Research projects
English in Taiwan: Form and functions
This DFG-funded project, jointly led with Sofia Rüdiger (Bayreuth) investigates the English found in Taiwan. Specifically, we're interested in compiling a first corpus of spoken Taiwanese English. The present funding period is a pilot study that collected data from 22 participants. The focus lies primarily on morphosyntactic features.
Language attitudes and language repertoires in the United Arab Emirates (LARES)
This project, funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), is lead jointly with Peter Siemund (Hamburg) and Ahmad Al-Issa (American University Sharjah). It considers the hitherto understudied linguistic ecology of the Dubai-Sharjah-Ajman metropolitan area. In the UAE, citizens make up just 15% of the population, with the remainder being transitory migrants from a wide variety of geographical, social, and linguistic backgrounds. As a result of this diversity, English has risen to the role of an undisputed lingua franca, used by locals and foreigners alike in a wide range of settings. The project is explorative in nature and aims at collecting information on language attitudes and language repertoires from around 600 informants, with another 100 recorded for further structural analysis. Data collection started in March 2019.
Output: one article, several conference papers.
Language policy and attitudes in Quebec (LPAQ)
A component of the habilitation project "Language planning and policy in Quebec: A comparative perspective". Funded by an EU Marie Curie Actions International Outgoing Fellowship (327100 LPAQ) for the period September 2013 to August 2015, it focusses on the interaction, in the québécois context, between language policy measures (typically concerned with safeguarding the status of French as the main language in as many domains as possible, which translates into restrictions on the use of English, e.g. in the education system) and actual language use by young Québécois/Quebeckers. A pilot phase of the fieldwork took place in Montreal in September 2012, gathering data from Anglophones, Francophones, and Allophones (i.e. speakers of languages other than English, French, and Aboriginal languages). The project investigates linguistic repertoires and attitudes towards languages and policies, which are expected to give a picture of the policy–use interaction.
Output: Habilitation thesis, several conference papers and articles (see publications for more details).
How multilingual are Singaporeans really? Language repertoires in Singapore’s vocational training schools
Led jointly with Peter Siemund (Hamburg) and funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG, LE3136/2-1), this project, to begin in late 2015, is a follow-up study of Siemund et al (2014), which gathered linguistic and sociological information from 300 Singaporean university and polytechnic students and was the first larger-scale survey to take a sociolinguistic approach. It included an examination of speaker attitudes towards the varieties spoken in Singapore, as well as towards the various government language policies in place. The present project seeks to enhance the validity of this study by extending the informant base beyond university and polytechnic students, to include students of the Institute of Technical Education (ITE). By doing so, it is argued that a more representative cross-section of the population would be mobilised to further inform our understanding of the language dynamics in the city-state. Specific differences expected among ITE students include a larger array of language profiles, with a more multilingual repertoire, as well as a more balanced ethnic sample, resulting in turn in more Malay and Indian languages. While general attitudes towards languages and policies are not expected to differ greatly from those gathered among university and polytechnic students, it is expected that non-official languages enjoy greater vitality in the ITE sample.
Output: one article, several conference papers.
Measuring 'viewing' in linguistic landscapes with eye-tracking methods
Linguistic landscapes, the visible manifestation of language in public space (eg billboards, traffic signs, etc), have received increasing attention in the past few decades. Initiated together with Debra Titone (McGill), this project attempts to capture the way in which people read naturalistic linguistic landscape (LL) signs, particularly multilingual ones, with the help of methods from the eye movement toolkit. In a first study, bilingual Anglophones and Francophones from Montreal were presented with bilingual signage, and their eye movements are being tracked to investigate gaze and fixation patterns, with a view to find tendencies with respect to L1 and language placement on the sign.
Output: several conference papers, one article, one chapter.
Imperfectives in Indian Singapore English
A joint projcet with Lavanya Sankaran (QMUL), focussing on the use of -ing-constructions in Singapore English, with special emphasis on how the Indian community uses it. Preliminary results from fieldwork carried out in 2011 suggests that Indians (Tamil speakers) are more likely to judge as grammatical non-delimited habituals inflected with -ing than the other ethnic groups. Ongoing research is trying to capture this in more detail, with a larger sample.
Output: one poster at ISLE 2011 in Boston, one book chapter.
Variation in Singapore English
My DPhil project, which I never fully left behind. I'm interested in the way language variation (both between English and Singlish but also between the various official and non-official languages) in Singapore is dealt with, in terms of language planning and policy, linguistic landscaping, language attitudes, and generally in how the various groups of speakers interact in daily life.
Output: DPhil thesis, one monograph and several articles.
Indexicality and authenticity
A topic that grew out of the DPhil research. I'm curious about how linguistic variation (in its traditional sense) can be used as a resource in 'creating' (ie indexing) authenticity, and how this ostensible authenticity is perceived in interaction. Implementing this in multilingual settings is an additional challenging area I want to venture into.
Output: a conference on 'Indexing authenticity', with an edited volume containing its papers.