Biography

Broadly, my research seeks to understand how conversation works and the ways in which everyday language shapes organizational practices and outcomes in institutional settings, like public office, the news media, and the law. I hold advanced degrees in Linguistics and Sociology, and I’m currently a PhD candidate in Sociology.

My dissertation interrogates indirectness in everyday language and social interaction, applying conversation-analytic methods to explore communication strategies and relationship obligations between judges, politicians, and others exposed in a major corruption scandal in Peru. My data comes from several months of news media coverage and +150 audio recordings from police wiretapping leaked to the Peruvian press.

Since 2020, I’ve been involved in an international initiative to promote the field and methods of conversation analysis (CA) in Spanish-speaking academia. As part of this effort, together with a group of colleagues from Latin America and Spain, I coordinate Seminario Permanente de Análisis de la Conversación (SPAC), a virtual space ¡en español! for learning what CA is all about. The schedule is here, and a post about it here. ¡No dudes en contactarme si tienes interés en participar de estas actividades! Additionally, in 2022, my colleague Chase Raymond (UC Boulder, Linguistics) and I published the first introductory monograph on CA written in Spanish. You can find the book here and a review (in Spanish) here.