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Abbas Benmamoun

Vice Provost for Faculty Advancement
Duke University

Overview


Abbas Benmamoun is the vice provost for faculty advancement, a position responsible for providing intellectual leadership, guidance and oversight of university-wide strategies and programs to enhance faculty excellence. He oversees faculty and leadership development programs, including programs to recruit and hire outstanding and diverse faculty, and partner with schools, departments, and centers to enhance faculty success at Duke and promote an inclusive and equitable learning, research, and work environment.

Prior to joining Duke, Dr. Benmamoun served as vice provost for faculty affairs and academic policies at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. He additionally served in different leadership roles at the University of Illinois, including as acting director of the Center of Middle Eastern and Asian Studies, head of the Department of Linguistics, director of the School of Literatures, Cultures, and Linguistics, and Associate Provost for Faculty Development.

A native of Morocco, Benmamoun earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from the Mohammed V University in Rabat, Morocco, his master’s degree from University College London, and his Ph.D. from the University of Southern California. Benmamoun’s research focuses on the comparative syntax and morphology of natural language and on heritage languages, particularly on issues of language maintenance and loss within immigrant communities. He is the author of “The Feature Structure of Functional Categories”, co-author of “The Syntax of Arabic”, and co-editor of the “Routledge Handbook of Arabic Linguistics.”

Administrative Assistant: Jan Carico
Pronouns: he/him/his

Current Appointments & Affiliations


Vice Provost for Faculty Advancement · 2017 - Present Duke University
Professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies · 2017 - Present Asian & Middle Eastern Studies, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
Director of the Linguistics Program · 2024 - Present Linguistics, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
Professor in Linguistics · 2025 - Present Linguistics, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences

In the News


Published November 18, 2024
A How-To on Navigating the Tenure Process
Published October 3, 2024
How Duke Starts New Faculty on the Road to Success
Published June 14, 2023
Advancing Racial Equity at Duke

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Recent Publications


Wh-questions in the grammar of heritage Egyptian speakers

Journal Article International Journal of Bilingualism · January 1, 2024 Aims and objectives: Despite the growth in research on heritage grammars, very few studies focused on heritage speakers’ knowledge of the syntax of wh-questions. This paper examines heritage Egyptian speakers’ knowledge of wh-questions in their L1 with par ... Full text Cite

Heritage Language Research and Theoretical Linguistics

Chapter · January 1, 2021 Our understanding of the syntax of natural language and syntactic aspects that obtain across languages and other aspects that display variation has greatly benefited from research on a large number of languages representing a diversity of language families ... Full text Cite

Is learning a standard variety similar to learning a new language?: Evidence from heritage speakers of Arabic

Journal Article Studies in Second Language Acquisition · March 1, 2018 This study examines heritage speakers' knowledge of Standard Arabic (SA) and compares their patterns of SA acquisition to those of learners of SA as second/foreign language (L2). In addition, the study examines the influence of previously acquired language ... Full text Cite
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Recent Grants


Provost's Initiative on Free Inquiry, Pluralism & Belonging

Institutional SupportPrincipal Investigator · Awarded by Duke Endowment · 2024 - 2028

Ivy+Faculty Advancement Network(FAN)

Institutional SupportPrincipal Investigator · Awarded by University of Chicago · 2023 - 2026

Faculty Leadership Development Initiative

Institutional SupportPrincipal Investigator · Awarded by Duke Endowment · 2018 - 2022

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Education, Training & Certifications


University of Southern California · 1992 Ph.D.