I am Professor of English Linguistics in the Department of English at Stockholm University. Over the last two decades, my research has focused on academic discourse analysis and explored how English is used across various disciplines in multilingual university settings. I am currently collaborating in the ReMoDEL project funded by the Swedish Research Council. This project investigates the dynamic nature of students’ comprehension in university lectures where English is used as the language of instruction.
In Fall 2021, I was an Erik Allardt Fellow at HCAS. During that period, the Collegium’s “freedom to think” motto materialized into a real experience, as I had time to reflect and develop my thinking. For example, my research explores connections between disciplinary knowledge structures and language use, and HCAS provided an ideal environment to engage in cross-disciplinary discussions during our weekly seminars. It was an honour to be invited to participate in a panel at the HCAS 20th Anniversary conference and to discuss my research with leading scholars from different parts of the globe. This intellectually stimulating experience has been crucial in shaping my ideas and informing my current research.
Writing is my true passion. In practical terms, the fellowship enabled me to complete the first draft of my monograph Tension-filled English at the multilingual university: A Bakhtinian perspective (2023, Multilingual Matters) and to develop a proposal for the edited volume Dynamics of multilingualism: Spatialised repertoires and representation (2024, Palgrave Macmillan; with Caroline Kerfoot). Through my affiliation with HCAS, I also enjoyed experimenting with different styles and made contributions to the HCAS blog and Collegium talks at the Think Corner. As I look back, I realize that my time at the Collegium was one of the most enjoyable and formative periods in my career.
I am professor of media studies at the University of Turku and PI of the Strategic Research Council consortium, Intimacy in Data-Driven Culture (2019–2025). I work at the intersection of digital media research, critical sexuality studies, and affect inquiry.
My tenure as collegium researcher in 2007–2010 was crucial for me finding my academic voice and basically having the space and time to focus on conceptual thinking in ways that I found impossible to combine with my previous teaching job. My project was on online pornography and feminist tactics of reading and led to Carnal Resonance: Affect and Online Pornography (MIT Press 2011) that in some ways established me in the then emergent field of porn studies. This may also have been when I discovered by love for the format of an academic monograph.
HCAS in many ways felt like an oasis. After my introductory tour I described the experience as straight out of science fiction in this being too perfect a professional set-up to actually exist. Yet it did. Over a decade later, I continue to treasure the collegial friendships formed during those three years and consider it probably the most enjoyable period of my academic life.