PROFESSOR JANET HOLMES

Janet Holmes holds a personal Chair in Linguistics at Victoria University of Wellington, where she teaches a variety of sociolinguistics courses. She is Director of the Wellington Corpus of Spoken New Zealand English and of the highly recognised Language in the Workplace Project. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 1994.

Janet has published on a wide range of topics including New Zealand English, language and gender, sexist language, pragmatic particles, compliments and apologies, and most recently on aspects of workplace discourse. Her publications include a textbook, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics, a book on language and gender, Women, Men and Politeness, and an edited collection of papers Gendered Speech in Social Context. Her most recent books are the Blackwell Handbook of Language and Gender, co-edited with Miriam Meyerhoff, and Power and Politeness in the Workplace co-authored with Maria Stubbe.

Currently Janet is directing research which examines the communication styles of leaders in different workplaces, identifies cross-cultural differences in leadership style, describes different mentoring styles, and analyses women’s talk at work.

Her keynote address focuses on the last of these areas, and the title is "The glass ceiling" - does talk contribute? Gendered discourse in the New Zealand workplace."

PROFESSOR GEORGE CHENEY

George Cheney is Professor of Communication at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City, USA. Also, he is Adjunct Professor of Management Communication at the University of Waikato, Hamilton, NZ. Previously, he taught at the universities of Illinois, Colorado, and Montana. In addition, he has lectured or conducted research in Denmark, The Netherlands, Spain, Mexico, and Colombia.

George's teaching and research interests include identity and power in organizations, the analysis of corporate public discourse, quality of worklife, employee participation and workplace democracy, professional ethics, and corporate social responsibility, and the rhetoric of war. He has published four books and is at work on two others. He is the author of more than 70 journal articles, book chapters, and reviews.

George is committed to the integration of teaching, research, and service, and has been an advocate of service learning for undergraduate and graduate students. George's current interest in professional ethics and communication is based on a belief that informed and inspired ethical practice is crucial to the effectiveness of our organizations and strikes to the heart of who we are as 'professionals' and citizens in the 21st century. George is writing a book on communication and professional ethics which will span the contexts of the classroom, work, and popular culture.

The title of his keynote address will be "Talking about Ethics at Work: Strategies for Pedagogy, Research and Practice."

PROFESSOR GRAEME TURNER

Graeme Turner is Professor of Cultural Studies and Director of the Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies at the University of Queensland in Australia. He has an outstanding international reputation as a result of his contribution to the development of cultural and media studies in Australia and beyond. His work is used in a range of disciplines including media and cultural studies, communication, history, and film and television studies and has been translated into seven languages. Graeme’s research interests focus mainly on Australian media and popular culture. Currently he is studying talkback radio.

His most recent publication presents a study of the production and consumption of celebrity, Understanding Celebrity, published Sage (UK) in 2004. Other recent publications include books on film cultures, media and communication in Australia, and fame games.

Graeme Turner is Vice-President of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, a member of the Expert Advisory Committee for the Humanities and Creative Arts in the Australian Research Council, and the Director of Research for the Faculty of Arts at the University of Queensland.

The title of Graeme's keynote address will be "The mass production of celebrity: celetoids, reality TV and the demotic turn".