Sabina Fontana

Associate Professor of [L-LIN/01]

Sabina Fontana is associate professor of Linguistics and Glottology. After having graduated in Foreign Languages and Literature at the University of Catania, she won a grant for attending master in philosophy abroad. She obtained the Diploma in Social  Science in Deaf Studies at the University of Bristol and the Mphil in Foreign Languages teaching at the University of Bologna. She taught languages and methodologies in training courses and workshops for  teachers and support teachers. She has worked as advisor in the field of linguistic education and sign language for schools, the National Deaf Association, the Enel, and non profit organizations. In 1997, she has founded, with the funding of the local council of Ragusa, the service of social secretariat and interpreting for deaf people. Some years later, in cooperation with the Province of Ragusa, she founded the school support service for deaf pupils and the relay service. At the same time, she worked as mediator/interpreter in local and international settings. In 2007, she obtained the PhD in philosophy of Language and Mind at the University of Palermo and she started to teach as a contract professor  semiotics, linguistics, theory of language at the University of Catania and Semantics at University Suor Orsola Benincasa, in Naples. In 2017 she became associate professor of  Linguistics and Philosophy of Language. In december 2011 she became assistant professor of linguistics.  In 2017, she has been habilitated as associate professor in linguistics (L-LIN/01) and in Philosophy of Language (M-FIL/05).

She is author of many publications, among which three volumes: Linguaggio e Multimodalità (ETS, 2009),  Tradurre lingue dei segni (Mucchi, 2013) Descrivere lingue dei segni. Una prospettiva sociosemiotica e cognitiva, with other authors (Il Mulino). She is co-director of the series Intelligere: mediating between identity and alterity with the editor Agorà, Lugano. She has participated to several research project at the national and the international level.

Within this department, she is responsible of dealing with the special needs of students with disabilities and learning difficulties for the CINAP. She is also in charge of the Third Mission.

 

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VIEW THE COURSES FROM THE A.Y. 2022/2023 TO THE PRESENT

Academic Year 2021/2022


Academic Year 2020/2021


Academic Year 2019/2020


Academic Year 2018/2019


Academic Year 2017/2018


Academic Year 2016/2017


Academic Year 2015/2016

Her research activities focus currently on sign languages in correlation with the concept of language as a faculty and the related theoretical and epistemological problems linked to their description and analysis. The analysis is based on a comparative approach with spoken languages. Under this perspective, she has dealt with metaphor and metonymy, with sociolinguistics, with translation and interpreting and different modelization of translation developed for spoken languages, with metalinguistic awareness and gramatization.  Furthermore, she works also in the field of co-speech and co-sign gesture in a developmental perspective and in deaf and hearing adult communication. More recently she has worked also in the field of linguistics rights, inclusion processes and empowerment of migrants and minorities.