Valentina ALFARANO
PhD in Linguistics
Thesis defended at INALCO on 2021, July 9th: “Clausal organisation in Nalögo, an Oceanic language of Santa Cruz Island” (co-dir.: Isabelle Bril (Lacito & Inalco), Åshild Næss (Oslo University)
Research expertise
Austronesian/Oceanic languages, verbal valence phenomena, Austronesian voice systems, transitivity, morphosyntactic alignment, possession, deixis, nominal classification, language documentation, language description, typology, historical linguistics, Clausal organisation in Nalögo, an Oceanic language of Santa Cruz Island
Research projects
Opérations de recherche au Lacito :
• Études océaniennes
• Terrains, Analyses, et Comparaison des langages (TACOL) (co-responsable depuis 2018)
Programme du Labex “Empirical Foundations of Linguistics“:
• LabEx EFL – Axe 3 (Typology and dynamics of linguistic systems).
Keywords
Austronesian/Oceanic languages – Reefs-Santa Cruz languages – morphosyntax – argument structure – transitivity – valency-changing operations – morphosyntactic alignment – voice systems – typology – language documentation and description – Nalögo
Formation
- PhD in Language Science: Linguistics and language didactics (Oct 2016 – Jul 2021) , at INALCO (Paris, France)
- MA (Dec 2013) in Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, University of Pavia (Italie)
- BA (Dec 2011) in Humanities (curriculum in Linguistics), University of Pavia (Italie)
- Post-Grad research in Linguistics at ELDTA (2014-2015), University of Newcastle (Australia)
Teaching and professional experience
- October 1, 2023– project: “Comparative-historical analysis of the clausal structure in RSC languages”, Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellow – MSCA-PF (University of Oslo)
- September 1, 2022 – September 2023, A.T.E.R (Université Sorbonne Nouvelle – Paris 3)
- October 1, 2022 – September 2023, Research Assistant (Prof. Isabelle Bril, LABEX EFL)
- November 1, 2021 – December 2021, Lecturer (INALCO, Paris)
- September 2021 – October 2021, research assistant (Prof. Antoinette Schapper, Free University of Amsterdam)
- Feb-Mar 2017 Seminar “Possessive constructions in Oceanic languages”, 5h, in the course Typologie et évolution des langues austronésiennes (Prof Isabelle Bril, EPHE)
- September 2019 – December 2019, Lecturer (INALCO, Paris)
- May to September 2013, tutoring, Introduction to General Linguistics course, University of Pavia, Italy
Mobility and field experiences
Field experiences in the Solomon Islands (Temotu Province) September – December; November 2017 – February 2018
collection of over 20 hours of audio/video recordings, with corresponding metadata, annotations and images. Creation of a primer for children and capture of a set of video clips based on the Melanesian context, made available to researchers for the elicitation of the argumental structure of predicates.
Talks at international conferences with selection committees
- Middles, reflexives and reciprocals in Nalögo: typology and evolution. APLL-15 (International Austronesian and Papuan languages and Linguistics Conference), Palacký University Olomouc, Czech Republic, August 22-25, 2023.
- Generic linked names in Nalögo. LDLT6 (Language Documentation and Linguistic Theory 6), SoAs, University of London, December 16-18, 2021.
- Some aspects of clausal structure and grammatical relations in Nalögo. APLL-13, (International Austronesian and Papuan languages and Linguistics Conference), University of Edinburgh, June 10-12, 2021.
- Middle, reflexive and reciprocal constructions in Nalögo, ALT 2019 (Association for Linguistic Typology), University of Pavia, September 4-6, 2019.
- Indirect possessive constructions in Nalögo: type and role of possessive classifiers, SLE 2019
(Societas Linguistica Europaea), University of Leipzig, July 21-24, 2019. - The evolution of three applicatives in Nalögo, APLL-11, University of Leiden, June 13-15, 2019.
- Functions of the prefix lë- in Nalögo, APLL-9, INALCO, Paris, June 21-23, 2017.
Work completed (online corpus)
Alfarano, Valentina. 2018. Documenting Nalögo, an Oceanic language of Santa Cruz Island. London: SOAS, Endangered Languages Archive, ELAR. (http://hdl.handle.net/2196/00-0000-0000-0010-7A76-9 Accessed on October 11, 2021)
Thesis and publications
- Alfarano, Valentina. (sous presse). Middle, reflexive and reciprocal constructions in Nalögo: a typological and diachronic account, Oceanic Linguistics 63(1).
- Næss, Åshild, Valentina Alfarano, Brenda H. Boerger, and Anders Vaa. 2023. Comitative constructions in Reefs-Santa Cruz, Oceanic Linguistics 62(1).
- Alfarano, Valentina and Brenda H. Boerger. 2022. The prefix (v)ö- in Nalögo and Natügu and its origin from POc *paRi-, Language & Linguistics in Melanesia 40, 31-59.
- Alfarano, Valentina. 2021. A grammar of Nalögo, an Oceanic language of Santa Cruz Island. Thèse de doctorat, INALCO, Paris.