Research overview

The English Department has an outstanding research and publications record. It is a leading centre for English studies in Asia, and its faculty regularly appear as keynote and plenary speakers at many international conferences in Asia, Europe and North America.

The Department has several very active research clusters in such areas as applied linguistics, business and corporate communication, corpus linguistics, cultural studies, discourse analysis, genre analysis, legal communication, sociolinguistics and world Englishes. In recent years, the Department has established a leading track record in securing research grants from the Research Grants Council (RGC) of the Hong Kong Government. Faculty in the Department are on the boards of a number of leading academic journals including Applied LinguisticsDiscourse and CommunicationEnglish World-WideEnglish for Specific PurposesInternational Journal of Bilingual Education and BilingualismLinguistics and EducationJournal of Business CommunicationTESOL Quarterly and World Englishes. At present, the Department has a established international reputation in such areas as applied English linguistics, discourse analysis, educational linguistics, genre analysis and sociolinguistics, and newer research areas currently under development also include Asian Englishes, Asian literature in English, cultural studies, English language and literature worldwide, and world Englishes. In coming years, particular attention will be placed on developing a new programme for PhD studies which will offer supervision in all relevant areas of English studies closely informed by the ongoing research of faculty in the Department.

For more information, prospective PhD students should follow the link to PhD students and also visit the individual webpages of faculty in the Department.