University Of Birmingham

Faculty Member, English

College of Arts and Law

About

My research is driven by a keen interest in the connections between social processes and language in use – from face-to-face interactions to the laws which prescribe educational policy. Since this requires knowledge both of ways of analysing language and ways of explaining the social world, I collaborate in my research with social scientists, and have found realist social theory the most useful perspective from which to approach a wide range of applied linguistic issues. This is because it has the advantage of distinguishing between structure, culture and agency, and thus allowing analysis of the interplay between them. While language is central to social life, the social world cannot be reduced to a discursive construction, and my current research explores various links between discourse and society, including through the use of corpus linguistic methods. I have also published research in language planning policy and practice, and in the potential of corpus methods for the development of language awareness, particularly with younger learners.

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