Contact Information
244 Lincoln Hall
702 S Wright
M/C 456
Urbana, IL 61801
Research Interests
The role of culture in verbal interaction
how speakers perform and infer cultural identities in their own and others' talk
style shifting and code switching in discourse
bilingualism
intercultural communication
sociolinguistics
oral narrative
Research Description
Professor Koven researches the relationships between identity and language practices in migrant communities. She is addresses how bilingual speakers enact multiple, culturally situated identities in talk, with a particular focus on narrative discourse.
Education
Ph.D., University of Chicago
Additional Campus Affiliations
Professor, Communication
Professor, French and Italian
Professor, Linguistics
Research Associate, Anthropology
Professor, European Union Center
Professor, Global Studies Programs and Courses
Professor, Center for Global Studies
Highlighted Publications
Koven, M. E. J. (2007). Selves in Two Languages: Bilinguals’ verbal enactments of identity in French and Portuguese. (Studies in Bilingualism; Vol. 34). John Benjamins Publishing Company. https://doi.org/10.1075/sibil.34
Recent Publications
Babu, S., Koven, M., Thompson, C. M., & Makos, S. (2025). (Re)making Scales: Communicative enfranchisement in Women’s Narrative Discourses About Health Dismissal. Health communication, 40(6), 1090-1100. https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2024.2386716
Koven, M., Kramer, E., & Perrino, S. M. (2025). Introduction to “Scaling stories: Narratives and the dialogic regimentation of scales”. Discourse Studies, 27(2), 183-191. https://doi.org/10.1177/14614456241276718
Koven, M. (2025). ‘My family wouldn’t have survived, and I would not be here’: Juxtaposing counterfactual and actual pasts and presents in narratives of rescue by Aristides de Sousa Mendes. Discourse Studies, 27(2), 214-233. https://doi.org/10.1177/14614456241276699
Koven, M. (2023). Affect in cross-chronotope alignments in narrations about Aristides de Sousa Mendes and their subsequent circulations. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology, 33(3), 350-372. https://doi.org/10.1111/jola.12411
Koven, M., & Marques, I. S. (2021). Multiaddressivity and Collective Addressivity in Vlog-based Interactions between Diasporic and Nonmigrant Portuguese. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology, 31(1), 97-118. https://doi.org/10.1111/jola.12301