I retired from my university job at the University of Nottingham on September 1, 2020, and am now Emeritus Professor.  Therefore I am no longer supervising PhD students or teaching at the university.  But I intend to stay active in the field, including writing books, journal articles, attending conferences, and consulting internationally.  I would be very open to teaching short courses while a visiting professor at other universities.  So I basically retired from the day job to free up the time to pursue these other professional interests.

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NEWEST BOOKS

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I have written a book about language

to help the general public understand

language better and use it more

effectivley.  The book is called

Language Power. 

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Click here for more details

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I have also co-authored a book

describing how our research team

developed the Knowledge-based

Vocabulary Lists.  These lists show the

words which are the best-known by

learners of English as a Second

Language.

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Click here for more details

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But where did it all start?  I began my career as an EFL teacher in Japan in 1988 and quickly became interested in how language learners acquire vocabulary in their second (or more) languages. I began researching vocabulary in earnest during my PhD years at Nottingham (1994-1997).  Since then, my interests have broadened to all aspects of lexical study, including vocabulary testing, phraseology and formulaic sequences, corpus-based research, and the interface between vocabulary knowledge and the ability to read and listen in English. Also, writing Language Power gave me the chance to explore a very wide range of language use issues.  

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On this website, you can find most of my research in downloadable format.  There are also vocabulary tests and word lists available on the Resources page.  I hope you find something that will be interesting and useful!