Dr Alex Ding

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.  As part of my role in directing CELT I also initiated the development and launch of the Language Scholar Journal. I was, until very recently, Director of Scholarship for the School of Languages, Cultures and Societies. Currently, I co-lead a new online MA in Teaching English for Academic Purposes

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 Scholarship (Language Centre)
• Co- lead for the MA in Teaching English for Academic Purposes

Research interests

My scholarship interests focus on the development, education, identity and agency of English for Academic Purposes Practitioners. My work equally focuses on the politics of EAP and how social theory can inform EAP. I have a particular interest in how Bourdieu and socio-analysis can inform understandings of the field of EAP.

I co-authored an influential book with Ian Bruce entitled The English for Academic Purposes Practitioner: Operating on the Edge of Academia (2017) published by Palgrave Macmillan. I co-wrote a chapter EAP teacher development in The Routledge Handbook of English for Academic Purposes (2017) as well as EAP Practitioner Identity (2019)  published in Specialised English: New Directions in ESP and EAP Research and Practice edited by Ken Hyland and Lillian Wong and published by Routledge.

I co-researched (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.

Forthcoming publications include:

• Ian Bruce and Alex Ding (2025) Language, Knowledge and Society in Higher Education: The Intersection of Social, Epistemological and Linguistic Knowledge in Academic Communication 
• Laetitia Monbec and Alex Ding (2024) Reconfiguring Language in Higher Education: Social Justice, Ethics and Practices. Palgrave Macmillan.
• Alex Ding and Laetitia Monbec (2024) (eds) English for Academic Purposes Practitioners: Explorations of Agency and Identity. Bloomsbury.
• Alex Ding and Laetitia Monbec (2024) ‘A socio-analysis of English for Academic Purposes’, in English for Academic Purposes Practitioners: Explorations of Agency and Identity. Bloomsbury.

Qualifications

• B.A. Philosophy (Essex)
• Educational Technology and TESOL (Manchester)
• Ph.D Education (Nottingham)

Professional memberships

• BALEAP
• IATEFL

Student education

I co-lead a new online MA in Teaching English for Academic

Research groups and institutes

• PRIA
• Language Centre