Professor Elena Semino
Distinguished ProfessorCurrent Teaching
LING 102: English Language
LING 103: Linguistics
LING 210: Stylistics
LING 450: Stylistics
LING 557: Corpus-based Discourse Analysis
Career Details
Director of the ESRC Centre for Corpus Approaches to Social Science.
Visiting Professor at Fuzhou University (China) and La Sapienza University (Rome, Italy).
Fellow of the RSA and the Academy of Social Sciences.
Associate Editor of the journal Metaphor and Symbol.
Member and current lead of the International Consortium for Communication in Health Care.
Former Head of the Department of Linguistics and English Language at Lancaster: 2011-14 and 2015-18.
Research Overview
My research interests are in health communication, medical humanities, stylistics, and metaphor theory and analysis. In my work I combine qualitative analysis with corpus linguistic methods.
Health communication/medical humanities: representations of autism and mental illness in fictional and non-fictional narratives; metaphor, cancer and the end of life; (figurative) language, creativity and chronic pain; metaphors for Covid-19; discourses around vaccinations.
Stylistics: cognitive stylistics; corpus stylistics; mind style in 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.
Research Interests
My research interests are reflected in my recent and current funded projects.
As Director of the ESRC Centre for Corpus Approaches to Social Science (CASS) I apply corpus methods to the study of communication about pain and of first-person accounts of the experience of voice-hearing (the latter in collaboration with Hearing the Voice at Durham University).
I have a long-standing interest in the use of metaphor in communication about cancer. From 2012 to 2014, I was Principal Investigator on the ESRC-funded project Metaphor, Cancer and the End of Life. I currently lead the strand on metaphor and cancer within the EU-funded project 4D Picture, which aims to help cancer patients, their families, and healthcare providers better understand their options.
Since 2021, I have worked on discourses around vaccinations, particularly online, as Principal Investigator of the ESRC-funded project: 'Questioning Vaccination Discourse: A Corpus-based Study' (Quo VaDis).
I am responsible as Co-Investigator for the linguistic strands of the following projects:
‘Improving peer online forums’, funded by the NIHR and led by Fiona Lobban (Lancaster)
‘The future of human reproduction’, funded by Wellcome and led by Stephen Wilkinson (Lancaster).
‘Interventions for better life-time mental health outcomes for young Australians with disability’, funded by the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council and led by Anne Kavanagh (Melbourne)
PhD Supervision Interests
Metaphor in discourse: study of metaphor in literature, politics, science and health communication; corpus-based approaches to the study of metaphor. Health communication/Medical Humanities: language use in communication about health and illness, including particularly metaphors and narratives. 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.
Young people, criticality and figurative language
01/10/2024 → 31/03/2027
Research
CASS Legacy funding
01/06/2024 → 31/05/2029
Research
DSI: Horizon Europe: 4D PICTURE: Design-based Data-Driven Decision-support Tools: Producing Improved Cancer Outcomes Through User- Centred Research
01/10/2022 → 30/09/2027
Research
A discourse analysis on public attitudes to rape and serious sexual offences (RASSO)
01/09/2022 → 31/12/2024
Research
DDPO DISCOURSE ANALYSIS PROJECT
01/07/2022 → 31/12/2024
Research
The Future of Human Reproduction: new agendas and methods for the Humanities and Social Sciences
22/04/2022 → 22/07/2025
Research
Interventions for better life-time mental health outcomes for young Australians (15-24 years) with disability
01/04/2022 → 31/03/2027
Research
DSI: Realist evaluation of online mental health communities to improve policy and practice
01/03/2022 → 30/06/2025
Research
Representations of ‘heart failure’ in English discourse
15/11/2021 → 20/12/2021
Research
Questioning Vaccination Discourse (Quo VaDis): A corpus-based study
01/03/2021 → 30/06/2024
Research
Social media discourse analysis – attitudes to young people’s mental health
01/02/2021 → 30/04/2021
Research
Corpus Analysis of Sellafield Employee Forum and Interviews
18/01/2021 → 31/03/2021
Research
Representations of 'race', racism and race equality in the UK press
10/02/2020 → 15/04/2020
Research
Representations of Social Care in the Politicians’ and General Public’s Discourse
15/11/2019 → 31/01/2020
Research
Representations of Social Care in the UK press: A Computer-aided Linguistic Study
01/05/2019 → 31/08/2019
Research
The psychological validity of non-adjacent collocations: Evidence from event-related brain potentials
01/04/2019 → 31/03/2020
Research
Linguistic challenges of the transition from primary to secondary school
01/09/2018 → 30/04/2021
Research
CASS ESRC Transition Funding
01/04/2018 → 31/01/2024
Research
Representations of social care in the UK press: A pilot study
01/04/2018 → 31/05/2018
Research
Lancaster University Business Plan – ESRC Business Boost Fund
01/02/2018 → 31/03/2019
Research
Big data media analysis and the representation of urban violence in Brazil
01/01/2015 → 31/12/2015
Research
Translating science for young people
14/11/2014 → 14/07/2016
Research
ESRC centre for Corpus Approaches to Social Science - CASS
31/03/2013 → 30/03/2018
Research
Metaphor in End of Life Care
01/09/2012 → 28/06/2014
Research
Using a semantic annotation tool for research on metaphor in discourse
01/12/2005 → …
Research
LAEL-China Network
01/01/1900 → …
Other
Evolving accents: Unravelling the mysteries of sound change
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
The science of multilingualism
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
The shared anti-science discourses
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Fabulosa! A brief history of Polari, the lost language of camp
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Vaccination is a huge global health success, so why do people hesitate?
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Panel event for International Consortium for Communication in Health Care series
Invited talk
Communication about vaccinations: What can linguistic analysis reveal?
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Narratives, information and persuasion in online discussions of HPV vaccination
Invited talk
More Than Words:using Languages expertise to support government thinking
Invited talk
Metaphor, illness and the end of life
Invited talk
Vaccination Discourse Seminar
Invited talk
Metaphor, and why it matters
Invited talk
Understanding carers’ perspectives of supporting friends and family members who have experienced suicidal behaviour
Oral presentation
A corpus of Victorian anti-vaccination discourse.
Invited talk
Talk at 3rd International Conference on Historical Medical Discourse
Invited talk
Pain: why and how language matters
Invited talk
Metaphors and Covid-19
Invited talk
DDPO DISCOURSE ANALYSIS PROJECT
Consultancy
Representations of rape and serious sexual offences in the press and on Twitter
Consultancy
Talking health online: Why it matters and what linguistics can contribute
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
A corpus-based study of representations of social care during the 2019 UK General Election campaign
Oral presentation
A corpus linguistic approach to the evaluation of medication safety oversight programs in the United States
Oral presentation
Social care in the UK press: A corpus-based study in collaboration with third-sector organisations
Oral presentation
Poetics and Linguistics Association Conference
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
4th International Cognitive Poetics Conference
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Keynote lecture on 'Metaphor and Narrative in Health Communication' at 4th Conference of the European Narrative Network
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
ESRC (External organisation)
Membership of committee
Talk on 'Corpus Linguistics and Health Communication' at Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Invited talk
Lectures in Stylistics and in Health Communication at Fuzhou University, China
Invited talk
Plenary lecture 'Metaphor and Framing in Discourse' at UK Cognitive Linguistics Conference
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Talk on 'Corpus Linguistics and Health Communication' at Georgetown University
Invited talk
Talk on 'Metaphor in End of Life Care' at Sheffield Hallam University
Invited talk
Talk on 'Metaphor in End of Life Care' at Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Invited talk
Talk on Metaphor in End of Life Care at the University of Glasgow
Invited talk
Plenary lecture at symposium on 'The Creating Mind: Interdisciplinary Perspectives', Bar-Ilan University
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Talk on 'Metaphor, creativity and reconceptualisation across genres' at An-Najah National University (West Bank)
Invited talk
Plenary lecture at Cognitive Poetics Symposium in Helsinki
Invited talk
Keynote lecture at 2013 Metaphor Festival in Stockholm
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Invited talks on language and pain at the UK Trigeminal Neuralgia Association Conference
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Plenary lecture at 'Cognitive Futures of the Humanities' Conference: Reading Minds that can't Mindread
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Talk on 'A linguistic perspective on the McGill pain questionnaire', at London's Eastman Dental Hospital
Invited talk
Lectures in Stylistics at Fuzhou University in China
Invited talk
Lecture at 'Pragma-stylistics' Colloquium, University of Sussex
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Talk on 'Metaphor, creativity and reconceptualization in communication about illness', University of Uppsala
Invited talk
Talk on 'Metaphor, creativity and reconceptualisation', University of East Anglia
Invited talk
- DisTex - Discourse and Text Research Group
- ESRC Centre for Corpus Approaches to Social Science
- FASS Health Hub
- Institute for Social Futures Fellow
- ISF Fellows 2019/20
- Research Group in Cognitive Linguistics
- UCREL - University Centre for Computer Corpus Research on Language