Elizabeth Naranjo Hayes

Dr. Elizabeth Naranjo Hayes (she/her) is an Assistant Professor of French and Spanish Linguistics at Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri. Her office is located in McClain Hall and can be reached at enhayes@truman.edu. She specializes in sociolinguistics, particularly the intersection of society, language, and culture, with a focus on code-switching and phonetic variation in popular music.

Dr. Hayes earned her PhD in Romance Languages: Spanish and French Linguistics. She previously worked as a professional interpreter/translator for the Federal Courts and is a disabled US Army veteran. Her teaching methodology emphasizes sociolinguistic approaches, leveraging global music trends to contextualize language learning through lyrics.

• Research Interests: Sociolinguistics, code-switching, sociophonetics, second language acquisition, and the role of music in language education.
• Language Proficiencies: Native English and Spanish; near-native French; conversational Catalan, Galician, Portuguese, Italian, Latin, and others in Western Europe and the Americas.
• Resources: Operates a store, Lengua es Cultura, offering infographics and song lyric materials for language educators.

Her recent work examines phonetic and codemixing patterns in Bad Bunny and J Balvin's spontaneous speech versus artistic performances, noting regional pronunciation preservation in speech but modification in artistic contexts. She also explores cross-linguistic trends in Spanish-English-French lyrical code-switching among global artists.