Photo of Mary Hughes

Mary E. Hughes

Senior Lecturer

Dr. Mary Hughes is a senior lecturer in the Language & Literacy Department at Boston University Wheelock College of Education & Human Development. Dr. Hughes’ research and teaching interests include linguistics, first and second language acquisition, multilingualism, language education, and language revitalization. Her first language acquisition research focuses on the interaction of syntactic and discourse–pragmatic effects in the acquisition of reference to shed light on the early development of referential choice in dyadic conversation. Her second language acquisition research focuses on the instruction of complex grammatical structures found in content-area academic texts for multilingual learners.

Dr. Hughes has taught undergraduate and graduate students in institutions as diverse as Temple University, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of the Performing Arts in Philadelphia, Camden County Community College in New Jersey, Harvard University Extension School, Boston College, Northeastern University, and Boston University, and she has taught subjects as varied as developmental and academic writing, English as a Second Language, Irish language and linguistics, theoretical and applied linguistics, and first- and second-language acquisition theory and methodology.

Dr. Hughes is also a board member and the current treasurer for the Massachusetts Association of Teachers of Speakers of Other Languages (MATSOL), a TESOL regional affiliate. She has presented her research on first- and second-language acquisition at regional, national, and international conferences, and she has published in high-impact journals such as the Journal of Pragmatics and Lingua.

Pronouns: she/her

PhD, Applied Linguistics, Boston University

MA, Linguistics, Temple University

BA, Communications & Voice Performance, Temple University

WED ED 220: Theme-Based Approaches to Studying Complex Issues of Language in Education and Human Development

WED LS 560: Introduction to Language and Language Acquisition

WED LS 565: Applied Linguistics: Language & Linguistics Survey

WED LS 567: Structure of English

WED LS 658: Second Language Acquisition

SAR SH 524: Language Acquisition

Allen, S.E.M., Hughes, M.E., & Skarabela, B. (2015). The role of cognitive accessibility in children’s referential choice. In The Acquisition of Reference. L. Serratrice & S. Allen (eds.). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S.E.M. (2015). Competing motivations in children’s omission of subjects? The interaction between verb finiteness and referent accessibility. In Competing Motivations on Grammar and Usage. B. MacWhinney, A. Malchukov, & E. Moravcsik (eds.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S.E.M. (2014). The incremental effect of discourse-pragmatic sensitivity on referential choice in the acquisition of a first language. Lingua 155, 43-61.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S.E.M. (2013). The effect of individual discourse-pragmatic features on referential choice in child English. Journal of Pragmatics 56, 15-30.

Allen, S., Skarabela, B., & Hughes, M.E. (2008). Using corpora to examine discourse effects in syntax. In Corpora in Language Acquisition Research: History, methods, perspectives. H. Behrens (ed.), Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2006). A discourse-pragmatic analysis of subject omission in child English. Proceedings of the 30th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD), Vol. 1, 2006. Edited David Bamman, Tatiana Magnitskaia, and Colleen Zaller; pp. 293-304. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

Hughes, M. E. & Latham Keh, M. (2017, January). The Language of Quantitative Reasoning. Workshop session at SEQuEL 2017: Southeastern-Massachusetts Quantitative Literacy & Engagement Meeting. Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts.

Hughes, M.E. & Latham Keh, M. (2016, April). Grammar Toolkit: Instructing Complex Syntax in Authentic Academic Texts. Workshop session at Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages Conference (TESOL 2016). Baltimore, Maryland.

Hughes, M.E. & Latham Keh, M. (2015, September). Instructing Complex Syntax in Authentic Academic Texts. Invited workshop presented for K-8 ELL specialists in the Public Schools of Brookline. Brookline, Massachusetts.

Latham Keh, M. & Hughes, M.E. (2015, June). Identifying and Instructing Language Forms in Content Area Texts. Workshop presented at the annual meeting of the Massachusetts Educators of English Language Learners 2015 Conference (MATSOL). Framingham, Massachusetts.

Hughes, M.E., & Allen, S. (2014, July). An investigation into the relative strength of six discourse-pragmatic features in the acquisition and use of referential forms in child English. Paper presented at the Thirteenth Congress of the International Association for the Study of Child Language (IASCL), Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Sullivan, G. & Hughes, M.E. (2012, June). Te Reo Māori language revitalization: Examining criteria to evaluate minority language vitality. Paper presented at the Fourth Annual Meeting of the Native American & Indigenous Studies Association (NAISA), Montville, Connecticut.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2011, July). Competing Constraints: A Comparison of Grammatical and Discourse Pragmatic Accounts in the Acquisition of Referential Choice. Poster presented at the Twelfth Congress of the International Association for the Study of Child Language (IASCL), Montreal, Quebec.

Allen, S.E.M. & Hughes, M.E. (2011, May). The incremental effect of discourse-pragmatic sensitivity in subject omission in child English. Paper presented at the International Conference on Cognitive Science, Tehran, Iran.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2011, April). A comparison of discourse-pragmatic and grammatical accounts: The combined effects of accessibility and verb finiteness on the acquisition of referential choice. Poster presented at the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD) Biennial Meeting, Denver, Colorado.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2010, November). Competing constraints in the acquisition of referential choice: A comparison of grammatical and discourse-pragmatic accounts. Paper presented at the Conference on Competing Motivations at the Max Plank Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2010, November). The contribution of grammatical and discourse-pragmatic effects to the acquisition of referential choice in English. Poster presented at the 35th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD), Boston, Massachusetts.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2009, April). The effect of discourse-pragmatics on the development of referential choice in English. Paper presented at the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD) Biennial Meeting, Denver, Colorado.

Skarabela, B., Hughes, M.E., & Allen, S. (2008, July). Developmental effects of discourse-pragmatics and social cognition on argument realization: A comparison of child English and child Inuktitut. Paper presented at the Eleventh Congress of the International Association for the Study of Child Language (IASCL), Edinburgh, Scotland.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2008, July). Child-directed speech and the development of referential choice in child English. Poster presented at the Eleventh Congress of the International Association for the Study of Child Language (IASCL), Edinburgh, Scotland.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2007, November). A developmental study of referential choice in child English. Paper presented at the 32nd Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD), Boston, Massachusetts.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2005, November). A discourse-pragmatic analysis of subject omission in child English. Paper presented at the 30th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD), Boston, Massachusetts.

Hughes, M.E. & Allen, S. (2005, July). A discourse-pragmatic account of argument omission in early child English. Paper presented at the Tenth Congress of the International Association for the Study of Child Language (IASCL), Berlin, Germany.