Interview with Mike Baynham

Abstract

Mike Baynham is Projessor of TESOL in the School ofEducatlon of the University of Leeds. He ·is currently Chair of the British Association Jor Applied Linguistics (BAAL) for the period 2001-2003, and co-convenor with Mastín Prinsloo of the Intemational Applied Lingulstics Association (AlLA) Scientific Commission on Literacy. Befare that, he worked in both London (where he was involved in Adult and Higher Education) and Sydney (as Director of tht Centre Jor Language and Literacy at the University of Technology). Although his academic background is in Sociolinguistics, he has always been involved in Applied Linguistics, his main research intaests including oral narrative, speech represtntation, and socially situated ô€‚‡ectives on llteracy. He has published a substantial number of research articles and books, among which it is worth highlighting Literacy Practices (Longman, 1995), and nNarrative as evidence in literacy research" (Llnguistics in Education, 2000). Professor Baynham gave a talk at the XX Congreso Nacional de AESLA, held at the Univmity of Jaén in April 2002. His lecture was entit!ed "T aking the social tum: the New Literacy Studies and SLA • and this interview is aimed at discussing more deq¡Iy sorne of the main aspects dealt with in that ta!k.