Prof Susan Lacey.

Wednesday, 22 March, 10.00

Metaphor identification and its application to real-world discourse.
by
Prof Susan Nacey, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences (INN)

Wednesday, 22 March, 10.00, on MS Teams (Click here to join the meeting)

Abstract: Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980) observation that metaphor is a central aspect of our daily lives, both in metaphor and thought, sparked off a ‘metaphormania’ in the fields of psychology, linguistics, philosophy, and other disciplines.  This growing interest in metaphor has - especially in recent years - led to a focus on increased methodological rigor when it comes to metaphor identification, in the goal of producing reliable, replicable and theoretically valid research.

This talk introduces the Metaphor Identification Procedure Vrije Universiteit (MIPVU), the protocol that currently offers the most thorough and well-tested guidelines for the manual identification of linguistic metaphor (see Steen et al., 2010; Nacey et al., 2019).  After a brief introduction to the procedure, the talk moves on to discuss three recent projects involving various ways of applying the results of MIPVU analysis to different types of real-world discourse:

  1. Metaphors about relationship abuse, investigating metaphorical analogies in an online discussion forum for abuse survivors (Nacey, 2020);
  2. Learner translation of metaphor, exploring metaphor translation strategies of student translators (Nacey & Skogmo, 2021);
  3. Metaphors about the doctoral education trajectory, analyzing linguistic metaphors in doctoral dissertation acknowledgments (Nacey, 2022).

(references available on request)

Bio: Susan Nacey is a professor of linguistics and currently Vice Dean for Research at the Faculty of Education at Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences. She researches metaphor and other features in a wide variety of text types in English and Norwegian, especially in written and spoken learner language. She is the author of ‘Metaphors in learner English’ (John Benjamins, 2013) and the co-editor of ‘Metaphor identification in multiple languages: MIPVU around the world’ (John Benjamins, 2019). More here: Susan Nacey - Metaphor Matters (inn.no).

 

 

Dr Robbie Love

Wednesday, 29 March, 10.00

Corpora and the study of variation and change in contemporary spoken English
by
Dr Robbie Love, Aston University,UK

Wednesday, 29 March, 10.00, on MS Teams (Click here to join the meeting)

Abstract: This webinar will discuss some of the applications of corpus methods for the analysis of casual conversation, drawing on recent examples from my own research into social and regional variation and change in contemporary British English, including topics such as swearing and subject-verb agreement. 

Bio: Dr Robbie Love is Lecturer in English Language in the School of Social Sciences and Humanities at Aston University. He has research interests in the application of corpus linguistics and discourse analysis to the study of contemporary English in contexts including casual conversation and public communications. He has published research on linguistic topics including swearing, modality and adverbs as well as research on methodological issues including corpus compilation and transcription. He is the author of “Overcoming Challenges in Corpus Construction: The Spoken British National Corpus 2014” (Routledge, 2020), co-editor of “Applications of Corpus Linguistics” (Cambridge, forthcoming) and host of the corpus linguistics podcast CorpusCast.

Prof Olcay Sert

Wednesday, 12 April, 13.00

Classroom Discourse in TESOL: From practice-based research to research-based teaching and teacher education
by
Prof Olcay Sert, Mälardalen University, Sweden.

Wednesday, 12 April, 13.00, on MS Teams (Click here to join the meeting)

Abstract: In this webinar, based on years of research into language classrooms in Luxembourg, Sweden, and Turkey, I will demonstrate the interactional dynamics of TESOL classrooms. I will argue that findings based on micro-analytic investigations into language classroom interaction will lead the way to research-based teaching, teacher education, and teacher development. 

Bio: Olcay Sert is Professor of English Language Education at Mälardalen University and the editor of Classroom Discourse, an international, peer reviewed journal published by Routledge. He leads the Mälardalen Interaction and Didactics (MIND) Research Group and the SOLD Research environment at Mälardalen University. His research deals with classroom discourse, L2 interaction, and language teacher education.