My research interests are in stylistics, metaphor theory and analysis, and the medical humanities.

Stylistics: cognitive stylistics; corpus stylistics; mind style in prose fiction.

Metaphor theory and analysis: metaphor in literature, politics, science, health communication, end-of-life care; metaphor and embodied simulation; corpus approaches to the study of metaphor.

Medical humanities: representations of autism and mental illness in fictional and non-fictional narratives; (figurative) language, creativity and chronic pain.

I am interested in supervising students in the following areas:
Metaphor in discourse: study of metaphor in literature, politics, science and health communication; corpus-based approaches to the study of metaphor.
Cognitive stylistics: integration of linguistic analysis with theories of cognition (e.g. Schema theory, Blending theory) in order to study literary texts; the linguistic construction of fictional text worlds; the linguistic construction of minds in fictional and non-fictional narratives.
Corpus stylistics: application of corpus methods to the study of literary texts.

LING 102: English Language

LING 210: Stylistics

LING 306: Corpus approaches to English Language

LING 450: Stylistics

I teach Stylistics on the MA in English Language by Distance and the PhD in Applied Linguistics by Thesis and Coursework.

Before joining the Department, I taught Italian as a foreign language at Napier Polytechnic (Edinburgh) and Lancaster University.

I hold a Visiting Professorship in the Faculty of Foreign Languages at Fuzhou University in China.

Stylistics - My work in stylistics focuses primarily on poetry and fictional and non-fictional narratives. I have a long-standing interest in 'mind style' - how distinctive fictional minds are linguistically constructed in novels. I am currently working on: the linguistic representation of autism in fiction; and the representation of the experience of schizophrenia in a non-fictional narrative, with Dr Zsófia Demjén (Open University).

Metaphor theory and analysis - I have worked on metaphor in literary texts and in a range of non-literary text-types, including political speeches, newspaper language, scientific communication and health communication. I was part of an international group of metaphor scholars who developed a methodology for the identification of metaphorical expressions in naturally-occurring language (see Pragglejaz Project ). I am currently working on: metaphor and the expression of chronic pain, in consultation with Prof Joanna Zakrzewska (Eastman Dental Hospital, London); and metaphor in end-of-life care, with funding from the ESRC: http://ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/melc/index.php

Medical humanities - I contribute to this broad interdisciplinary area with my research on narratives of autism and schizophrenia, and on metaphor in communication about health and illness.