Guest PhD students

October 2014 - October 2015

Justina Urbonaitė is a PhD student at the University of Vilnius, Lithuania. She obtained her BA degree in English Philology and MA degree (cum laude) in English Linguistics at Vilnius University. Her MA dissertation was on HEALTH metaphor in economic and political discourse in English and Lithuanian. Justina's interest in cognitive linguistics, metaphor and legal discourse has determined her decision to continue research on metaphor in a PhD programme. The researcher is currently carrying out a cross-linguistic study on metaphor in legal discourse, namely in the area of criminal law and criminal justice. Her main research interests centre around the areas of cognitive linguistics, metaphor research, applied linguistics, language acquisition, translation, language of the law, and English language and linguistics in general.

Justina's decision to spend a year as an exchange student at the European University Viadrina was largely determined by the possibility to explore the diverse interdisciplinary fields of linguistic and cultural studies carried out by the group of researchers led by Prof. Dr. Cornelia Müller as well as share her own research and exchange ideas with the researchers here. In addition, the guest researcher stresses that the exchange has enlarged the scope of her research possibilities because European University Viadrina offers a rich variety of scientific resources as well as easy access to other libraries and research centres in Berlin. According to Justina, her academic, linguistic and cultural experience at Viadrina has been very useful and enriching and it has influenced her academic and personal growth. She continues her research work at the University of Viadrina and is looking forward to another semester here and the many scientific and cultural discoveries it will bring.

July - October 2014