Dr Alex Ding
- Position: Associate Professor
- Areas of expertise: English for Academic Purposes; Practitioner identity & agency; Practitioner education & development; Scholarship of teaching and learning
- Email: A.Ding@leeds.ac.uk
- Phone: +44(0)113 343 3483
- Website: Teaching EAP | Twitter
Profile
I started working at Leeds in October 2015 and was appointed Director of Scholarship at the Language Centre. Shortly after, I was appointed Director of Centre for Excellence in Language Teaching (CELT) and was tasked with setting up CELT and leading scholarship inititaives within the School of Languages, Cultures and Societies. CELT has organised over 20 scholarship events in 2 and half years ranging from scholarship lunches to national and internation conferences. As part of my role in directing CELT I also initiated the development and launch of the Language Scholar Journal.
Prior to working at Leeds, I worked at the University of Nottingham for 14 years and led scholarship in the Centre for English Language Education. I also set up and led an MA in Teaching English for Academic Purposes, supervised numerous MA, EdD and PhD students as well as teaching on a wide range of English for Academic Purposes programmes. I also have extensive experience of teaching English for Specific Purposes in various prestigious French higher education establishments, including École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, Institut National des Sciences Appliquées de Lyon and L'École nationale supérieure des sciences de l'information et des bibliothèques.
Responsibilities
- Director of the Centre for Excellence in Language Teaching
- Director of Scholarship (Language Centre)
Research interests
My scholarship interests focus on the development, education, identity and agency of English for Academic Purposes Practitioners. I have recently published a book with Ian Bruce entitled The English for Academic Purposes Practitioner: Operating on the Edge of Academia (2017) published by Palgrave Macmillan. I have also co-written a chapter EAP teacher development in The Routledge Handbook of English for Academic Purposes (2017) and I've written another EAP Practitioner Identity (in press) to be published in Specialised English: New Directions in ESP and EAP Research and Practice (in press) edited by Ken Hyland and Lillian Wong and published by Routledge.
I am co-researching with Prof. Cynthia White a two year multisite research project entitled ''Transitions into Scholarship'. This project examines agency, identity and structure in relation to EAP practtitioners' transitions into developing a scholarship profile and identity.
I have also published on scholarship: Challenging scholarship: A thought piece as well as, for example, collaborative teacher autonomy (Tensions and struggles in fostering collaborative teacher autonomy online), teacher identity (Identity and self in e-language teaching) with Cynthia White.
<h4>Research projects</h4> <p>Any research projects I'm currently working on will be listed below. Our list of all <a href="https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/dir/research-projects">research projects</a> allows you to view and search the full list of projects in the faculty.</p>Qualifications
- B.A. Philosophy (Essex)
- Educational Technology and TESOL (Manchester)
- Ph.D Education (Nottingham)
Professional memberships
- BALEAP
- IATEFL
Research groups and institutes
- PRIA