Core team:

Dr. Jennifer (Jennie) Dailey-O’Cain
(University of Alberta)
Dr. Jennifer (Jennie) Dailey-O’Cain is a sociolinguist with a research focus on everyday language in use, but always with an eye toward how this use relates to broader social phenomena such as identity, ideology, and globalization. Her previous research has included projects on the perception of language variation in post-unification Germany, language use among migrants from western to eastern Germany, code-switching in the advanced foreign-language classroom, language, identity and space among German-Canadians, the use of transnational English in social media interaction by Dutch and German youth, and multimodal interaction. She is currently Professor of German and Applied Linguistics in the Department of Modern Languages and Cultural Studies at the University of Alberta, in Canada.
University of Alberta profile page
Contact: jenniedo@ualberta.ca

Dr. Grit Liebscher
(University of Waterloo)
Dr. Grit Liebscher’s research in Applied Linguistics and sociolinguistics addresses questions of language and identity within and outside of the classroom context. In her book Language, Space and Identity in Migration (2013, co-authored with Jennifer Dailey-O’Cain), she discusses how German-Canadians use their multiple languages as resources, how forms of address can become markers of group identities, and how meaning is created through language that is saturated with historical contexts and ideologies. An ongoing project with Dr. Dailey-O’Cain is her interest in language attitudes in interaction, sparked by previous research, including language use among migrants from western to eastern Germany. In her research in classroom contexts, she has focused on the use of the first language in the second-language classroom, the use of “okay” to mark transitions in peer learner interactions, and trans-Atlantic telecollaborations. She is currently Professor of German in the Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies at the University of Waterloo, Canada.
University of Waterloo profile page
Contact: gliebsch@uwaterloo.ca

Richard Feddersen
(University of Alberta)
Richard Feddersen defended his Ph.D. dissertation in Applied Linguistics at the University of Alberta, in the Department of Modern Languages and Cultural Studies, in September 2023. He currently works as a German instructor in Germany. Prior to coming to the University of Alberta, he completed a Magister Artium at the University of Cologne in Germany, and worked for several years as a German instructor at the German Jordanian University and the Goethe-Institut Jordan. His research interests include sociolinguistics and second language acquisition, with particular focus on the concept of identity. His projects include studies of German identity construction in language textbooks and by learners of German.
Contact: fedderse@ualberta.ca

Cole Sutherland
(University of Waterloo)
Cole Sutherland is a Ph.D. student in German Studies at the University of Waterloo. Prior to this, he completed his MA in the Intercultural German Studies program run between the University of Waterloo and the Universität Mannheim (his thesis used data from the Ideologies of English in the Linguistic Landscape project as a jumping-off point) and his BA in Germanic and Scandinavian studies at the University of Alberta. His research interests include grammar, linguistics, and media studies.
Contact: c7suther@uwaterloo.ca

Other contributors:

Amirhossein Firuzkohi
(University of Alberta)
Amirhossein Firuzkohi is a Ph.D. student in Applied Linguistics at the University of Alberta. He earned his Master’s degree in Teaching English as a Foreign Language from Shahid Beheshti University, Iran. Since the beginning of his career as a researcher in 2017, he has published on various topics in applied linguistics, including plagiarism policies, linguistic landscape, task-based language teaching, and intercultural pragmatics. His research interests mainly lie in, but are not limited to, linguistic landscape, language policy, bi/multilingualism, SLA, and teacher education.
Contact: fazlolah@ualberta.ca

Rebecca Stamper 
(University of Alberta)
While she worked with our team, Rebecca was in her final year as an undergraduate student at the University of Alberta with a double major in History and Modern Languages and Cultural Studies. As a research assistant, she explored her interest in sociolinguistics and the use of the English language across the world. She graduated with a BA in June 2023 and hopes to continue her studies in the future.
Contact: rstamper@ualberta.ca

Regan Kat
(University of Waterloo)
While working on our team, Regan Kat was a Masters student in the Intercultural German Studies program at the University of Waterloo and Universität Mannheim. Throughout her bachelors and masters work she focused on topics surrounding multilingualism, second language learning, and second language teaching. Her successful master’s thesis had a focus on the interaction between place and identity in multilingual families. She has studied in Mannheim, Germany, where she collected data for the Ideologies of English in the Linguistic Landscape project in both Mannheim and Leipzig.
Contact: rkat@uwaterloo.ca

Wangtaolue Guo
(University of Alberta)
Wangtaolue Guo is a translator and PhD candidate in Transnational and Comparative Literatures at the University of Alberta. Before joining the U of A, he received his BA in Translation from Jinan University in China and MA in Translation from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. His research interests include queer translation, sexuality and translation, and translingual writing. His academic work has appeared in TranscUlturAl, New Voices in Translation Studies, and The Routledge Handbook of Translation, Feminism and Gender.
Contact: wangtaol@ualberta.ca

Saraf Anjum 
(University of Alberta)
While working on our team, Saraf Anjum was a Masters student in the Modern Languages and Cultural Studies department at the University of Alberta. Prior to coming to the U of A, she did her bachelors in Linguistics and her first Masters in Literature from BRAC University. Her interests lie in the multiple versions of the English language and how these Englishes have meshed into the global world.
Contact: sanjum1@ualberta.ca