PROVO, Utah (May 19, 2020) — Professor Jeffrey Turley has been reappointed as department chair for the Department of Spanish & Portuguese. Turley has served in this capacity since May 2017 and will continue serving for another term in this position.
Turley completed both his BA and MA in Spanish linguistics at BYU, and has taught at BYU since 1989 after receiving his PhD in Romance Philology from UC Berkeley. Turley’s research includes Romance lexicography, historical morphosyntax (especially the pronoun system), and early-modern Iberian texts, especially those related to colonial expansion.
Turley teaches the gamut of Spanish linguistics courses: introduction to Spanish linguistics, phonetics, contrastive English-Spanish linguistics, history of the Spanish language, syntactic theory, semantics, Romance Philology, and third- and fourth-year grammar.
Turley also enjoys playing classical and jazz piano and organ. He is married to Susan M. Quebbeman, with whom he loves to explore the beautiful mountains, canyons, and deserts of Utah.
Dean J. Scott Miller remarked, “Jeff is a wise and compassionate leader who garners the respect and devotion of his colleagues. I am grateful he is willing to continue his service and look forward to the strength he brings to the position.”
— Sage W. Brown (’20, Public Health)