Dr Lisa Lim

(BA NUS; PhD Reading)
Tel: 3917 2871
Office: Room 742, 7/F, Run Run Shaw Tower (Building B, Arts), Centennial Campus
Email: lisalim@hku.hk

HKU Scholars Hub: http://hub.hku.hk/rp/rp01169

{Profile}{Research and teaching grants}{Publications}

 

Profile

Dr Lisa Lim graduated from the National University of Singapore with a First Class Honours in English Language, and went on to do her PhD in phonetics at the University of Reading. She returned to the Department of English Language and Literature of the National University of Singapore in 1996 as Lecturer/ Assistant Professor. In 2004 she exchanged balmy breezes for North Sea winds to be at the University of Amsterdam, for a year at the Institute of Phonetic Sciences, and then as senior lecturer and researcher at the Department of English and the Amsterdam Centre for Language and Communication (ACLC).

2009 saw her returning, thrilled, to tropical Asia, where she joined the University of Hong Kong as Assistant Professor and Coordinator of the Language and Communication programme. In the latter role, she revamped the L&C programme, turning its lens onto today’s multilingual, globalised world, and introducing in the programme experiences such as fieldwork in local minority communities, field trips, a vibrant internship scheme, and knowledge exchange with the community.

Her research interests – reflected in her teaching and supervision – centre around phonetics/ phonology/ prosody, sociolinguistics, language documentation, New Englishes, especially postcolonial Asian varieties in multilingual ecologies, with particular interest in contact dynamics, involving both sociohistorical and linguistic investigation; and issues of language choice, shift, endangerment, and identity in minority/ diasporic Malay-speaking communities. One of the projects she is currently running, funded by Hong Kong’s Research Grants Council, focuses on the ecology and evolution of Asian Englishes. She has edited a number of volumes and special issues, in particular on both structural and sociolinguistics aspects of English in Asia, and is currently co-authoring (with U. Ansaldo) Languages in Contact for CUP. She serves on the editorial board for World Englishes.

Research and teaching grants

  • The ecology and evolution of Asian Englishes. Research Grants Council (RGC) General Research Fund (GRF) 2011/12 Exercise, Hong Kong. HKD391,262. Principal Investigator. 2012-2014.
  • English as a global language in Asian contexts. Common Core Teaching Development Grant, University of Hong Kong.  HKD70,000. Principal Investigator. 2012-2013.
  • LinguisticMinorities.HK. Knowledge Exchange Impact Project, KE Funding Exercise 2012/13, University Grants Council, Hong Kong. HKD85,142. Principal Investigator. 2012-2013.
  • Contrastive Linguistics: Constructional and functional approaches. Scientific Research Network (WOG), Research Foundation – Flanders (FWO). Co- investigator, HKU team. 2011-2016.
  • English Studies in Asia: Reception, institutionalization, futures. Louis Cha Fund –East-West Studies, Faculty of Arts, The University of Hong Kong. HKD77,760. Co-investigator. 2011-2013.
  • Exploring the Peranakans as a China-West locus in Southeast Asia: The continuing evolution of their linguistic repertoire. Seed Funding Programme for Basic Research, The University of Hong Kong. HKD119,449. Principal Investigator: 2010-2012.
  • The documentation of Sri Lanka Malay: Linguistic and cultural creolisation endangered. Volkswagen Stiftung, initiative for the Documentation of Endangered Languages (DoBeS). EUR248,000. Co-investigator & project manager. 2004-2009.
  • Contact patterns: A corpus of Trade Malay varieties. Academic Research Fund, National University of Singapore. SGD15,300 (= EUR7,200). Principal Investigator. 2003.
  • Transcription of the Malay of Cocos (Keeling) Islands and Christmas Island (C-103-000-222-091). Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Research Support Scheme, National University of Singapore. SGD4,950 (= EUR2,300). Principal Investigator. 2002-2003.
  • Towards A Reference Grammar of Singapore English. Academic Research Fund, National University of Singapore. SGD70,555 (= EUR33,300). Principal investigator. 1998-2001.

The ongoing results of two previous research projects are the following:

The Grammar of Spoken Singapore English Corpus (GSSEC) was collected for the project Towards a Reference Grammar of Singapore English, which was funded by a National University of Singapore Academic Research Grant R-103-000-003-112 (Lisa Lim and Joseph A. Foley, principal investigators; Vivienne Fong, Ni Yi-Bin and Lionel Wee, project members; 1998-2001). GSSEC, collected in the period 1998-99, comprises 32 recorded extracts, coming to approximately 8 hours of conversation, totalling over 60,000 words, of naturally occurring spontaneous discourse of native Singapore English speakers, varying along a number of demographic variables, such as age, gender, ethnic group, and education level. [The data have also been incorporated into the Singapore component of the International Computerised Corpus of English (ICCE-SIN).] The recordings are accompanied by orthographic transcriptions. Researchers are welcome to use the corpus, observing the Ground Rules and Conventions. [download pdf] Requests should be sent to Lisa Lim (lisa.ls.lim@gmail.com), enclosing a completed Usage Declaration form. [download pdf] Users must acknowledge GSSEC as a source in their research (citing Lim 2001 and Lim & Foley 2004), and should send a copy of any resources derived from the data (publications, additional annotations or analyses, etc.) to Lisa Lim.

The documentation of Sri Lanka Malay: Linguistic and cultural creolization endangered, a project funded by the Volkswagen Stiftung’s initiative for the Documentation of Endangered Languages (DoBeS) (2004-2009), involving Umberto Ansaldo (principal investigator; then University of Amsterdam, now University of Hong Kong), Lisa Lim (co-investigator and project manager; then University of Amsterdam, now University of Hong Kong), Walter Bisang (collaborator; Universität Mainz, Germany), Thiru Kandiah (collaborator; University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka and Curtin University), Sebastian Nordhoff (PhD researcher, University of Amsterdam). The digital archive is accessible at the project webpage at http://www.mpi.nl/DOBES/projects/slm

Courses developed and taught:

ENGL2030  World Englishes
LCOM1001 Introduction to language and communication
LCOM2005 Language, communication and globalisation – Politics, peril, pop
LCOM3001 Cultural dimensions of language and communication

Courses offered in 2012-13:

CCGL9038     English as a Global Language in Asian Contexts
LCOM1002    Language, communication, society, field
LCOM3001    Cultural dimensions of language and communication

 

Publications (selected, from 2003)

Books and special issues 

Lim, Lisa. in prep. Roots of Singlish. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Lim, Lisa and Umberto Ansaldo. in prep. Languages in Contact. Cambridge University Press.

Goh, Robbie, Lisa Lim & Lionel Wee, eds. in prep. The Politics of English in Asia: Language Policy and Cultural Expression in South and Southeast Asia and the Asia Pacific. (Studies in World Language Problems.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

Lim, Lisa, Christopher Stroud & Lionel Wee, eds. in prep. The Multilingual Citizen.Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change. (Encounters.) Multilingual Matters.

Lim, Lisa & Nikolas Gisborne, eds. 2011. The Typology of Asian Englishes. (Benjamins Current Topics 33.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. [Link to volume]

Lim, Lisa, Anne Pakir & Lionel Wee, eds. 2010. English in Singapore: Modernity and Management. (Asian Englishes Today.) Hong Kong University Press. [Link to volume]

Lim, Lisa & Nikolas Gisborne, eds. 2009. The Typology of Asian Englishes. Special Issue, English World-Wide 30(2). [Link tovolume TOC]

Lim, Lisa & Ee-Ling Low, eds. 2009. Multilingual, Globalising Asia: Implications for Policy and Education. AILA Review 22. [Link to volume TOC and abstracts]

Ansaldo, Umberto, Stephen Matthews & Lisa Lim, eds. 2007. Deconstructing Creole. (Typological Studies in Language 73.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

Saldin, B.D.K. In collaboration with Lisa Lim. 2007. Kamus Bahasa Melayu Sri Lanka. A Sri Lanka Malay–Malay–English dictionary. Colombo; Frankfurt/ Nijmegen: Volkswagen Stiftung/ DoBeS.

Lim, Lisa, ed. 2004. Singapore English: A Grammatical Description. (Varieties of English Around the World G33.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. [Link to volume TOC]

 

Articles in journals & volumes 

Forthcoming/ in preparation

Ansaldo, Umberto & Lisa Lim. in prep. Citizenship theory and fieldwork practice in Sri Lanka Malay communities. In Lisa Lim, Christopher Stroud & Lionel Wee, eds. The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change. (Encounters.) Multilingual Matters.

Lim, Lisa. in prep. The politics of English (and Sinhala and Tamil) in Sri Lanka: Kaduva for privileged power, tool for rural empowerment? In Lionel Wee, Lisa Lim  & Robbie Goh, eds. The Politics of English in Asia: Language Policy and Cultural Expression in South and Southeast Asia and the Asia Pacific. (Studies in World Language Problems.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

Lim, Lisa. fc. Southeast Asia. In Markku Filppula, Juhani Klemola & Devyani Sharma, eds. The Oxford Handbook of World Englishes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Lim, Lisa. in prep. Singapore: Language situation. In Rint Sybesma, ed. The Encyclopaedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics. Leiden: Brill.

Lim, Lisa. in prep. Singlish. In Rint Sybesma, ed. The Encyclopaedia of Chinese Language and Linguistics. Leiden: Brill.

 

2012

Ansaldo, Umberto and Lisa Lim. 2012. English in Asia. In Raymond Hickey, ed. Areal Features of the Anglophone World. (Topics in English Linguistics.) Berlin/ New York: Mouton de Gruyter. [Link to volume]

Lim, Lisa. 2012. Standards of English in Southeast Asia. In Raymond Hickey, ed. Standards of English: Codified Varieties Around the World. (Studies in English Language.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 274-293. [Link to volume]

Lim, Lisa. 2012. English and multilingualism in Singapore. In Carol A. Chappell, ed. The Encyclopaedia of Applied Linguistics. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell Publishing. [Link to volume]

Lim, Lisa & Umberto Ansaldo. 2012. Contact in the Asian arena. In Terttu Nevalainen and Elizabeth Closs Traugott, eds. The Oxford Handbook of the History of English. New York: Oxford University Press. 560-571. [Link to volume]

 

2011

Lim, Lisa. 2011. Tone in Singlish: Substrate features from Sinitic and Malay. In Claire Lefebvre, ed. Creoles, Their Substrates and Language Typology. (Typological Studies in Language 95.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 271-287.

Lim, Lisa. 2011. Revisiting English prosody: (Some) New Englishes as tone languages? In Lisa Lim & Nikolas Gisborne, eds. The Typology of Asian Englishes, (Benjamins Current Topics 33.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 97-118. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa & Umberto Ansaldo. 2011. Colloquial Singaporean English (Singlish). In Bernd Kortmann & Kerstin Lunkenheimer, eds. The Electronic World Atlas of Varieties of English [eWAVE]. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. http://www.ewave-atlas.org/.

Lim, Lisa & Nikolas Gisborne. 2011. The typology of Asian Englishes: Setting the agenda. In Lisa Lim & Nikolas Gisborne, eds. The Typology of Asian Englishes, (Benjamins Current Topics 33.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 1-10. [download pdf]

 

2010

Lim, Lisa. 2010. Peranakan English in Singapore. In Daniel Schreier, Peter Trudgill, Edgar W. Schneider & Jeffrey P. Williams, eds. The Lesser-Known Varieties of English: An Introduction. (Studies in English Language.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 327-347. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa. 2010. Migrants and ‘mother tongues’: Extralinguistic forces in the ecology of English in Singapore. In Lisa Lim, Anne Pakir & Lionel Wee, eds. English in Singapore: Modernity and Management. (Asian Englishes Today.) Hong Kong University Press. 19-54.

Lim, Lisa & Umberto Ansaldo. 2010. Colloquial Singaporean English (Singlish). In Bernd Kortmann & Kerstin Lunkenheimer, eds. The Electronic World Atlas of Variation in English: Grammar. Max Planck Digital Library in cooperation with Mouton de Gruyter.

Lim, Lisa, Anne Pakir & Lionel Wee. 2010. English in Singapore: Policy and practice. In Lisa Lim, Anne Pakir & Lionel Wee, eds. English in Singapore: Modernity and Management. (Asian Englishes Today.) Hong Kong University Press.

 

2009

Lim, Lisa. 2009. Revisiting English prosody: (Some) New Englishes as tone languages? In Lim, Lisa & Nikolas Gisborne, eds. The Typology of Asian Englishes Special Issue, English World-Wide 30(2): 218-239. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa. 2009. Beyond fear and loathing in SG: The real mother tongues and language policies in multilingual Singapore. In Lim, Lisa & Low Ee-Ling, eds. Multilingual, globalizing Asia: Implications for policy and education. Special Issue, AILA Review 22: 52-71. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa. 2009. Not just an 'Outer Circle', 'Asian' English: Singapore English and the significance of ecology. In Thomas Hoffman & Lucia Siebers, eds. World Englishes: Problems, Properties, Prospects. (Varieties of English Around the World G40.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 179-206.

Lim, Lisa & Nikolas Gisborne. 2009. The typology of Asian Englishes: Setting the agenda. In Lim, Lisa & Nikolas Gisborne, eds. The Typology of Asian Englishes Special Issue, English World-Wide 30(2): 123-132. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa & Low Ee-Ling. 2009. Introduction. In Lim, Lisa & Low Ee-Ling, eds. Multilingual, globalizing Asia: Implications for policy and education. Special Issue, AILA Review 22: 1-4.

 

2007-2008

Lim, Lisa. 2008. Dynamic linguistic ecologies of Asian Englishes. Asian Englishes 11(1): 52-55.

Ansaldo, Umberto, Lisa Lim & Salikoko S. Mufwene. 2007. The sociolinguistic history of the Peranakans: What it tells us about ‘creolization’. In Umberto Ansaldo, Stephen Matthews & Lisa Lim, eds. Deconstructing Creole. (Typological Studies in Language 73.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 203-226.

Lim, Lisa. 2007. Mergers and acquisitions: On the ages and origins of Singapore English particles. World Englishes 27(4): 446-473. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa & Umberto Ansaldo. 2007. Identity alignment in the multilingual space: The Malays of Sri Lanka. In Anchimbe, Eric A., ed. Linguistic identity in postcolonial multilingual spaces Cambridge Scholars Publishing. 218-243. [download pre-print version pdf]

 

2005-2006

Ansaldo, Umberto & Lisa Lim. 2006. Globalisation, empowerment and the periphery: The Malays of Sri Lanka. In Elangaiyan, R., R. McKenna Brown, Nicholas D.M. Ostler & Mahendra K. Verma, eds.Vital Voices: Endangered Languages and Multilingualism. Proceedings of the FEL X Conference. Bath: Foundation for Endangered Languages; & Mysore: Central Institute of Indian Languages. 39-46. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa & Umberto Ansaldo. 2006. Keeping Kirinda vital: The endangerment-empowerment dilemma in the documentation of Sri Lanka Malay. In Aboh, Enoch & Miriam van Staden, eds. ACLC (Amsterdam Centre for Language & Communication) Working Papers 1: 51-66. [download pdf]

Lim, Lisa & Umberto Ansaldo. 2005. Countries and Languages –Asia In Brown, Keith, ed. The Encyclopaedia of Language and Linguistics, 2nd ed. Elsevier Publishers.

Ng, Sandy & Lisa Lim. 2005. Appreciating language contact in pronunciation teaching: Local languages’ effect on Singapore English. In Deng, Xudong, Victor Matthew Cole, Maria Luisa C. Sadorra & Wu Siew Mei, eds. Paradigm shifts in English Language teaching and learning. (Selected Papers from the Inaugural CELC International Symposium.) Singapore: Centre for English Language Communication, National University of Singapore. 143-154.

 

2003-2004

Ansaldo, Umberto & Lisa Lim. 2004. Phonetic absence as syntactic prominence: Grammaticalization in isolating tonal languages. In Fischer, Olga, Muriel Norde & Harry Perridon, eds. Up and down the cline – The nature of grammaticalization. (Typological Studies in Language 59.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 345-362.

Lim, Lisa. 2004. Sounding Singaporean. In Lim, Lisa, ed. Singapore English: A grammatical description. (Varieties of English Around the World G33.)Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 19-56.

Lim, Lisa. 2004. Everything you wanted to know about how stressed Singaporean Englishes are. In Burusphat, Somsonge, ed. Papers from the eleventh annual meeting of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society. Arizona: Program for Southeast Asian Studies, Arizona State University.

Lim, Lisa & Joseph A. Foley. 2004. English in Singapore and Singapore English: Background and methodology. In Lim, Lisa, ed. Singapore English: A grammatical description. (Varieties of English Around the World G33.) Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 1-18.

Lim, Lisa & Umberto Ansaldo. 2003. Sounds Cocos. In Solé, M.J., D. Recasens & J. Romero, eds. Proceedings of the XVth International Congress of Phonetic Sciences (ICPhS2003). Barcelona: The 15th ICPhS Organizing Committee. 803-806.

 
 


Last updated: 1 March 2013