Our Team

Olga K. Iriskhanova, Director of SCoDis,Vice-Rector For Research at Moscow State Linguistic University, professor at the Department of General and Comparative Linguistics at MSLU, professor at the Department of English Stylistics, Doctor of Philology
Research interests: cognitive semantics, distribution of attention in language, discourse studies, multimodal communication, linguistic creativity, communicative strategies of institutionalized communication
Languages: Russian, English, Spanish, Polish
oiriskhanova@gmail.com

Alan Cienki, Founding director of PoliMod, Professor at MSLU, Professor in English linguistics at the Vrije Universiteit (VU) in Amsterdam
Research interests: cognitive semantics, slavistics, multimodal communication, verbal communication and gestures, metaphor in multimodal discourse
Languages: English, Russian, German, Dutch, Polish, French, Latin, Hungarian, Bulgarian
a.cienki@vu.nl

Maria V. Tomskaya, Director of the Gender Lab, Assistant Professor at the Department of Linguistics and Professional Communication of Law at the Institute of Economics, Law and Information Management of MSLU, Ph.D.
Research interests: gender linguistics, discourse studies, institutionalized communication, verbal and non-verbal aspects of intercultural communication
Languages: Russian, Yakut, German, English
mtomskaya@rambler.ru

 Anna V. Leontyeva, Director of the Laboratory for the Study of Sign Languages, PhD
Research interests: cognitive linguistics, gender linguistics, multimodal communication, gesture studies
Languages: Russian, English, French
lentevanja27@gmail.com

Maria I. Kiose, Ph.D., Vice -Director and Senior Researcher at SCoDis
Research interests: lexical semantics, contextual semantics, indirect naming in language and text
Languages: Russian, English, Italian, French
maria_kiose@mail.ru

Olga V. Agafonova, junior researcher at SCoDis, teacher at the Department of Linguistics and Professional Communication in Mass Media
Research interests: cognitive linguistics, multimodal communication, speech and gestures, international relations, politics
Languages: Russian, English, German
olga.agafonova92@gmail.com 

Ekaterina S. Balakina, Ph. D. student at the Department of General and Comparative Linguistics at MSLU
Research interests: cognitive semantics, discourse studies, multimodal communication, gestures in speech
Languages: Russian, English, French
katushka063@mail.ru

Varvara D. Kharitonova, junior researcher at the Laboratory for the Study of Sign Languages, teacher at the Department of English Stilistics, MSLU
Research interests: gesture languages, cognitive linguistics, multimodality in linguistics
Languages: Russian, English, Russian sign language, International Sign 
varyadk@gmail.com

Elena I. Karpenko, Assistant Director of PoliMod, Associate Professor at the Department of Lexicology and Stylistics of the German language at the Faculty of the German Language at MSLU, Ph.D.
Research interests: metaphor, symbol, cultural linguistics, semantics of language signs
Languages: Russian, German, English
elena_karpenko@list.ru

Stephen Pax Leonard, researcher at SCoDis, Ph.D.
Research interests: semiotics, sociolinguistics, linguistic anthropology, language and ideology.
Languages: Norwegian, Swedish, French, German, Spanish, Icelandic, Russian, Faroese, Polar Eskimo

steph.p.leonard@gmail.com

Alexandra O. Tambovtseva, junior researcher at SCoDis
Research interests: psychology and anthropology of education,  theory and framework of teaching, individualisation of learning, research culture, gesture studies
Languages: Russian, English, German
a.tambovtseva@linguanet.ru

Alina I. Nikolaeva, assistant to Vice-Rector for Research, junior researcher at SCoDis
Research interests: cognitive linguistics, gender linguistics, multimodal communication, parent/child communication, gesture studies
Languages: Russian, English, French, Spanish
alinamakoveyeva@gmail.com

Andrej A. Petrov, Ph. D. student at the Department of General and Comparative Linguistics at MSLU, Researcher at SCoDis
Research interests: semiotics, speech and gestures
Languages: Russian, English, German
petrov@linguanet.ru

Olga N. Prokofieva, Ph.D., Senior Researcher at SCoDis, senior lecturer at the Department of Stylistics of the English language at the Faculty of the English Language at MSLU
Research interests: multimodal communication, experimental research, eye tracking, interconnection between speech and gestures, co-speech gestures, interconnection between speech, gestures and eye movement, multimodal analysis of different types of discourse (descriptive, explicative)
Languages: Russian, English, German, French
oliviaprok@gmail.com

Evgenia E. Smirnova,  junior researcher at SCoDis
Research interests: cognitive linguistics, film discourse, gesture studies, discourse studies, semiotics
Languages: Russian, English, German, French
e.e.smirnova@linguanet.ru

Geert Brône, associate professor at Faculty of Arts, KU Leuven, coordinator of Linguistics Research Unit, Ph. D

Research interests: cognitive linguistics, multimodal communication, gesture studies, eye-tracking
Languages: French, English
geert.brone@kuleuven.be