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Cyprus

The project 

This project investigates the role, status, and functions of English within the multilingual ecology of the divided Mediterranean island of Cyprus. It specifically focuses on how English interacts with the multiple other languages of the island as one part of its multilingual ecology. The non-prototypical development of English in post-colonial Cyprus and the current socio-political situation, i.e., the division of the island and the complex sociolinguistic dynamics resulting from this division, have caused research on English in Cyprus to remain scarce.

This project draws on systematically collected, unprecedentedly rich data that promise a new understanding of the specifics behind individual multilingual ecologies and their relation to other local contexts. Examining the impact of socio-political and identity factors on the use and status of English and other local languages in Cyprus contributes to developing an inclusive theoretical approach to the global use of English in its various local multilingual ecologies.

The team

Sarah Buschfeld is a Professor and Chair of English Linguistics (Multilingualism) at TU Dortmund University. She is the author of the Extra- and Intra-territorial Forces (EIF) Model (with A. Kautzsch) and has worked on a number of postcolo­nial and non-postcolonial varieties of English and in the fields of language acqui­sition and multilingualism. She has written and edited several articles and books on these topics and explores the boundaries between such disciplines and their concepts.

Manuela Vida-Mannl is a Postdoctoral Researcher in English Linguistics at TU Dortmund University. Her research interests include multilingualism and the sociolinguistics of English around the globe. She is the author of The Value of the English Language in Global Mobility and Higher Education: An Investigation of Higher Education in Cyprus (Bloomsbury 2022) and co-author of Multilin­gualism: A Sociolinguistic and Acquisitional Approach (with Sarah Buschfeld and Patricia Ronan; Springer 2023).

Contacts: sarah.buschfeld@tu-dortmund.de, (sarah.buschfeld"AT"tu-dortmund.de,)manuela.vidamannl"AT"tu-dortmund.de

Erna Selmanovic is a PhD student in English Linguistics at TU Dortmund. 

Contacts: erna.selmanovic"AT"tu-dortmund.de

Kleanthes Grohmann is Professor of Biolinguistics (Theory, Development, Grammar) at the University of Cyprus.  His main research interest include biolinguistics (generative grammar), architecture of the grammar (interfaces), theoretical syntax (minimalism), comparative syntax (esp. Germanic, Romance, Slavic/Balkan), (Cypriot) Greek morpho-syntax and first and second language acquisition. For more information, please refer to: https://www.ucy.ac.cy/directory/en/profile/kleanthi