S2 E1: Forensic Linguistics - Dr. Nicci MacLeod

Much Language Such Talk

Today, we're joined by Dr. Nicci MacLeod. She is a Senior Lecturer in English Language and Linguistics at Northumbria University. She got her PhD from Aston University in Birmingham where she conducted discourse analysis on police interviews with women reporting rape.
Until 2018 she was employed as a Research Associate at the Aston Institute for Forensic Linguistics, working on various projects focusing on authorship analysis, native language identification, and assuming identities online in the context of undercover investigations against child sex offenders. She is co-author of the book Language and Online Identities: The Undercover Policing of Internet Sexual Crime..
Nicci also works as self-employed forensic linguist. For this, she undertakes casework in the areas of authorship analysis, sociolinguistic profiling and forensic discourse analysis. She is part of the National Crime Agency Expert Advisor Database. On top of that, she has worked with the Serious Organised Crime Squad, the Independent Police Complaints Commission, UK police forces and defence solicitors, and she has appeared as expert witness in the Crown Court of England and Wales, and both the Sherriff Court and the High Court of Justiciary in Scotland.
Her current research interests lie in discursive patterns of representation and negotiation, particularly in legal and investigative contexts, the language of policing, and the language of violence.

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Recorded on 24/8/2021

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