Professor Dr. Leelo Keevallik

Biography

Leelo Keevallik works in the field of interactional linguistics and multimodal interaction analysis, exploring the sequentiality of social action and the temporal nature of grammar. Her research interests include emergent grammar, interactional linguistics, and conversation analysis. Keevallik has published extensively on the development and use of pragmatic particles, features of grammar, projection, clause combining, clitics, reduplication, and prosody in interaction. She has also reinterpreted the function of pro-forms and deixis in real-time embodied contexts, currently investigating practices that coordinate grammar and the body. Her focus includes non-lexical vocalizations such as strain grunts, pain cries, and sounds used by dance instructors and robots. Keevallik's work is at the intersection of language, movement, and embodiment, and she actively engages with methods that reveal how people make sense of communication beyond traditional spoken language.

Research Interests

Experience