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Faculty of Education and Language Studies > People Profiles > Barbara Mayor

Barbara Mayor

Lecturer

The Open University Faculty of Education and Language Studies Centre for Language and Communication


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Profile

I am a Lecturer in the Centre for Language and Communication. Since joining the Open University in 1977, I have contributed to a variety of courses concerned with both language and equality issues. I have also acted as consultant to BBC television and radio programmes, including Languages for Learning (1992), The Golden Thread: English and other languages (1996) and Word4Word (2005).






Teaching Interests

I currently chair the course U211 ‘Exploring the English Language', one of The Open University’s most popular courses, with an annual student population of almost 2000 across the European Union, plus major partnership schemes in Singapore, Hong Kong and the Arab OU. This is a broad-ranging interdisciplinary course, with a strong applied linguistics dimension. I was also the founding chair of the Language Studies BA degree, and was involved in establishing the English Language and Literature BA degree.

I have written distance teaching material on various topics related to bilingualism and ethnicity; the applications of grammar in translation and forensics; text linguistics and metaphor. I also teach oral skills face to face as part of the Postgraduate Academic Communication in English course, and have previously taught on the French residential school.

I have served as external examiner for the MAs in Applied Linguistics, Bilingualism and Translation Studies at Birkbeck College, London, and for the BA English Language and Communication at the University of Kingston-upon-Thames.

Research Interests

I am a member of the Applied Language and Literacies Research Group in CREET.

My research interests are in individual and community bilingualism, with particular reference to the pragmatic expression of identity, and in academic literacy and language testing, with particular reference to cross-cultural differences in the use of English as a global language. The latter has included British Council-funded research on the IELTS test, with particular reference to the performance of Chinese and Greek-speaking candidates.

I have recently supervised and examined postgraduate students in a range of topics related to  family bilingualism, cross-cultural pragmatics and academic writing.

Current Research

Bilingualism Interest Group

Linguistic landscapes (with Philip Seargeant and Beth Erling)

Publications

Book Chapter
Mayor, Barbara (2010). Perspectives on children learning English: from structures to practices. In: Maybin, Janet and Swann, Joan eds. The Routledge Companion to English Language Studies. The Routledge Companion series. Abingdon, Oxford, United Kingdom: Routledge, pp. 218–231.
Mayor, Barbara; Hewings, Ann; North, Sarah; Swann, Joan and Coffin, Caroline (2007). A Linguistic analysis of Chinese and Greek L1 scripts for IELTS Academic Writing Task 2. In: Taylor, Linda and Falvey, Peter eds. IELTS Collected Papers: Research in speaking and writing assessment. Studies in language testing (19). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 250–315.
Mayor, Barbara (2007). English in the repertoire. In: Mercer, Neil; Swann, Joan and Mayor, Barbara eds. Learning English. London, UK: Routledge, pp. 43–72.
Monaghan, Frank and Mayor, Barbara (2007). English in the curriculum. In: Mercer, Neil; Swann, Joan and Mayor, Barbara eds. Learning English. London, UK: Routledge, pp. 151–176.
Hewings, Ann; Lillis, Theresa and Mayor, Barbara (2007). Academic writing in English. In: Mercer, Neil; Swann, Joan and Mayor, Barbara eds. Learning English. London, UK: Routledge, pp. 227–252.
Coffin, Caroline and Mayor, Barbara (2004). Texturing writer and reader reference in novice academic writing. In: Banks, David ed. Text and texture. Paris, France: l'Harmattan.
Mayor, Barbara and Swann, Joan (2001). English language and global teaching. In: Lea, Mary R. and Nicoll, Kathy eds. Distributed learning: social and cultural approaches to practice. UK: Routledge.
Mayor, Barbara (1996). English in the repertoire. In: Mercer, Neil and Swann, Joan eds. Learning English: Development and Diversity. London, UK: Routledge, pp. 41–71.
Mayor, Barbara (1993). What does it mean to be bilingual? In: Stierer, Barry and Maybin, Janet eds. Language, Literacy and Learning in Educational Practice. Language & Literacy in Social Context. Clevedon, Avon: Multilingual Matters Ltd, pp. 74–91.
Journal Article
Mayor, Barbara M. (2006). Dialogic and hortatory features in the writing of Chinese candidates for the IELTS Test. Journal of Language, Culture and Curriculum, 19(1), pp. 104–121.