Varieng

The Research Unit for Variation, Contacts and Change in English (VARIENG) is a research unit at the University of Helsinki in Finland.
Members of the unit study English in its social, regional and discourse contexts, giving special attention to the development of the English language from its earliest stages up to its present-day varieties. One focus of research is language use in contact situations, including those between English and the national languages of Finland. The three major domains of the research unit are language in society, language as discourse and linguistic processes and typology.
Approximately fifty people work within Varieng at the two funding universities (Helsinki and University of Jyväskylä). Another source of funding is the Academy of Finland, which has declared the unit one of its Centres of Excellence. Varieng researchers focus on empirical work: they compile and utilize electronic corpora of English and develop tools and methods for corpus-based and ethnographic studies.

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