Prof Jim McKinley

Professor of Applied Linguistics

UCL Institute of Education, University College London

Keynote Speaker

Bio

Jim McKinley is Professor of Applied Linguistics at UCL Institute of Education and an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Oxford. His research focuses on academic and scholarly writing, English-medium instruction, Global Englishes, research methods, and the relationship between language teaching and research. His recent work examines authorial voice, writer identity and knowledge production in AI-mediated academic contexts. He is Editor-in-Chief of TESOL Quarterly and has been co-editor of System and Cambridge Elements in Language Teaching since 2019. He has published widely on language education, academic writing and research methodology.

Keynote Speech Title

What Counts as TESOL Research in the Age of AI?

Speech Abstract

Generative AI is beginning to reshape how TESOL research is conceived, conducted, written, reviewed and published. This keynote considers what these changes mean for the kinds of knowledge our field produces and values. I examine the growing role of AI in research design, literature synthesis, data analysis and academic writing, and ask what happens to researcher expertise, methodological judgement and responsibility when these processes become increasingly AI-mediated. I also consider the implications for multilingual researchers and for participation in international knowledge production, where AI may reduce some longstanding linguistic barriers while creating new forms of inequality. Drawing on research into academic writing, research methodology and scholarly publishing, alongside experience editing System and TESOL Quarterly, I argue that the central challenge is how TESOL can retain intellectual and methodological rigour while reconsidering what counts as expertise, authorship and meaningful research contribution in an AI-mediated field.