Lara Portmann completed her PhD in Language and Communication at the University of Bern in 2023. Her research examines the cultural politics of digital media from an ethnographic perspective that centres how language is used not just by users but also by producers of digital media.
Her PhD project, closely affiliated with the SNSF-funded project “Elite Creativities” (led by Prof. Thurlow), examined the language work of so-called user experience writers (aka UX writers). Typically working behind the scenes and often invisibilized, these are the professionals who create the verbal content of websites, apps, and other software interfaces.
Research Interests
language work/ers; critical sociolinguistics; language/semiotic ideologies; digital discourse studies; interface texts; cultural politics of technology; discourse ethnography
