Staff Profile: Dr Thomas Dickins

Summary

Tom Dickins’s background is in Russian and Czech language and literature. He teaches on a wide range of modules, and has been Course Leader for Linguistics for several years. His current research interests relate primarily to applied linguistics: in particular, Czech lexicology, language variation and change, linguistic purism and loanwords, and language and political discourse.

Qualifications

• PhD (by published work): ‘Selected aspects of language contact in the case of Czech, with a particular focus on lexical borrowing and changing attitudes to the self and others’, University of Wolverhampton, 2012
• PGCE: Qualified to teach Russian, French and English, (awarded Wortley Year Prize for theory of education), University of Nottingham, School of Education, 1986
• MA (by research): ‘Critical responses to Socialist Realism in Czech literature: 1958–
• 1969. A study of selected works by Josef Škvorecký, Bohumil Hrabal and Milan Kundera’,University of Leeds, 1983
• BA (Hons): Russian Studies (with 3-year French Subsidiary), University of Leeds,1981

Current Subjects Lectured and Other University Activities

• Language in Use (Level 4)
• Language and Society (Level 5)
• Research Methods for English Language, Linguistics and TESOL (Level 5)
• Language Variation and Change (Level 6)
• Russian Language (All levels)
• Writing skills (All levels)

Member of various University committees (including the Student Management Board, the Programme Management Board and the School Research Committee)

Publications

Articles and Books

• ‘Historical “signposts” and other temporal indicators in the Czech lexicon’, The Slavonic and East European Review 90 (4), 2012, pp. 601–41.
• ‘The Czech-speaking lands, their peoples and contact communities: titles, names and ethnonyms’, The Slavonic and East European Review 89 (3), 2011, pp. 401–454.
• Attitudes to lexical borrowing in the Czech Republic  (Liberec: Nakladatelství Bor, 2009).
• ‘Češi a slovenština’, Naše společnost 7 (1), 2009, pp. 12–26.
• ‘Postoje k výpůjčkám v soudobé češtině’, Naše společnost 6 (1), 2008, pp. 14–28.
• ‘The legacy and limitations of Czech purism’,  Slavonica 13 (2), 2007, pp. 113–33.
• ‘Russian and Soviet loanwords and calques in the Czech lexicon since the beginning of the twentieth century’,  The Slavonic and East European Review 84 (4), 2006, pp. 593–638.
• ‘Representations of Russian and Soviet society in standard Czech reference dictionaries’, Central Europe 2 (2), 2004, pp. 133–59.
• ‘Gender differentiation and the asymmetrical use of animate nouns in contemporary Czech’, The Slavonic and East European Review 79 (2), 2001, pp. 212–47.
• ‘Changing ideologies in Slovník jazyka českého (1937–52)’, Slavonica 7 (1), 2000, pp. 24–74.
• ‘Reflections of ideology in Slovník jazyka českého (1946-52)’, in Robert Pynsent (editor), The Phoney Peace: Central European Politics and Culture, 1945–1949  (London: London University Press, 2000), pp. 359–84.
• ‘Prepositional vocalization in contemporary Czech’, The Slavonic and East European Review 76 (2), 1998, pp. 201–33.
• ‘Linguistic varieties in Czech: problems of the spoken language’, Slavonica 1 (2), 1995, pp. 20 46. Reprinted (with amendments): Ročenka Kruhu moderních  filologů 21, 1997, pp. 58–87.

Teaching and Learning Materials

• (with Irina Moore), S azov (Russian from Scratch), University of Wolverhampton, 2004 A4, comb-bound: 536 pp. (Online version available at http://www.gefix.net/sazov/)
• Spoken Czech: Situational Dialogues for Intermediate Level Students (13 scenes on video with accompanying textbook, including an introductory chapter: ‘Notes on the development of the literary language and on different linguistic registers in Czech’) ,  University of Wolverhampton, 1993.

Book Reviews 

• James Wilson, Moravians in Prague. A Sociolinguistic Study of Dialect Contact in the Czech Republic (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2010), in  The Slavonic and East European Review 89 (3), 2011.
• Lubomír Štrougal, Paměti a úvahy  [Memoirs and Reflections] (Prague: Epocha, 2009) in The Slavonic and East European Review 89 (2), 2011.  (with Eric Dickins), Jenny Carl & Patrick Stevenson (eds), Language, Discourse and Identity in Central Europe. The German Language in a Multilingual Space (Houndsmill, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), in Slovo a slovesnost 71 (2), 2011.
• Tora Hedin, Changing Identities: Language Variation on Czech Television (Stockholm: Stockholm University Press, 2005), in The Slavonic and East European Review 85 (4), 2007.
• James Naughton, Colloquial Czech, in  Irish Slavonic Studies 1, 2000.
• Kevin Hannan, Borders of Language and Identity in Teschen Silesia, in Czech Language News 9, 1997.
• Robert B. Pynsent, Questions of Identity: Czech and Slovak Ideas of Nationality and Personality, in Irish Slavonic Studies 1, 1996.
• František Čermák, Jan Holub, Jiří Hronek, Milan Šára & David Short, A multi-level course for advanced Czech learners (2 Vols), in The Slavonic and East European Review 76 (2), 1995.
• Milena Kelly, Czech for You, in  Czech Language News 2, 1994.

Conference Papers

• 9 September 2011 Universitat Pompeu Fabria (Barcelona),  Xenographies 2 conference: ‘Attitudes to the notion of “foreign” in The Czech-speaking lands, as reflected in the post nineteenth-century lexicon’
• 8–10 September 2011 Member of Scientific Committee: Universitat Pompeu Fabria(Barcelona), Xenographies 2 conference
• 1 July 2011 New Research in LSSC (University of Wolverhampton): ‘Historical “signposts” and other temporal indicators in the Czech lexicon since the Great War’
• 2 July 2010 New Research in LSSC (University of Wolverhampton): ‘Czech perceptions of themselves and other peoples, as reflected in naming practices’
• 2 July 2009 Co-organizer of conference: New Research in HLSS (University of Wolverhampton)
• 13 September 2008 University of Essex, Linguistics Association of Great Britain, peer-reviewed conference paper:  ‘The Czechs and the Slovak language’ (themed session on Central and East European sociolinguistics)
• 24 May 2006 Nottingham Trent University, Invited paper:  ‘Attitudes to loan words in contemporary Czech’
• 23–24 June 2005 University of Wolverhampton, HAGRI–ETAT Post-communism conference: Chair of two panels
• 11 January 2003 Embassy of the Czech Republic, ‘New Ideas and Trends in the Study of Czech Culture, Language, and Literature’: Discussant for paper on changes in the Czech language
• 31 July 2000 Finnish Institute for Russian and East European Studies, Tampere, Finland, VI ICSEES Congress: ‘The asymmetrical use of animate nouns in Czech’ (Organizer of international, multi-disciplinary panel: ‘Gender and representation in the Czech context’)
• 14 June 2000 University of Wolverhampton, Research Seminar: ‘Representations of Czechoslovakia in Slovník jazyka  českého, 1937-1952’
• 3 April 2000 Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge, BASEES Annual Conference: Chair for panel on Russian lexicography
• 1 April 2000 Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge, BASEES Annual Conference: ‘Russian and Soviet referents in the Czech lexicon’
• 1999 University of Wolverhampton, New Slavonic Linguistics Seminar: ‘Gender differentiation in the Czech dictionary’ (Co-organizer of conference with Neil Bermel, University of Sheffield)
• 1999 University of Wolverhampton, Russian and East European Centre, Research Seminar: ‘Sex in Czech? Gender differentiation and the asymmetrical use of animate nouns in Slovník spisovné  češtiny pro školu a veřejnost’
• 1998 Centre for the Study of Central Europe, School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University of London, Another Transition: Central Europe 1945–1949: ‘Reflections of ideological values in Czech-Czech dictionaries’
• 1996 Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge, BASEES Annual Conference: ‘Russian–Czech cross-foreign language interference’
• 1995 Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences, V World Congress for Central and East European Studies: Discussant for panel on aspects of contemporary Czech culture
• 1994 Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge, BASEES Annual Conference: ‘Linguistic registers in Czech: problems of the spoken language'
• 1990 Wolverhampton Polytechnic, occasional seminar paper: ‘Multilingualism in Soviet education’

Other Relevant Activities

External Examining

• 2004–2009 Department of Languages, Coventry Business School, University of Coventry, BA (Hons) degree examinations in Russian
• 2004–2008 Department of Russian and Slavonic Studies, University of Sheffield, BA (Hons) and MA degree examinations in Russian Studies (Czech)
• 1988–2003 The Centre for Modern Languages, University of Birmingham, B.Eng., M.Eng. (etc.) degree examinations (Russian)
• 1998–2003 CREES, University of Birmingham, BA (Hons) and MA degree examinations in Russian
• 1998–2003 University of Durham, BA (Hons) and MA degree examinations in Czech
• 1996–1999 University of Leeds, BA (Hons) degree examinations in Russian (Czech)
• 1995–1997 European Business School (Russian language, level 200)
• 1995–1996 University of Birmingham, BA (Hons) degree examinations in Russian (Czech)

Membership of Editorial Board

• January 2009 – Member of the editorial board of Czech language journal, Studie z aplikované lingvistiky (Studies in Applied Linguistics), published by the Philosophical Faculty of Charles University (Prague)