Cecilia Montes-Alcalá

Dr. Cecilia Montes-Alcalá received her PhD in Hispanic Linguistics from the University of California, Santa Barbara. She joined the Georgia Tech faculty in 2004 as an Assistant Professor of Spanish & Linguistics in the School of Modern Languages.

A specialist in sociolinguistics, bilingualism and languages in contact, she has presented her work at numerous national and international conferences. Her recent publications include journal articles such as "Bilingual Texting in the Age of Emoji: Spanish–English Code-Switching in SMS” (Languages 9.4: 2024) and "The Dual Role of Code-Switching in Alejandro Morales’s Reto en el Paraíso” (Forum for Modern Language Studies 60.1: 2024: Oxford University Press); the co-edited volume (with Talia Bugel) New Approaches to Language Attitudes in the Hispanic and Lusophone World, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins series Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics (2020); and book chapters such as “Bilingualism and Biculturalism: Spanish, English, Spanglish?” (Routledge Handbook of Chicana/o Studies. Eds. Denise Segura, Francisco A. Lomelí and Elyette Benjamin-Labarthe. Routledge, 2018) and “Socio-Pragmatic Functions of Codeswitching in Nuyorican and Cuban American Literature” (Spanish-English codeswitching in the Caribbean and the U.S., Eds. Rosa E. Guzzardo Tamargo et al. John Benjamins, 2016).

Dr. Montes-Alcalá has received research support from CIBER, the Georgia Tech Foundation, and Ivan Allen College among other funding sources and she also holds a number of awards from Emory University, the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the University of Alcalá de Henares (Madrid). She teaches courses in bilingualism, sociolinguistics, applied linguistics, and Spanish culture and history. She is also director of the Spanish Program and the Spain LBAT summer program in Madrid.