ESP Project Leader Profile: Jack Hardy
Kevin Knight, Kanda University of International Studies, Chiba, Japan
Hello, ESPers worldwide!
The 64th ESP Project Leader Profile features Jack Hardy, Associate Professor of Linguistics at Oxford College of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. He teaches linguistics and statistics to undergraduates and is a co-author with Eric Friginal, who is also a featured leader in an ESP Project Leader Profile. Jack is a leader on the ESPIS Steering Board and has also contributed to TESOL as CPC and Convention Chair in 2022. Please see Jack’s bio below.
Dr. Jack A. Hardy is an Associate Professor of Linguistics at Oxford College of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia where he teaches foundational linguistics and statistics courses to first- and second-year undergraduate students. He earned his MA in Applied Linguistics from the Universidad de las Américas Puebla and his PhD in the same field from Georgia State University. He specializes in corpus linguistics, discourse analysis, and language education, with a focus on advanced-level and native English-using student writing across academic disciplines.
Dr. Hardy’s passion for English for Specific Purposes (ESP) emerged during his early teaching experiences at Oxford in 2011, where he observed the diverse and discipline-specific writing challenges faced by students. In addition to corpus linguistics, Dr. Hardy’s research interests include historical and social discourses across cultures, research methodology, and second language teacher education. He has collaborated on projects involving English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Chinese, demonstrating a multilingual and multicultural perspective in his work.
As an educator, Dr. Hardy is committed to supporting undergraduate students’ academic success. He mentors students in research that has led to conference acceptances and publications, fostering their growth as scholars. His contributions to TESOL International, including serving as CPC and Convention Chair in 2022, highlight his dedication to professional service and leadership. Dr. Hardy also leads faculty development workshops and strengthens institutional collaborations to enhance teaching and learning.
Dr. Hardy’s next major initiative is to develop a digital space for collaborative corpus and discourse studies projects, aiming to create opportunities for students at Oxford College and beyond to engage in research. He remains deeply committed to advancing linguistic research and pedagogy while fostering mentorship and leadership within the broader academic community. In addition to his two books Corpus-based Sociolinguistics (Friginal and Hardy, 2014) and The Routledge Handbook of Corpus Approaches to Discourse Analysis (Friginal and Hardy, 2021), he is currently working on a textbook for teacher learners about using corpora in TESOL with Eric Friginal and Joseph J. Lee.
In his responses to the interview prompts, Jack defines leadership in terms of creating an environment that promotes collaboration. His narrative explains how communication was at the core of such leadership and enabled him to bring multiple stakeholders together for a study of discipline-specific academic writing for his doctoral dissertation.
Associate Professor of Linguistics at Oxford College of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia
Define Leadership in Your Own Words
To me, leadership is fundamentally about fostering collaboration and creating an environment where individuals feel valued and empowered to contribute their best ideas. As an extreme extrovert (if you've met me, you know), I thrive in group settings, finding joy and productivity in understanding what motivates others and uncovering their unique perspectives. Whether in the classroom or the workplace, effective leadership requires active listening and a willingness to learn from others. For example, in my teaching, even when teaching statistics, I try to always incorporate dialogue, ensuring students' insights and experiences shape the learning process as much as the course materials. Thus, great leadership, in my view, has to balance any kind of decisiveness with openness and adaptability.
Tell Me an ESP Project Success Story. Focus on Your Communication as a Leader in the Project. How Did You Communicate with Stakeholders to Make That Project Successful?
One of my most ambitious projects was my dissertation, conducted at a small liberal arts college where I had previously taught first-year writing. Inspired by my earlier experiences with using corpus and genre techniques to teach discipline-specific writing (Hardy et al., 2015), I designed a study to examine the writing practices across six different disciplines. This involved collecting a wide range of data, including syllabi, assignment sheets, rubrics, and both digital and handwritten student writing. Additionally, I conducted interviews with faculty members and several students to gain a deeper understanding of their perspectives on academic writing within their fields.
Communication was key to the success of this project. I began by establishing trust with faculty members, clearly outlining the goals of the study and emphasizing how their input would contribute to improving writing instruction. Regular check-ins and collaborative discussions ensured that they felt their voices were heard and valued throughout the process. With students, I adopted a similar approach, creating an open and supportive environment during interviews and encouraging them to share candid insights about their writing experiences.
The project not only provided a rich dataset for my dissertation but also fostered meaningful conversations about writing pedagogy across disciplines. By actively engaging with stakeholders and maintaining transparent communication, I was able to build a collaborative framework that made this ambitious project both manageable and impactful.
Jack’s ideas about leadership resonate with me. I have defined leadership as a creative process, one in which we communicate to create a vision and to achieve it. In the classroom, we co-create the learning experience with our students. (I actually had the opportunity to do this today with employees from a steel company when we used Generative AI to meet their English language communication needs in their work.) I hope that Jack’s success story inspires others!
Do you have any questions or comments for Jack? Please feel free to contact him directly.
All the best,
Kevin
PS – The profiles (1 to 55) have been published together in a book English for Specific Purposes Project Leader Profiles: The Leadership Communication of 55 ESP Project Leaders (which can be downloaded for free in the PDF version). The profiles 51 to 62 are accessible in past issues of ESP News. For insights into what inspired me to write the profiles in a certain way, see also Creating Leadership “Ways of Being” in L2 Learners for International Business Careers and Social Good.
References
Friginal, E., & Hardy, J. A. (2014). Corpus-based sociolinguistics: A guide for students. Routledge.
Friginal, E., & Hardy, J. A. (Eds.). (2021). The Routledge handbook of corpus approaches to discourse analysis. Routledge.
Hardy, J. A., Römer, U., & Roberson, A. (2015). The power of relevant models: Using a corpus of student writing to introduce disciplinary practices in a first year composition course. Across the Disciplines, 12(1).
Knight, K. (2022). English for specific purposes project leader profiles: The leadership communication of 55 ESP project leaders. Hong Kong: Candlin & Mynard.
Knight, K. (2024). Creating leadership “ways of being” in L2 learners for international business careers and social good. Hong Kong: Candlin & Mynard.
Kevin Knight (PhD in linguistics, MBA, MPIA) is Professor in the Department of International Communication of Kanda University of International Studies in Chiba, Japan. His research interests include leadership conceptualization and development, ESP, and professional communication. He is series editor of Leadership in Language Education. (See https://www.candlinandmynard.com/leadership.html.)