I am Professor of Science, Language, and Society at the Institute for Science and Society (School of Sociology and Social Policy), at the University of Nottingham. I am also a member of the STS Priority Group. I studied French and philosophy in Germany and gained a DrPhil in French linguistics. After a postdoc in general linguistic at Oxford I moved to Nottingham. My current research, mainly funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, focuses on the cultural and political contexts in which metaphors and other framing devices are used in the public, policy and scientific debates about emerging technologies, emerging diseases, as well as climate change. I have written books and articles on the history of linguistics, semantic change, metaphor, metonymy, polysemy and, more recently, the sociology of health and illness and the social study of science and technology. In 2011 the University of Nottingham awarded me a DLitt for my research and publications relating to the social study of metaphor. I am a Member of the Academy of Social Sciences.
Below you can find a list of books and articles I have published in recent years. First there is a list of books, then a list of articles relating to specific topics and projects, such as climate change, nanotechnology, genetics/genomics/stem cells, synthetic biology, infectious disease and food and agriculture, On the side bar you can also find links to projects on climate change in particular. There is a separate website for images and visualisations in science and society.
Many of my papers, old and new, have now been uploaded onto nottingham.academia.edu/BrigitteNerlich
The Social and Cultural Impact of Foot and Mouth Disease in the UK in 2001: Experiences and Analyses
Edited by Martin Döring and Brigitte Nerlich, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2009
PROJECTS and project related publications
Nanotechnology - Articles related to this topic
From Nautilus to Nanobo(a)ts…
Journal of Nano Education
Nanoscale Science and Engineering Education (Book)
Young adults and nanomedicine
Genetics, genomics, stem cells, synthetic biology - Articles related to this topic
Designer babies
Anatomy of a media event…
Genomics: shifts in metaphorical landscape between 2000 and 2003
Genomics discourses
The book of life: how the human genome project was revealed to the public
Beyond the human genome...
The microbiome and its metaphors
Cloning and popular cultural imagery
Cloning, fiction, fantasy, fears
Clones and crops
Meaning of Genetics
Infectious diseases, hygiene and biosecurity - Articles related to this topic
Metaphors and biorisks…
Conceptualising biosecurity – the case of swine flu
Avian Flu: The creation of expectations in the interplay between science and the media.
Modern matrons and infection control practices: aspirations and realities
The habitus of hygiene (MRSA)
Hygiene and biosecurity: The language and politics of risk (MRSA and avian flu)
MRSA and the post-antibiotic apocalypse?
The 'ins and outs' of biosecurity (avian infuenza)
Health, hygiene and biosecurity: Conflicting knowledge claims in the UK poultry industry
SARS and metaphors
Conceptualising foot and mouth disease…
War on foot and mouth disease
The social and cultural impact of the 2001 outbreak
Food and Environment - Articles related to this topic
Politics of food…
Discourse analysis of probiotic web advertising
Past publications on metaphor, metonymy, polysemy, and so on
Discourse metaphors
Ambiguities we live by
Mind, meaning and metaphor
More information about publications
Nottingham University e-prints
