Max Reuvers
Thesis title: The role of English in multilingual online transgender communities
In this project I investigate the hitherto unquestioned role of English in international online transgender communities. The emergence of English-medium online spaces for trans people has considerably increased trans people’s access to spaces with other trans people, being a lifeline for those who are otherwise disconnected from trans-specific resources and spaces. However, the dominance of English-medium spaces excludes those who cannot, or do not want to, use English to connect with trans communities.
While research on trans identities and online trans communities has in recent years increased, this work has largely been based on English-medium data without questioning the role of English in international spaces such as social media. As such, the multilingualism of the userbase of these platforms is often overlooked. In my project, I aim to bring an investigation of English as a characteristic rather than a given into research on trans communities, thus combining trans studies with work on English as a Lingua Franca and on multilingualism.
To better understand the role that English plays for trans people, whether as a language they grew up using or one they acquired later in life, I will analyse and compare trans-specific online spaces in various languages, paying special attention to the ways in which other languages feature in English-medium spaces and in which English features in non-Anglophone spaces. I will moreover investigate whether there are differences between the dominant narratives of transness and trans issues in these various communities.
Biography
Max holds a BA in English Language and Culture and an MA (research) in Language and Cognition, both from the University of Groningen. His research interests cover a wide range of topics concerned with minorities, representation, and discourse. In addition to the focus on queer and trans communities reflected in his PhD project, Max is interested in language variation, multilingualism, mutual intelligibility, language (in) education, English as a lingua franca and global language. He has been co-investigator in a longitudinal study on voice and speech change in bilingual transmasculine people using testosterone with Dr Remco Knooihuizen (University of Groningen) since 2017.
Applied Linguistics
University of Nottingham
2023 Cohort 1+3
Supervisory Team
Dr Lucy Jones
Prof Nicola McLelland