Dr. Anousha Sedighi is Professor and Head of the Persian program at Portland State University. She has more than 15 years of experience in program development and curricular innovation in both traditional and online formats. Her current areas of research include second language acquisition and pedagogy, heritage languages, and sociolinguistics. Her most recent book is entitled Iranian and Minority Languages at Home and in Diaspora, De Gruyter Mouton (2023). Her other books include The Oxford Handbook of Persian Linguistics, Oxford University Press (2018)). Her textbook Persian in Use: An Elementary Textbook of Language and Culture, Leiden University Press (2015) is currently taught at more than 20 universities nationwide as well as in Europe and Canada. It was also translated into German due to popular demand.
Dr. Sedighi founded the Persian program at PSU in 2005 and launched the Persian minor, the only such minor in the State of Oregon, in 2011. She is the recipient of the several fellowships and substantial grants including the Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute Fellowship and the PARSA Community Foundation grant, through which she organized many campus-community events including lecture Series, film series, and concerts.
Dr. Sedighi held leadership positions at nationally-leading organizations that promote diversity and cross-cultural understanding. She was president of the American Association of Teachers of Persian (2014-2016) and served on the executive board of the National Council of Less Commonly Taught Languages (2015-2017). She also served as the inaugural associate editor of linguistics for the International Journal of Iranian Studies, Cambridge University Press (2019-2022).
Published Books:
Iranian and Minority Languages at Home and in Diaspora, De Gruyter Mouton, 2023
Persisch Aktiv, Eine Einführungin Sprache und Kultur, Reichert Verlag 2022
The Oxford Handbook of Persian Linguistics, Oxford University Press, 2018
Persian in Use: An Elementary Textbook of Language and Culture, Leiden University Press, 2015, Companion website: www.persianinuse.com
Agreement Restrictions in Persian, Leiden University Press, 2010
Downloadable Papers:
"Persian As a Heritage Language", in Anousha Sedighi & Pouneh Shabani-Jadidi (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Persian Linguistics. Oxford University Press, 2018, 361-387.
“Teaching Persian to Speakers of Other Languages”, with ShabaniJadidi, in Anousha Sedighi & Pouneh Shabani-Jadidi (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Persian Linguistics. Oxford University Press, 2018, 388-408.
“Teaching Persian to Heritage Persian Speakers”. International Journal on Iranian Studies. Routledge Publications. 2010. 43: 5, 681-695.
“Do Psychological Constructions in Persian Involve Complex Predicates?” Rice Working Papers in Linguistics. 2009, 1: 65-78.
“Psychological Constructions and Super High Applicatives in Persian”. Cahier Linguistic d’Ottawa. 2007, 35: 137-160.
“Animacy: The Overlooked Feature in Persian”. Proceedings of the Canadian Linguistics Association Conference. 2005. 1-12.