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Dr. Dorothea Horst


Center for Teaching and Learning (ZLL) / European University Viadrina

Contact details

horst[at]europa-uni.de

Research Areas

  • Multimodal and multimedia discourses
  • Mediality of language and communication
  • Language and power
  • Metaphor studies
  • Embodiment

Curriculum Vitae


Dorothea Horst graduated in Theatre Studies, Journalism and Spanish Studies from the University of Leipzig (2001–2006) and in Intercultural Communication Studies from the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder) (2007–2010). She researched and taught as member of the Chair for Language Use and Multimodal Communication at Viadrina before joining the Center for Teaching and Learning as part of the SKILL Team in December 2021. From 2009 to 2013 she was a junior researcher in the project “Multimodal Metaphor and Expressive Movement” at the interdisciplinary research center Languages of Emotion (Freie Universität Berlin) in the context of which she is collaborating author of the book “Cinematic Metaphor. Experience – Affectivity – Temporality” (2018) and co-editor of the volume “Cinematic Metaphor in Perspective. Reflections on a Transdisciplinary Framework” (2018). In 2017, Dorothea received her doctoral degree from European University Viadrina with a thesis on “Meaning-Making and Political Campaign Advertising. A Cognitive-Linguistic and Film-Analytical Perspective on Audiovisual Figurativity” that was published with De Gruyter in 2018. During her time at Viadrina, she was interim professor of Media, Culture and Communication (2018–2019) and co-conducted the seed-money project “Multimodal Constructions of Threat: Conceptualizing Danger and Enemies in Populist About the EU in Germany and Poland” (2015).

Her research interests are located at the interface of applied as well as cognitive linguistics and media studies with a particular focus on multimodal and multimedia discourses, mediality and materiality of language and communication, language and power, metaphor studies and embodiment. Empirically, she works on questions of the (re)configuration of the social in public and media discourse, implications of power in private and public discourse, and opportunities and limits of digital technologies for research and teaching in the humanities.