About Me

I hold a BA in Film Studies and an MA in English Language & Literature from the University of Lausanne (Switzerland), and a PhD in Linguistics from Queen Mary University of London. My thesis (that you can find here) was supervised by Prof. Erez Levon and Dr. Olivia Knapton.

Some people may find it difficult to pronounce my last name. Here is a phonetic transcription that might help you: ˈɛlvɪs 'kɔimbɹɑ 'gəʊmɛs

The "C" in "Coimbra" is pronounced like the "c" in "cat" and the "oi" like in "going".

Considering the lack of qualitative research on OCD, I also founded the conference/platform OCD in Society which was launched in 2019. The last (3rd) edition was held in London in 2022.

I strive to conduct truly interdisciplinary, cutting-edge, and impactful research. As such, I apply qualitative and quantitative tools from sociolinguistics (e.g., critical discourse analysis, corpus linguistics, ethnography) on two different fronts:

PSYCHOLOGICAL LEVEL

Focusing on sexuality and gender-related obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) – e.g., Homosexual OCD (HOCD), Sexual Orientation OCD (SO-OCD), Pedophilia OCD (POCD), Transgender OCD (TOCD), Gender Identity (GI-OCD) – I am interested in exploring how affected people orient in their discourse towards normative ideas of selfhood, gender, sexuality and mental health. Related to this topic, I have collaborated with Prof. Heiko Motschenbacher.

SOCIOPOLITICAL LEVEL

I am also interested in understanding the different ways language and ideology get intertwined in discourse for social and political goals. For instance, I have explored with Dr. Stamatina Katsiveli the role of metonymy in anti-genderist discourse when framing feminist and LGBT+ groups as a dangerous Other.