Interests
Recently, quite a bit of my thinking on various subjects happens on my Heremeneutic Heretic blog. Language, culture and education are my key academic interests. Most of my research and thinking is centered around conceptual frames, metaphors (or more generally domain mapping, currently known as conceptual integration or blending) and conceptualization as a social phenomenon. I work in the framework of cognitive linguistics developed by scholars such as George Lakoff (whose seminal book I recently translated), Leonard Talmy, Ronald Langacker, and Gilles Fauconnier. I try to apply these ideas to problems from other aspects of the humanities such as national identity, writing and education. See ConceptualMetaphor.net and Cogling.info for more details. My linguistics heroes of the moment are Ronald Langacker and William Croft whose work on cognitive/construction grammar I find immensely facinating. More about my interests can be gleaned from my writing on HermeneuticHeretic.net. Quite outside my academic interests lies my fascination with sailing and playing the blues guitar. Recently, I found an outlet for my interests in the world of technology on a local radio station and in a podcast. Occasionally, I let off steam about my frustrations with technology on TechWillow.com. In Czech, I contribute semi-regularly to several Czech papers on a variety of subjects. I also regularly speak at conferences. I'm hoping to start an archive of all my writing and presentations on this site.
Work
Luck has been with me so far, and I've been able to make a living in human communication. Until June 2003, I was the Czech lektor at the Department of Slavonic Studies at University of Glasgow . Previously, I spent two years as the Czech lektor at School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES) in London. Prior to that I have worked as a more or less free-lance trainer and consultant in language, culture and computers.
I also occasionally work for the US Peace Corps as a language and training consultant. Most recently I worked as a teacher trainer in Kazakhstan, conference facilitator in Blugaria and training developer in Romania. Most recently, I finished a 10-month contract for Peace Corps Albania as Pre-Service Training Director and Education Specialist (June 2004).
I also occasionally make a living as a translator and interpreter between English and Czech and recently have developed websites for money.
More details can be found in my resume on this site which includes an employment history, a list of publications and a skills portfolio.
Web work
Aside from doing web development for money. I manage several language/communication related webs many of which started life as sections on Bohemica.com. This site tries to integrate them all in one place.
A complete list of all my websites is here. It all started with pure FrontPage-assisted HTML but now all my websites are based around a CMS. Mostly Drupal but a few Wordpress. I've tried Joomla but found it too inflexible. I've also had a CMS developed (see TuiT.GlottalStart.com for an old version of Bohemica but have now replaced it by Drupal.)
I have also at one time designed and managed these webs. All of which have moved on to better things since.
Life
Just in case somebody is interested, I was born in Liberec, Czech Republic while it was still Czechoslovakia, I have lived in Prague with many interruptions for 15 years and currently reside in Norwich. I have spent two years in London and one in Glasgow. I have traveled and worked in over twenty-five countries around the world. (Most of my trips have been between 1 and 6 weeks. The only places, other than the UK and the Czech Republic, where I've spent more than a quarter of a year in one go were Spain, Kazakhstan and Albania). A map of my travels is available courtesy of Google Maps.
