I am a sociolinguist, meaning I am interested in the relationship between society, in the broadest sense, and how it interacts with language.
My current academic position is with the Faculty of Arts at the University of Helsinki, where I hold the position of University Lecturer (Associate Professor) in the Department of Languages. In May 2019 I was awarded the Title of Docent. You can see more about my home department here, and my University of Helsinki research site is here.
At the moment, I have two main research areas: language contact with English and heritage Scandinavian languages in Utah, USA. You can see more about my research in the links below.
My first book, Making Sense of “Bad English”: An Introduction to Language Attitudes and Ideologies has just been published by Routledge (2020).
I am the sociolinguistics and pragmatics editor for the academic journal Ampersand. Please contact me if you have questions about submitting.
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6057-1804
twitter: epeterso
Research and Publications
Danes and Danish in Utah
Other publications
Dynamics and Innovations in Discourse-Pragmatic Variation and Change (CUP, in preparation)
Recent presentations
Downloadable Academic CV
Languages: US Standardized English (native)
Finnish (good enough to become a citizen)
Swedish (good enough to make my family cringe and to talk to small children and animals)
French (reading is fine, production is much more complicated)
Contact:
elizabeth.peterson(AT)helsinki.fi
