Anat Stavans, Prof.
Anat Stavans, Ph.D. is an associate professor in Applied Linguistics in the English Department and Director of the Research Authority at Beit Berl Academic College. Her research focuses on developmental and educational linguistics, trilingual acquisition and development, and cross-cultural and cross-linguistic literacy development. Prof. Stavans is the author of numerous articles on topics such as code switching, narrative input and development, immigrant multilingualism, educational language policy, parent-child interaction, and multi-literacy development. She co-edited a volume Studies in Language and Language Education: Essays in Honor of Elite Olshtain (with Irit Kupferberg, 2008, Magnes); she wrote Linguistic and Developmental Analysis of Child-Directed Parental Narrative Input (in Hebrew, NCJW) and she co-authored Multilingualism (with Charlotte Hoffmann, CUP, 2015). In addition, she has developed and led several intervention projects concerning the fostering of early language and literacy development among educators and parents and served as consultant to several international agencies and institutions on multilingualism and multi-literacy. She has been appointed to the EU-COST Action N° IS1306: “New Speakers in a Multilingual Europe: Opportunities and Challenges” and to the EU-COST Action N° IS1401: “European Literacy Network”; she is also a member in ERASMUS + Higher Education Reform Expert (HERE) Forum of Israel. Prof. Stavans holds a grant by the Israel Science Foundation as the Principal Investigator in a research project on “Predictors of text quality in written expository texts: a developmental study”. Currently, Dr. Stavans is involved in international collaborations on language and literacy development in early multilingualism.
Peer-Reviewed Journals
- Stavans, A. 1992. Sociolinguistic factors affecting codeswitches produced by trilingual children, Journal of Language, Culture and Curriculum, 5(1):41-53.
- Stavans, A. and Oded, B. 1993. Are Ethiopian learners of English as a foreign language poor learners or culturally distant?, System, 21:481-494.
- Oded, B. and Stavans, A. 1994. The effect of false schema activation on the comprehension of reading, System, 22(4): 497-507.
- Stavans, A. 1996. One Two or More? Pluralization in ISL. In W.H. Edmondson, and R.B. Wilbur (eds.), International Review of Sign Linguistic, 1(4): pp. 95-114.
- Stavans, A. 1996. The development of parental narrative input, Journal of Narratives and Life History, 6(3):253-280.
- Stavans, A. 2003. The ability to narrate in two languages: a comparison of bilingual and monolingual adult narratives, Narrative Inquiry, 13(1):128-151.
- Stavans. A. and Swisher, M.V. 2006. Language switching as a window on trilingual acquisition, International Journal of Multilingualism, 3(3):193-220.
- Hoffmann, C. and Stavans, A. 2007. The evolution of trilingual code-switching from infancy to school age: the shaping of trilingual competence through dynamic language dominance, International Journal of Bilingualism, 11(1): 55-72.
- Stavans, A. and Muchnik, M. 2007. Language Production in Trilingual Children, Sociolinguistic Studies, 1(3):483-511.
- Stavans, A. and Goldzweig, G. 2008. Parent-Child and Child-Adult Storytelling: a comparison of parental narrative input and children’s narrative production, Narrative Inquiry, 18(2):230-259.
- Muchnik, M. and Stavans, A. 2009. Telling the same story: Mothers’ versus Fathers’ Storytelling Interaction, Women and Language, 32(1).
- Stavans, A., Olshtain, E. and Goldzweig, G. 2009. Parental Perceptions of Children’s Literacy and Bilingualism: the Case of Ethiopian Immigrants in Israel, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development. 30( 2):111-126.
- Stavans, A. and Goldzweig, G. 2009. Insights on Learning Hebrew as L2 by Ethiopian and Russian immigrants in Israel: “Must” or “Have”, Iyunim Besafa Vehevra [Studies in Language and Society]. (Hebrew) 1(2):59-85.
- Stavans, A. (2012). Language Policy and Literacy Practices in the Family: The Case of Ethiopian Parental Narrative Input. JMMD, special issue, Li Wei (Ed.). Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 1-21, iFirst article.
- Stavans, A. (2011). Language education policy by proxy: the ‘ideal’ meets the ‘real’ in the educational network of the Jewish Community in Mexico City. International Journal of Multilingualism, doi:10.1080/14790718.2011.588331
- Dewaele, J.M. and Stavans, A. (2012). The effect of immigration, languages and social factors on personality profiles of local- & foreign-born Israeli teenagers. International Journal of Bilingualism published online 26 April 2012 DOI: 10.1177/1367006912439941.
- Geva, P., Davidovsky, A. Ventura, L., Zadunaisky-Erlich, S., Yifat, R., Frank, N. and Stavans, A. (2011). Aleph Bet shel Hasafa [The A,B,C of the Language]. Hed Hagan, 2011(4), Pp. 22-27. (in Hebrew).
- Yemini, M., Sadeh, E., Holzmann, V., Stavans, A., Fadila, D. and de Wit, H. (2014). Reconsidering internationalization – Israeli colleges’ heads perceptions and motivations. Higher Education Policy. doi:10.1057/hep.2014.9
- Yemini, M., Holzmann, V., Fadilla, D., Natur, N., & Stavans, A. (2014). Israeli college students’ perceptions of internationalisation. International Studies in Sociology of Education, 24(3), 304-323.
- Stavans, A. (2015). Monolingual and multilingual discrimination of written sequences’ readability. Writing Systems Research, 7(1), 108-127.Published Stavans, A. and Kupersmitt, J. (In Press). ‘Moving’ within and across languages: the linguistic expression of motion events in the narratives of simultaneous trilingual children. Iyunim be Safa ve Hevra [Israel studies in language and society]
- Stavans, A. (2015). Enabling bi-literacy patterns in Ethiopian immigrant families in Israel: a socio-educational challenge. International Journal of Multilingualism, 12(2), 178-195.
- Etxeberria, F., Azpillaga, V., Intxausti, N., Martínez-Arbelaiz, A., Pikabea, I., & Stavans, A. (2015). Discourse organization in parent-led narratives: Storytelling in Basque and Spanish. Narrative Inquiry, 25(1), 70-90.
- Stavans, A., & Kupersmitt, J. R. (2016). ‘Moving’ within and across languages: the linguistic expression of motion events in the narratives of simultaneous trilingual children. Israel Studies in Language and Society, 8(1-2), 276-306.
- Stavans, A. & Webman-Shafran, R. (2017). The pragmatics of requests and refusals in multilingual settings. International Journal of Multilingualism. Published online: 18 Jun 2017 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14790718.2017.1338708
Books
- Stavans, A. 1998. Linguistic and Developmental analysis of Child-Directed Parental Narrative Input. Jerusalem: The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the NCJW Research Institute for Innovation in Education. (Hebrew)
- Stavans, A. and Kupferberg, I. (Eds.). 2008. Studies in Language and Language Education. Jerusalem: The Magnes Press.
- Stavans, A., & Hoffmann, C. (2015). Multilingualism. Cambridge University Press.
Chapters in Peer-Reviewed Books
- Stavans, A. 2001. Trilingual narratives: Relating events in three languages. In L. Verhoeven and S. Stromqvist (Eds.) Narrative Development in a Multilingual Context (pp. 341-371). Netherlands: John Benjamin.
- Wigglesworth, G. and Stavans, A. 2001. A crosscultural investigation of parental interaction in narratives between children at a range of age. In K. Nelson, A. Aksu-Koc, and C. E. Johnson (Eds.) Children’s Language (pp. 73-91), Vol. 10. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
- Stavans, A. and Narkiss, D. 2004. Creating and Implementing a Language Policy in the Israeli Education System: The Producers, the Product, the Consumers, and the Market. In C. Hoffmann and J. Ytsma (Eds.) Trilingualism in Family, School and Community (pp. 139-165). Clevedon, UK.: Multilingual Matters.
- Stavans, A. 2005. Advantages and benefits trilingualism. In I. Kupferberg and E. Olshtain (Eds.) Discourse in Education: Educational Events as a Field of Research (pp.418-449). Tel Aviv: Mofet. (Hebrew)
- Stavans, A. and Hoffmann, C. 2007. From code-switching via code-mixing to trilingual competence. In A. Stavans and I. Kupferberg (Eds.) Studies in Language and Language Education (pp.147-184). Jerusalem: The Magnes Press.
- Muchnik, M. and Stavans, A. 2007. Telling the same story: his or her style? Igala-4: Book of Proceedings (pp. 318-332), Valencia, Spain: University of Valencia.
- Hoffman, C. and Stavans, A. 2008. Co-existence and Multilingualism: An analysis of educational practices for immigrant populations in Israel. Proceedings of AIDIPE – XIII Congreso Nacional de Modelos de Investigacion Educativa: Convivencia, Equidad, Calidad (pp. 189-210), San Sebastian, Spain: Universidad del Pais Vasco. (Spanish)
- Stavans, A. (2012). Challenges faced by a medium-sized language community (MSLC) in the twentieth-first century: the case of Hebrew, in Vila, F. Xavier (ed.) Survival and Development of Language Communities: Prospects and Challenges, 150, 81. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters.
- Stavans, A. (2015). “If you know Amharic you can read this”: Emergent literacy in multilingual pre-reading children. In Gessica De Angelis, Marijana Kresic and Urlike Jessner (Eds.) Multilingualism: Crosslinguistic influence in language learning. Bloomsbury Publishing.
- Stavans, A., Seroussi, B., Rigbi, A. and Zadunaisky-Ehrlich, S. (forthcoming). The Relative Contribution Of Cognitive, Linguistic And Reading Abilities To The Writing Quality Of Expository Text Structure In Young Hebrew Speaking School Children. In Rui Alves, Teresa Limpo and Malatesta Joshi, Eds. Reading-Writing Connections.
Additional Publications
- Olshtain, E, Stavans, A., and Kotik, B. 2003. Language Patterns Use in Russian Speaking Immigrants to Israel. Final Report to Israeli Academy of Science.
- Stavans, A. and Olshtain, E. 2003. Literacy Patterns among Ethiopian Immigrant Parent- Child Interactions: A Developmental perspective. Interim report to Israeli National Science Foundation (Ford).
- Stavans, A. and Olshtain, E. 2005. Literacy Patterns among Ethiopian Immigrant Parent-Child Interactions: A Developmental perspective. Final report to Israeli National Science Foundation (Ford).
- Stavans, A. and Gross, Y. 2005. Incipient scientific discourse: written, spoken and pictorial expressions of a scientific phenomenon in Kindergarten Children. Final. Report to MOFET.
- Olshtain, E, Stavans, A., and Kotik, B., Obler, L. 2006. The development of bilingualism in two immigrant communities of Russian Speakers: in Israel and the USA. Final. Report to the Bi-national Science Foundation.
- Stavans, A. 2007. Language policy and planning in Jewish schools in Mexico City: The case of inherent trilingualism across childhood. Final report to Hebraica University, Mexico City, Mexico. Five reports for different communities.
- Stavans, A. 2008. Emergent Home literacy in Underprivileged Families in Israel. Mid-year and Final Reports to the Jewish Federation of NY.
- Tolchinsky,L. and Stavans, A. (2010). Family Literacy – Collaborative Learning Group. Final Report to the Jewish Federation of NY.
- Stavans, A. & Muchnik, M. (2013). Three Generations of Hebrew-Spanish Bilingualism in Kibbutzim and Urban Centers: Languages Use, Maintenance, and Attitude. Final Report Beit Berl Internal Research Grant Committee.
- Stavans, A. and Kupersmitt, J. (2014). Linguistic strategies and narrative stance in dyadic interactions between mothers of children of different age groups: a developmental difference. Final Report Beit Berl Internal Research Grant Committee.