DEPARTMENT OF SPANISH & PORTUGUESE

Eider Etxebarria is an Assistant Professor of Instruction at the Spanish and Portuguese Department at NU. Born and raised in the Basque Country, she received her Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Spanish Linguistics with two concentrations: SLATE (Second Language Acquisition and Teaching Education) and translation. Her research ––funded by the National Science Foundation, among other awards–– explores parental, educational, and communal linguistic practices to ensure optimal dual language development in bilingual children, which is essential for the survival of endangered and minoritized languages. She is also a translator whose translation and adaptation projects, such as “Basque for English speakers” (2021), reflect her mission to disseminate Basque language and culture with the aim that English-speakers can inquire more into and come to appreciate her cultural treasure and linguistic heritage.  

For over a decade, Eider has taught elementary through advanced language and linguistics courses ––both in Spanish and Basque–– at the University of Illinois, University of Deusto, and more recently Northwestern University. She is currently the coordinator of Spanish 101 (Elementary Spanish) and teaches Spanish Elementary and Accelerated Spanish Elementary courses. Her goal as a language and linguistics professor is to provide students with the competence and hands-on communicative strategies to integrate Spanish in their personal, vocational, and professional communities.