Dr. Luisa Seguin
/ luiza səgɛ̃ /
I am a postdoctoral research associate in the CNRS Bases Corpus Langage laboratory at Université Côte d'Azur in Nice (France), working with Dr. Lena Baunaz. I am also associated with the Centre d'Études Francoprovençales in Saint-Nicolas (Aosta Valley, Italy).
I work on Romance, with a particular emphasis on Francoprovençal languages. I am interested in how structure (syntax) interacts with the other components of the grammar: meaning and sound. I am currently working on questions in an understudied Francoprovençal variety spoken in Aosta Valley (Italy), Valdôtain Patois (see my dissertation here). Other projects focus on exceptive and exclusive constructions (Except John/setting aside John, everyone came.), reflexive verbs (They wash themselves.), and clitic pronouns. Finally, I am involved in #FPGlobal, a project led by Naomi Nagy (UofT) that aims to bring together speakers of Francoprovençal across Europe and North America, while creating a corpus of Francoprovençal varieties.
I hold a PhD from the Department of Linguistics at the University of Maryland, where I was advised by Maria Polinsky, Aron Hirsch, and Gary Thoms (NYU).
Email me: luisa [dot] seguin [at] univ-cotedazur [ dot] fr
OR lseguin9 [at] umd [dot] edu
NEWS!
My paper The syntax and pragmatics of clause internal wh-phrases in Valdôtain Patois just appeared in the latest issue of Linguistic Variation: Theoretical and empirical issues in Italo-Romance varieties, 26(1), 203 - 220. Email me for a copy!
This summer, I have been invited to teach at the Yerevan Academy for Linguistics and Philosophy!
In February, I will present my work Patterns of cliticization and clitic movement in Francoprovençal at 51° Incontro di Grammatica Generativa (IGG51) in Udine.
On January 1st, I started a 2-year postdoc at Université Côte d'Azur in Nice in the BCL (Bases, Corpus, Langage), where I will be working with Dr. Lena Baunaz!
In the news!
In August 2025, the newspaper of Aosta Valley La Vallée Notizie published an article about my research on Francoprovençal!
In the picture on the top of the page, a view of the Alps back home. Courtesy of Charbonnier Mongolfiere.