Bio data

NE QUID NIMIS


Marija Liudvika Drazdauskiene (née Rutkauskaite)

Though long, these names are variously important to me: the first double name is my true identity as is the maiden name, while the surname (Drazdauskiene) has been kept as made public. As the British put it, “people are sensitive about their own names”...

Born: 30 July 1944 in the town Marijampole, Lithuania, a Lithuanian.

1950-1961, a pupil of secondary school (Secondary school No. 2 in the town of Marijampole, Lithuania).

In 1961, I received Certificate of Secondary Education and the Gold Medal Award to it for excellent knowledge and creditable behaviour.

1961-1962, a teacher in a seven-year rural school in Lithuania

1962-1967, a student in the Department of English Philology, University of Vilnius, in the Programme of English Language and Literature.

In 1967, I graduated from the University of Vilnius qualified as a teacher of English and a linguist with a philological bias, and received a respective Diploma with Honours.

1967-1970, a postgraduate in the Department of English at Moscow University guided by Professor Olga S. Akhmanova. This period was the time of a slave’s work, of excellent relations and achievement.

In 1970, I presented the first Doctoral dissertation and had Doctor’s degree (i.e. Candidate of Philology, formerly) conferred in English style and philology (in the continental sense of this word).

1971-2002, a lecturer and Docent in the Department of English Philology, University of Vilnius. The academic title of Docent was conferred in 1975-1977, on the publication of the first book, "The Linguistic Analysis of Poetry" / Edited by David Bassett, in Vilnius University in 1975.

In 1976, a participant of the Summer Programme for the Soviet Teachers of English at UCLA, USA.

While a lecturer at the University of Vilnius in 1971-1981, I created a course of English stylistics for university undergraduates, taught it for twenty years and was a successful academic. My course of lectures in English stylistics was published by Vilnius University Press in 1990 under the title „English Stylistics: An Introductory Course“. At about this time, the new culture set in with „exertion out of proportion to what is required“ and achievements never acknowledged.

In 1982-1984, I took a two-years Sabbatical to write a second Doctoral dissertation. The dissertation was completed in 1983 and approved in the Department of English Philology, University of Vilnius, on 27 January 1984. A small book, Uses of English and Style in Language, published in 1983 in the University of Vilnius, publicised results of the second doctoral dissertation. The dissertation was officially presented only in 1994 because of the chaos in the meantime in Eastern Europe. The second Doctoral dissertation earned me Degree of Doctor habilitatus in English and the humanities. A respective Diploma was issued on 21 October 1994.

In 1991-1998, I headed an IPrA (International Pragmatics Association) Distribution Center for the Baltic States in the University of Vilnius and was a trusted representative (as well as a member since 1991) of the European Association for Lexicography (EURALEX) in the University of Vilnius.

In 1991, I was an invited participant in the Fifth International Lexicography Course at the University of Exeter, UK.

In 1971-2002, as a researcher and author, I published three small books on English style, a Reader, Myths, Tales, and Legends, for secondary schools, which was issued in several editions in Lithuania and Latvia, and over sixty articles on English style and different questions of Applied Linguistics in English, Lithuanian and Russian, published locally and internationally.

Made redundant at the University of Vilnius, I had to retire at the age of fifty-eight in August 2002 and continued publishing. 
Welcomed by the Polish colleagues, I have been employed as a Professor to teach courses of English grammar and communication at the Wszechnica Polska in Warsaw since 2008. Wszechnica Polska is a Polish national higher school of top quality academically and administratively. It welcomes and rewards every effort of a dedicated professor.

Functional linguistics (uses of language and communication) as well as English style my permanent engagement, I am busy at present, teaching and engaged in completing two major papers.

In 1976-2009, I participated in numerous international Conferences and Congresses in Poland, Lithuania, Greece, the Czech Republic, Italy, England and had the presentations published.

 

Spheres of interest

Music and dance. Ballet gymnastics at the University with a second grade achieved in it. International politics.

Divers: knitting and indoor plants.

Permis de conduir (but no driving practice).

The book is a revered object to me but I also appreciate the doors that open wider than the covers of the book.