Multilingual Research Journal, Signo y Seña, Sage Open Journal, Journal of Politeness Research, Classroom Discourse, Text & Talk, Hispanic Research Journal, Normas, Lengua y migración, Journal of Multicultural Discourses

Peer review work relating to edited collections and book proposals for the following publishing houses:

John Benjamins, de Gruyter, Wiley-Blackwell, University of Hawaii Press, Cascadilla Press, University of Ohio Press, Cambridge University Press, Routledge, Ediciones UVA, Cambridge Scholars. 

Peer review work for grant applications:

UK Arts and Humanities Research Council, Conacyt Chile, The Research Council of Norway, the Ohio University Research Committee (OURC). 

Professional memberships

• Member of the editorial/advisory board of the following journals: 

  Journal of Pragmatics

  Sociocultural Pragmatics, International Journal of Spanish Linguistics

  Oralia, Análisis del Discurso Oral

  Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics

  Discurso & Sociedad

  Tonos Digital Revista Electrónica de Estudios Filológicos

  Estudios Lingüísticos de la Universidad de Alicante (E.L.U.A)

  Revista de la Asociación Brasileña de Hispanistas 

  Journal of Spanish Language Teaching

  Euroamerican Journal of Applied Linguistics and Languages

  Applied Pragmatics

  Revista Estudios Discurso Digital

  Verbum et Lingua 

  Español Actual 

• Associations:
  International Pragmatics Association (IPRA)
  

  Asociación de Lingüística y Filología de América Latina (ALFAL)

  International Association for the Study of Spanish in Society (SIS) (co-founder)

  
  

• Networks:

  Estudios del discurso de la cortesía en español (EDICE)

  International Network of Address Research (INAR)

ORCID

0000-0002-5471-4661

Research

Research interests

• Social media discourse
• Regional pragmatic variation
• (E-) service encounters
• Discursive racism
• (Im)politeness phenomena
• Small talk and rapport management
• Address forms
• Speech act realisation in technology mediated interaction

Supervision and teaching

Supervision

I welcome enquiries from prospective PhD students who are interested in undertaking research in any of my areas of research interest

Teaching

I teach in the areas of (digital) discourse analysis, sociocultural, cross-cultural and variational pragmatics. 

Publications