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I am a professor of English as a second/foreign language (an American ex-pat), and currently work as the Vice Dean for Research at the Faculty of Education in Hamar/Lillehammer. This is part of Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences (formerly Hedmark University of Applied Sciences).
My research interests include metaphor and learner language, with a focus on Norwegian L2 English, as well as L2 Norwegian. I published a monograph entitled ‘ Metaphors in Learner English‘ in 2013, dealing with metaphors produced in the written English of Norwegian students, as well as methodological issues concerning the Metaphor Identification Procedure (MIPVU). I was also responsible for collecting the Norwegian version of the LINDSEI corpus (spoken learner English). The interviews and transcriptions are now completed and have been sent to Louvain to be included in the second edition of LINDSEI. I have carried out some preliminary research on the data on communication strategies, prepositions, and phrasal verbs. Among other things, I am currently involved in a project exploring learner translations of metaphor (L1 Norwegian to L2 English translations). I am also a collaborator in the MetCLIL project led by researchers at the University of Extremadura (Spain), investigating the role of metaphor in university-level seminars where English is used as a medium of instruction.
I am also interested in the ‘language of betrayal’, metaphors produced by survivors of relationship abuse when they discuss their experiences in an online discussion forum. I have also been involved in the compilation of the TraWL corpus (Tracking Written Learner Language), a longitudinal corpus of English texts written by Norwegian pupils aged 10 – 19. In addition, I research metaphor in other types of discourse, such as career guidance videos, American church marquees, etc. Although most of my work has focused on English, I have also researcher metaphor in other languages: i.e. metaphors in the New Year’s Eve speeches of the Norwegian king and Danish queen, and metaphors written by L2 learners of Norwegian, from texts collected in the Norwegian Second Language Corpus.etc. Further, methodological issues connected to metaphor research are a concern of mine, especially (linguistic) metaphor identification and valid statistical analysis. Together with A.G. Dorst, T. Krennmayr, and W.G. Reijnierse, I edited a volume entitled “ Metaphor identification in multiple languages: MIPVU around the world” (Benjamins, 2019).
I am the review editor of the scientific journal “Metaphor and the Social World“, published by John Benjamins. I am also currently a co-editor of this journal, together with Alice Deignan and Dennis Tay. I am an associate editor of “Metaphor and Symbol“.
My work is registered in the Current Research Information System in Norway (Cristin): here.
I am a member of INN University’s research group ‘English Language in Use’ (ELiU). Read here to find out what EliU does (or here if you understand Norwegian).
You can reach me at susan.nacey@inn.no.