Dr Ursula Lanvers

Profile

Biography

I am Programme Leader for the PhD Programme in Applied Linguistics (offered jointly by the Department of Education and the Department of Language and Linguistics).

I teach a variety of core and option modules on the MA in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages, as well as Undergraduate modules.

I joined the Department on 1 October 2015 as a lecturer in language education.

Before this, I taught languages and a variety of linguistics courses at the Open University for eight years, specialising on developing distance language learning materials for German in particular.

I have also worked at the University of Plymouth and University of Exeter as a research fellow in student learning, and taught language modules at the University of Exeter and Durham.

I completed my PhD at the University of Exeter in Bilingual First Language Acquisition in 1999. I completed my first degree in French, History and Education Studies at the University of Munster, Germany, in 1990. I completed my PGCE (Modern Languages) at the University of Oxford in 1993.

Research

Overview

I have three main research interests:

• Language education policy
• Motivation and attitude in language learning
• The psychology of language learning (motivation, attitude, identity, affect)
• Global English and its effect on language learning language (both in Anglophone countries and beyond)

My research takes me into schools (secondary and primary), but also engages learners in different settings.

I use both qualitative and quantitative methods, including questionnaires, interviews and focus groups, and prefer using mixed methods in most research projects.

Projects

During 2022-23, I am working on the following projects:

• Language policies in Ukrainian Higher Education: between Ukrainisation and Westernisation
  This project is supported by the British Academy.
• Language policies and rationales for learning LOTE in the age of Global English: a reconceptualization
• Second language learning policies in the European Union: all second languages are equal-or not?
• Developing curricula and rationales for Linguistics in MFL A level
• This project is supported by the Linguistics in MFL project

Research group(s)

• Centre for Advanced Studies in Language and Education (CASLE)

Collaborators

I collaborate with a large number of Applied Linguists both nationally and internationally - see my research outputs.

Supervision

I supervise a number of MA students annually.

Postgraduate supervision

• I currently supervise 3 PhD students on the topics of language education policy, EMI and task-based learning
• I have ONE vacancy for a PhD starting October 2023, on the topic of language education policy

External activities

Memberships

• I am an elected member of CliE
• I am a member of BAAL the British Association of Applied Linguistics and a member of their Special Interest Group: Language Learning and Teaching
• I am a reviewer for a number of Academic Journal including Modern Language Journal, Applied Linguistics, Language Learning Journal, System, International Journal of Bilingualism, Educational Psychology
• I regularly examine PhD and EdD theses externally and internally