Background

In my early career I taught English as a Second Language in Britain and in the Philippines, and since 1983 I have taught English Language and Applied Linguistics at undergraduate and postgraduate levels in a number of institutions. Before coming to the University of Birmingham I worked at the National University of Singapore and the University of Surrey; I also worked on the Cobuild project.

Teaching

I teach in various areas of Discourse Analysis and Corpus Linguistics.

Research

My research focuses on two areas: Corpus linguistics, especially the interface between lexis and grammar, phraseology, and the contribution of corpus linguistics to Applied Linguistics and to discourse studies; and Discourse Analysis, in particular the study of the evaluation and the analysis of written academic English.

Research groups

I am a member of the Corpus Linguistics research group in the Department of English; I am also an active member of the Collaborative Research Network in Human Communication in the University of Birmingham.

Conferences

I help to organise the Corpus Linguistics conferences in Birmingham, held in 2005 and 2007. I have been an invited or plenary speaker at a number of conferences in Italy, Germany, Lebanon, Korea, Taiwan and the US as well as in Britain.

I regularly supervise Mphil and PhD research in the following areas::

• Corpus-based approaches to the study of the discourse of academic disciplines
• Applications of corpus studies to language learning and language teaching
• Corpus and non-corpus based studies of media or other types of discourse
• I particularly welcome applications from research students interested in stance/evaluation and in grammar patterns

Other activities

I am currently Chair of the British Association for Applied Linguistics, and co-editor of the Cambridge Applied Linguistics Series.

Selected publications

Books

• 1999 Pattern Grammar: a corpus-driven approach to the lexical grammar of English. Benjamins. (with G. Francis)
• 2000 Evaluation in Text: authorial stance and the construction of discourse. Oxford University Press. (edited, with G. Thompson)
• 2002 Corpora in Applied Linguistics. Cambridge University Press
• 2006. System and Corpus: Exploring connections. Equinox. (edited, with G. Thompson)

Recent papers

• 2002 ‘Pattern grammar, language teaching, and linguistic variation: applications of a corpus-driven grammar' in Reppen, Biber and Fitzmaurice (eds.) Using Corpora to Explore Linguistic Variation. Benjamins
• 2003 ‘Lexis, wordform and complementation pattern: a corpus study' Functions of Language 10: 31-60
• 2003 ‘Frame, phrase or function: a comparison of frame semantics and local grammar' in Archer, Rayson, Wilson and McEnery (eds.) Corpus Linguistics 2003. Lancaster University. CD-ROM
• 2004 ‘Counting the uncountable: problems of identifying evaluation in a text and in a corpus' in Partington, Morley and Haarman (eds.) Corpora and Discourse. Peter Lang. 157-188
• 2004 ‘ “It has rightly been pointed out…”: Attribution, consensus and conflict in academic English' in Bondi, Gavioli and Silver (eds.) Academic Discourse, Genre and Small Corpora. Rome: Officina Edizioni. 15-33
• 2004 ‘The corpus, grammar patterns, and lexicography' Lexicographica 20: 99-112
• 2004 ‘The automatic recognition of verb patterns: a feasibility study' International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 9: 253-270. (with Oliver Mason)
• 2006 ‘Conflict and consensus: construing opposition in Applied Linguistics' in Tognini-Bonelli and Del lungo Camiciotti (eds.) Strategies in Academic Discourse. Amsterdam: Benjamins. 1-16
• 2006. ‘Phraseology and system: a contribution to the debate' in Thompson and Hunston (eds.) System and Corpus: exploring connections. Equinox. 55-80
• 2006. ‘Introduction' in Thompson and Hunston (eds.) System and Corpus: exploring connections. Equinox. With G. Thompson. 1-14
• 2006. ‘Truth and lies: the construction of factuality in a television documentary' in Caldas-Coulthard and Toolan (eds.) The Writer's Craft, the Culture's Technology. 181-194
• 2007. ‘Grammar patterns and literacy' in McCabe, Anne, O'Donnell, Mick, & Whittaker, Rachel (eds). Advances in Language and Education. London : Continuum. 254-267
• 2007. ‘Semantic Prosody Revisited'. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 12,2: 249-268
• 2007. ‘Using a corpus to investigate stance quantitatively and qualitatively’. in Englebretson (ed.) Stancetaking in Discourse. Benjamins. 27-48.
• In press. ‘Collection strategies and design decisions'. Handbook of Corpus Linguistics (Mouton de Gruyter)
• 2008. Starting with the small words: Patterns, lexis and semantic sequences. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 13: 271-295.
• 2008. The evaluation of status in multi-modal speech. Functions of Language 15: 64-83.

Encyclopedia entries

1. 2006. ‘Evaluation' (with Geoff Thompson). The Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics 2nd edition. Elsevier
2. 2006. ‘Corpus linguistics'. The Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics 2nd edition. Elsevier