Prof. Dr. Sofie Decock

I am Associate Professor in Applied Linguistics at the German Section of the Department for Translation, Interpreting and Communication at Ghent University. In 2009, I received my PhD in literature at Ghent University on the mythical spatial and temporal discourses in Annemarie Schwarzenbach’s travel writing. I published several articles in edited volumes and in journals such as Journal of Pragmatics, Intercultural Pragmatics, Multilingua, International Journal of Business Communication, Discourse Context & Media Business and Professional Communication Quarterly, and Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik. I conduct research on:

1. digital business communication, with a focus on complaints, reviews and webcare. From a mixed methods perspective, I analyze 1) the discursive and linguistic patterns in these genres, and I examine 2) how these discursive strategies and linguistic features impact perceptions, attitudes and response strategies. On top of this, I am interested in how L2 written language use is perceived by L1 professionals in the intercultural workplace.
2. gender and language
3. discursive representations of otherness and body semiotics in travel texts