Dr Joanne Close
Deputy Head of Department
I am Senior Lecturer in English Language, Programme Leader for the BA English Language Combined Honours degree and Deputy Head of English. I joined the Department of English as Lecturer in English Language in September 2011. Prior to this I was Teaching Fellow at the University of Leeds and Research Fellow at University College London.
I completed a PhD on the syntax of the English auxiliary system in non-standard varieties of English at the University of York in 2005.
I have taught on a range of English Language and Linguistics courses, including research-led modules on dialect syntax, corpus linguistics and change in contemporary English.
I currently teach on and/or convene:
- EN4305 Foundations of English
- EN5316 Advances in English
- EN6308 Corpus Linguistics
- EN6310 Dissertation (English Language)
- EN6311 Topics in Syntax
- EN7401 Descriptive Grammar and Phonetics
- EN7402 Approaches to Discourse Analysis
- EN7404 Research Methods in English Language and Linguistics
- EN7405 Dissertation
- EN7407 Contemporary Issues in English Language and Linguistics
Postgraduate supervision
I am currently supervising a dissertation (MA) on corpus-based approaches to discourse analysis. I have previously supervised dissertations on corpus stylistics (MA), the acquisition of Polish inflections (MRes), and a corpus analysis of Trump’s speeches (MRes).
I welcome enquiries about research projects on:
- English grammar
- Linguistic change
- Corpus Linguistics
My main research interests are in syntactic theory, the syntax of English dialects, the English auxiliary system, corpus linguistics and language change, particularly the changes taking place in present-day English.
From November 2007 to August 2009, I was Research Fellow on The changing verb phrase in present-day British English project based in the Survey of English Usage, UCL. In this project we conducted a large-scale investigation of changes in the (morpho)syntax of the spoken British English verb phrase over a period of twenty-five to thirty years (1960s-1990s) using the Diachronic Corpus of Present-Day Spoken English (DCPSE) compiled at UCL. I co-edited (with Bas Aarts, Geoffrey Leech and Sean Wallis) The Verb Phrase in English: Investigating Recent Language Change with Corpora which was published by Cambridge University Press in the Studies in English Language Series in spring 2013. A paper from the volume, ‘Choices over time: methodological issues in investigating current change’ (co-written with Bas Aarts and Sean Wallis) is to appear in abridged form in the second edition of Dan McIntyre’s History of English: A Resource Book for Students, due to be published by Routledge in late 2019/early 2020.
I have presented papers on change in contemporary English at ICEHL (the International Conference of English Historical Linguistics) and ISLE (the International Society for the Linguistics of English). I have published papers on changes in the English modal verbs and the progressive construction.
Recent chapters
‘Choices over time: methodological issues in investigating current change’ (2013) (with Bas Aarts and Sean Wallis). In: Aarts, Bas, Joanne Close, Geoffrey Leech and Sean Wallis (eds.) The Verb Phrase in English: Investigating Recent Language Change with Corpora. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
‘Recent changes in the use of the progressive construction in English’ (2010) (with Bas Aarts and Sean Wallis). In: Cappelle, Bert and Naoaki Wada (eds.) Distinctions in English Grammar. Offered to Renaat Declerck. Japan: Kaitakushu.
‘Current change in the modal system of English’ (2010) (with Bas Aarts). In Lenker, Ursula, Judith Huber and Robert Mailhammer. English Historical Linguistics 2008. Selected papers from the fifteenth international conference on English Historical Linguistics (ICEHL 15), Munich, 24—30 August 2008. Volume I: The history of English verbal and nominal constructions. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Recent conference papers
‘A diachronic study of have contractions in written American English’ (with Naomi Gradwell). Presented at Diachronic Corpora, Genre and Language Change, University of Nottingham, 8th April 2016.
'The stative possessive in present-day spoken British English'. Presented at ICAME 35, University of Nottingham, 3rd May 2014.
‘Recent changes in the modal system of English’. Invited talk at the Cambridge Historical Linguistics Workshop, University of Cambridge, March 2010.
‘Choices over time: Methodological issues in current change’ (with Bas Aarts and Sean Wallis, UCL). Presented at the symposium on Current Change in the English Verb Phrase at the Third International Conference on the Linguistics of Contemporary English (ICLCE 3), London, July 2009.
'The subjunctive in spoken British English' (with Bas Aarts, UCL). Presented at ICAME 30, Lancaster, 28 May 2009.
‘Changes in the use of the modals have to, have got to and must’ (with Bas Aarts, UCL). Presented at the International Conference for English Historical Linguistics (ICEHL) 15, Munich, August 2008.
'MUST and its rivals in the Diachronic Corpus of Present-Day Spoken English' (with Bas Aarts, UCL). Presented at the First Triennial Conference of the International Society for the Linguistics of English (ISLE), Freiburg, 8 October 2008.
- BA, PhD (York)
- PGC Learning and Teaching HE
- SFHEA