Department of Linguistics University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

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Abbas Benmamoun

Director of the School of Literatures, Cultures, and Linguistics, Professor of Linguistics
Professor of LAS Global Studies
Affiliate Professor of French

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  • Address:
    University of Illinois
    Dept. of Linguistics, MC-168
    707 South Mathews Avenue
    Urbana, IL 61801
    USA

    Office: 4088B Foreign Languages Bldg.
  • Telephone: (217) 333-3563
  • Email:

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Research Interests

Comparative Syntax



Arabic Syntax and Morphology



Arabic as a Heritage Language



Syntax, Morphology, Arabic, Semitic, Arabic as a Heritage Language, Acquisition of Arabic as First and second Language.



Education

  • BA. Mohammed V University. Morocco.
  • MA. University College London. UK.
  • Ph.D. University of Southern California

Current Projects

  • Comparative Syntax of Arabic Varieties. Funded by NSF (2009-2012).
  • Arabic as a Heritage Language (with Abdulkafi Albirini, Utah State University)
  • Acquisition of Kuwaiti Arabic Syntax (with Khawla Aljenai, Kuwait University).
  • Co-PI: Multi-dialect phrase-based speech recognition and machine translation for Qatari broadcast TV. Qatar National Research Fund grant. CoPI with Mark Hasegawa-Johnson (PI, UIUC) and Roxana Girju (UIUC), Eiman Mustafawi (Qatar University) and Rehab Duwairi (Qatar University)
  • Magnetic resonance imaging of Arabic pharyngeals. Ryan Shosted (PI), Abbas Benmamoun (co-PI), and Brad Sutton (co-PI). University of Illinois Campus Research Board Award

    • Publications

    Books

    • Aoun, Joseph , Elabbas Benmamoun, and Lina Choueiri. Arabic Syntax. Cambridge University Press, 2010.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. The Feature Structure of Functional Categories. Oxford University Press, 2000.

    Book Contributions

    • Hasegawa-Johnson, Hasegawa-Johnson, Elabbas , Benmamoun, Eiman Mustafawi, and Mohamed Elmahdy . ". On The Definition of the Word `Segmental'." Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Speech Prosody. 2012.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. " Clause Structure and Tense of Verbless Sentences." Foundational Issues In Linguistics Theory. Ed. Maria-Luisa Zubizaretta, Robert Freidin, and Carlos Otero. MIT Press, 2008. 105-131.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. "Reciprocals as Plurals." Research in Afroasiatic Grammar II. Ed. Jacqueline Lecarme. John Benjamins, 2003. 53-62.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. "The Role of the Imperfective Template in Arabic Morphology." Language Processing and Acquisition in Languages of Semitic, Root-based, Morphology. Ed. Joseph Shimron. John Benjamins, 2003. 99-114.

    Edited Books

    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics XIX. John Benjamins, 2007.
    • Al-Hawary, Mohammad , and Elabbas Benmamoun. Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics XVII-XVIII. John Benjamins, 2005.
    • Parkinson, Dilworth, and Elabbas Benmamoun. Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics XIII-XIV. John Benjamins, 2002.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics XII. John Benjamins, 1999.
    • Lappin, Shalom, and Elabbas Benmamoun. Fragments: Studies In Ellipsis and Gapping. Oxford University Press, 1999.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas, and Mushira Eid. Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics Vol. XI. John Benjamins, 1998.

    Journal Articles

    • Albirini, Abdulkafi , Brahim Chakrani, and Elabbas Benmamoun. "Gender and Number Agreement in the Oral Production of Arabic ." Language and Cognition 16.1 (2013): 1-18.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. "Agreement and Cliticization in Arabic Varieties from Diachronic and Synchronic Perspectives." Al-`Arabiyya 44-45 (2012): 137-150.
    • Albirini, Abdulkafi, and Elabbas Benmamoun. "Aspects of second language transfer in the oral production of Egyptian and Palestinian heritage speakers." International Journal of Bilingualism (2012):
    • Albirini, Abdulkafi, Elabbas Benmamoun, and Eman Saadah. "Grammatical features of Egyptian and Palestinian Arabic Heritage Speakers’ Oral Production." Studies in Second Language Acquisition 33 (2011): 273-303..
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas, Archna Bhatia, and Maria Polinsky. "Closest Conjunct Agreement in Head-Final Languages." Linguistic Variation Yearbook 9 (2010): 67-88.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. "The Syntax of Arabic Tense." Linguistique Arabe (2007): 9-25.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas, and Heidi Lorimor. "Featureless Expressions: When Morpho-phonological Markers are absent." Linguistic Inquiry 37.1 (2006): 1-23.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. "Licensing Options: The Puzzle of Head NPIs." Linguistic Inquiry (2006): 141-149.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas , and Rajesh Kumar. "The Overt Licensing of NPIs in Hindi." The Yearbook of South Asian (2006): 31-48.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. "Agreement parallelism between sentences and noun phrases." Lingua 113 (2003): 747-764.

    Encyclopedia Entries

    • Benmamoun, Elabbas . "Arabic Syntax." Encyclopedia of Arabic Linguistics IV. Brill Academic Publishers, 2009.
    • Benmamoun, Elabbas. "The Construct State." Encyclopedia of Arabic Linguistics. Brill Academic Publishers, 2006.