Keynote Speakers

Get to know more about the speakers of the 11th Explorations in Ethnography, Language and Communication (EELC) Conference.
Leah Sprain, University of Colorado Boulder, USA

Leah Sprain is an Associate Professor in the CU Department of Communication where she directs the Center for Communication and Democratic Engagement. Her research program draws on ethnography of communication and discourse analysis to focus on democratic engagement, studying how specific communication practices facilitate and inhibit democratic action. 

Hanna Maarit (Hanna-Máret) Outakoski, Sámi University of Applied Sciences, Norway

Hanna Maarit (Hanna-Máret) Outakoski is Professor of Sámi Language and Didactics at the Sámi University of Applied Sciences, Norway. Her research addresses endangered Sámi languages, multilingualism, literacy in Sápmi, Indigenous writing pedagogy, e-learning, and the relationships between learning contexts, content, and language in education, including teacher education and digital learning environments.

Sari Pietikäinen, University of Jyväskylä, Finland

Sari Pietikäinen is Professor of Discourse Studies at the University of Jyväskylä. She is an interdisciplinary scholar working at the nexus of Discourse Studies, Sociolinguistics, Anthropology, and Environmental Humanities and Social Sciences. Her research interests include critical assemblage analysis of climate change and multispecies interaction in the Arctic, the power of discourse in revaluing natural resources, and the politics of language and identity in unequal multilingual situations. Pietikäinen has led several international research projects examining shifts in ecological, political, and cultural discourses and practices in the heating Arctic. Her recent book is Cold Rush: A Critical Assemblage Analysis of a Heating Arctic (2024, Palgrave Macmillan).

Ben Rampton, King's College London, UK

Ben Rampton is Professor of Applied & Sociolinguistics at King's College London.  He does interactional sociolinguistics and linguistic ethnography, and his interests cover urban multilingualism, youth, ethnicity & social class, conflict & (in)securitization, and language education policy & practice.  He was founding convener of the Linguistic Ethnography Forum,  currently co-convenes , and is regularly involved in adult ESOL teaching.