Susan Gass | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1943-05-21)May 21, 1943 (age 82) Boston, Massachusetts, United States |
| Known for |
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| Awards | 2016:Kenneth W. Mildenberger Prize[1] |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | |
| Thesis | An investigation of syntactic transfer in adult second language acquisition (1979) |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Linguist |
| Sub-discipline |
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| Institutions | Michigan State University |
| Website | Gass on the website of Michigan State University |
Susan Gass (born 1943) is an American linguist who has won theKenneth W. Mildenberger Prize.[1] She is currently aprofessor emerita, retired from the Department of Linguistics, Languages, and Cultures atMichigan State University.[2] Her research focuses onapplied linguistics with a special focus onsecond language learning,corrective feedback, andtask-based language learning. She graduated in 1961 from Kingswood School Cranbrook.
Gass served as the director of the English Language Center, co-director of the Center for Language Education And Research (CLEAR), co-director of the Center for Language Teaching Advancement (CeLTA), and founding-director of the Second Language Studies (SLS) Ph.D. program atMichigan State University.
Between 2002 and 2008 she served as president of theInternational Association of Applied Linguistics.
She was the editor ofStudies in Second Language Acquisition.[3]
According to Google Scholar, Gass's most cited publications include: Second language acquisition: An introductory course, Second language research: Methodology and design, and Input, interaction, and the second language learner.[4]
One of her major publications is a journal article, published inApplied Linguistics in 1985, entitledNon-native/Non-native Conversations: A Model for Negotiation of Meaning. The article, co-written with Evangeline Varonis, builds on the research focusing on conversational interactions between native speakers and non-native speakers. The paper focuses on interactions among non-native speakers of English. Varonis and Gass noted that negotiation of meaning was the most common among non-native speaker/non-native speaker pairs.[5]
Gass has had work published in several major journals such asApplied Linguistics,Studies in Second Language Acquisition,Language Learning,The Modern Language Journal, andAILA Review.
She has co-written books withLarry Selinker,Alison Mackey,Charlene Polio, andBill VanPatten.
Gass has received numerous outstanding awards throughout her career.[6]