David Luke Caldwell

APrf David Luke Caldwell

Associate Professor

School of Education

College of Education, Behavioural and Social Sciences

Eligible to supervise Masters and PhD - email supervisor to discuss availability.

Available For Media Comment.

Dr David Caldwell is an Associate Professor in English Language and Literacy in Education Futures.
David completed his Bachelor of Teaching, Bachelor of Arts(Hons) and Master of Arts in linguistics at Deakin University (Melbourne), and his PhD in linguistics at the University of Sydney. He then completed a post in Singapore where he worked as an Assistant Professor at the National Institute of Education in the School of English Language and Literature, before joining UniSA in 2014.
David’s research applies functional linguistics to a range of contemporary contexts, with a focus on the role language plays in learning, identity and inclusion.  These contexts have included the on-field language practices of sports people, the language demands of NAPLAN and STEM, literacy practices on the APY Lands, English wordings on t-shirts in South-East Asia, the role of ‘Asia literacy’ in the Australian Curriculum, KanYe West’s hip-hop, and medical consultations between hospital patients and psychiatrists.  Drawing on these various educational sites, ‘non-traditional’ texts, and marginalized language users, David aims to disrupt prescriptive discourses of language to facilitate social inclusion, and at the same time, demonstrate the value in understanding how language works to solve real-world problems.  David is currently the co-series editor for the Bloomsbury series: Studies in Systemic Functional Linguistics and a co-conveyor of the AILA Research Network: Applied Linguistics in Sport.
David has more than 20 years experience teaching at a tertiary level, where he has taught a range of subjects in English language, literacy, and social linguistics. He has trained English language teachers for primary, secondary and tertiary level education in Australia and overseas. During his postgraduate studies, David taught in numerous primary school classrooms throughout Melbourne and Sydney. He currently provides professional learning sessions in English language and literacy to teachers and schools throughout South Australia.

Research Areas

Systemic Functional Linguistics, Social Semiotics, Genre Pedagogy in Australian Schools, Sports Discourse, Aboriginal and TSI Education, Hip-hop Culture and Pedagogy

Projects (selected)

Being heard: Remixing critical literacy for active citizenship, with Windle, J & Baak, M, Primary English Teaching Association of Australia Research Grant: CAT–2: $70 157.99

Evaluation of language and literacy levels tool, Department for Education, SA: CAT–2: $62 701.00

Student perceptions about their literacy development and language(s) practices, with Nichols, S & Yoshida, R, Adelaide Secondary School of English: CAT–2: $34 000.00

LLIS: Language for Learning Improvement: Science Pilot Project: CAT–2: Department of Education: $45 455.00

Digital literacy champions: Exemplary practice for 21st Century English Teaching: UniSA: URIPA Seed and Mentoring Grant: $14 434.80

Real Language in Real Time: Tracking the On-field Language Practices of SAASTA Students in the Aboriginal Power Cup: UniSA/Australian Government: Higher Education Participation and Partnerships Program: $94 719.00

Fresh water literacies: An interdisciplinary international study with primary teachers and researchers: UniSA: Research Themes Investment Scheme Seed Funding Grant: $34 606.00

Language, literacy and learning in cosmopolitan Asia: a study tour of Singapore’s National Institute of Education for Australian pre-service teachers: Australian Government, New Colombo Plan: $36 000.00

Year Citation
2025 Singh, N., Caldwell, D., & Mu, M. (2025). Pre-service teachers' experiences of learning grammar to support EAL/D learners. TESOL in Context, 33(2), 1-15.
DOI
2025 Caldwell, D. (2025). Memories of meaning-making: looking back at genre writing. Practical Literacy: The Early and Primary Years, 30(1), 4-7.
2024 Stahl, G., Brock, C., Sharplin, E., Caldwell, D., Young, J., & Boyd, F. (2024). 'Because the rules out there are different…': a case study of pre-service teachers' experiences in remote Australian Indigenous education. Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 44(2), 326-339.
DOI Scopus2
2023 Caldwell, D. (2023). Enacting power, solidarity and masculinity in sport: a discourse analysis of the language-in-action of Aboriginal boys. International Journal of Educational Research, 121(102227), 1-10.
DOI Scopus5 WoS2
2021 Brock, C. H., Caldwell, D., Rehbein, T. L., & Boyd, F. B. (2021). An ode to a state park: creating poetry during a summer writing camp. The Reading Teacher, 74(6), 807-811.
DOI
2021 Doran, Y. J., Caldwell, D., & Ross, A. S. (2021). Language in action: sport, mode and division of semiotic labour. Language, Context and Text, 3(2), 274-301.
DOI
2021 Soong, H., & Caldwell, D. (2021). Tensions, transformations and travel: comparative narratives of 'becoming' a cosmopolitan educator through an overseas study tour in Singapore. Journal of Comparative & International Higher Education, 13(2), 132-144.
DOI
2020 Stahl, G., Brock, C., Young, J., Caldwell, D., Sharplin, E., & Boyd, F. (2020). Dispositions towards diversity: two pre-service teachers' experiences of living and teaching in a remote indigenous community. Pedagogy, culture and society, 28(4), 525-542.
DOI Scopus6 WoS7
2020 Ross, A. S., & Caldwell, D. (2020). 'Going negative': An APPRAISAL analysis of the rhetoric of Donald Trump on Twitter. Language and communication, 70, 13-27.
DOI Scopus89 WoS61
2020 Caldwell, D. (2020). Sounds of the game: an interpersonal discourse analysis of 'on field' language in sports media. Discourse, Context and Media, 33(100363), 1-10.
DOI Scopus8 WoS2
2018 Paige, K., Lloyd, D., Caldwell, D., Comber, B., O'Keeffe, L., Osborne, S., & Roetman, P. (2018). Futures in primary science education-connecting students to place and ecojustice. Visions for sustainability, 9, 49-59.
DOI
2017 Caldwell, D., & White, P. R. R. (2017). That's not a narrative; this is a narrative: NAPLAN and pedagogies of storytelling. Australian journal of language and literacy, 40(1), 16-27.
WoS14
2017 Caldwell, D. (2017). Printed t-shirts in the linguistic landscape: a reading from functional linguistics. Linguistic landscape, 3(2), 122-148.
DOI
2017 Caldwell, D., Cominos, N., & Gloede, K. (2017). My words, my literacy: tracking of and teaching through the on-field language practices of Australian Indigenous boys. Boyhood studies an interdisciplinary journal, 10(2), 11-36.
DOI WoS4
2017 Caldwell, D., & White, P. R. R. (2017). That's not a narrative; this is a narrative: NAPLAN and pedagogies of storytelling. Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, 2017(FEB).
Scopus16
2015 Brock, C. H., Boyd, F. B., & Caldwell, D. (2015). Book club: A view from Mrs Nguyen's grade four classroom. Practical Literacy, 20(3), 5-8.
2015 White, P., Mammone, G., & Caldwell, D. L. (2015). Linguistically based inequality, multilingual education and a genre-based literacy development pedagogy: insights from the Australian experience. Language and Education, 29(3), 256-271.
DOI Scopus16 WoS13
2014 Caldwell, D. (2014). The interpersonal voice: applying appraisal to the rap and sung voice. Social semiotics, 24(1), 40-55.
DOI Scopus14 WoS7
2009 Caldwell, D. L. (2009). 'Working your words': appraisal in the AFL post-match interview. Australian review of applied linguistics, 32(2), 1-17.
DOI Scopus29 WoS22
2008 Caldwell, D. L. (2008). 'Affiliating with Rap Music: political rap or gangsta rap?'. Novitas - ROYAL, 2(1), 13-27.
1992 ABE, K., ANTILOGUS, P., ASTON, D., BAIRD, K., BEAN, A., BIENZ, T., . . . YUTA, H. (1992). PERFORMANCE OF THE FRONT END ELECTRONICS AND DATA ACQUISITION-SYSTEM FOR THE SLD CHERENKOV RING IMAGING DETECTOR. IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, 39(4), 897-900.
DOI

Year Citation
2025 Doran, Y. J., Caldwell, D., & Ross, A. S. (2025). Language in sport: Wherefore and where to?. In Language in Sport Real Time Talk in Training and Games (pp. 228-235). Routledge.
DOI Scopus1
2025 Ross, A. S., Caldwell, D., & Doran, Y. J. (2025). Sports linguistics: Speaking and doing. In Language in Sport Real Time Talk in Training and Games (pp. 1-11). Routledge.
DOI
2025 Caldwell, D. (2025). Mic'd up and mentoring: A discourse analysis of mediatised coach discourse. In Language in Sport Real Time Talk in Training and Games (pp. 115-140). Routledge.
DOI
2022 Martin, J. R., Knox, J. S., & Caldwell, D. (2022). Introduction: introducing appliable linguistics. In D. Caldwell, J. S. Knox, & J. R. Martin (Eds.), Source details - Title: Appliable Linguistics and Social Semiotics: Developing Theory from Practice (pp. 1-20). UK: Bloomsbury Academic.
Scopus2
2022 Caldwell, D. (2022). A hip-hop battle: describing sound in the contested academy. In D. Caldwell, J. S. Knox, & J. R. Martin (Eds.), Source details - Title: Appliable Linguistics and Social Semiotics: Developing Theory from Practice (pp. 67-80). UK: Bloomsbury Academic.
DOI
2019 Cominos, N., Caldwell, D., & Gloede, K. (2019). Brotherhood and belonging: creating pedagogic spaces for positive discourses of Aboriginal youth. In S. Habib, & M. Ward (Eds.), Source details - Title: Youth, place and theories of belonging (pp. 92-108). UK: Routledge.
DOI Scopus7
2018 Soong, H., Caldwell, D., & Restall, G. (2018). Teaching Chinese language for Asia literacy: Chinese teachers' experiences teaching Australian students. In H. Cominos (Ed.), Source details - Title: Asia literacy in a global world (Vol. 45, pp. 145-163). Singapore: Springer.
DOI Scopus7
2018 Caldwell, D., & Nichols, S. (2018). Images of 'Asia literacy': an analysis of online representations. In H. Soong, & N. Cominos (Eds.), Source details - Title: Asia literacy in a global world: an Australian perspective (Vol. 45, pp. 101-123). Singapore: Springer.
DOI Scopus1
2017 Walsh, J., & Caldwell, D. (2017). The visceral and the Analytics Discourses in the Evaluation of Sports Players. In D. Caldwell, J. Walsh, E. Vine, & J. Jureidini (Eds.), The Discourse of Sport Analyses from Social Linguistics (pp. 113-130). USA: Taylor & Francis.
2016 Caldwell, D. (2016). But they didn't win the Super Bowl! Printed t-shirts as place/d resources. In S. Nichols, & C. Snowden (Eds.), Source details - Title: Languages and literacies as mobile and placed resources (pp. 10-29). United Kingdom: Routledge.
2016 Caldwell, D., Walsh, J., Vine, E. W., & Jureidini, J. (2016). Discourse, linguistics, sport and the academy. In Source details - Title: The discourse of sport: analyses from social linguistics (pp. 1-12). New York, US: Routledge.
2016 Caldwell, D. (2016). But they didn't win the super bowl!: Printed t-shirts as place/d resources. In S. Nichols, & C. Snowden (Eds.), Languages and Literacies as Mobile and Placed Resources (pp. 2-29). Routledge.
DOI Scopus3
2015 Brock, C., Caldwell, D., & Wiest, L. (2015). "I hope my writing will change your opinion": A critique of disciplinary writing instruction in a Grade Six classroom. In J. Turbill, G. Barton, & C. Brock (Eds.), Source details - Title: Teaching writing in today's classrooms: Looking back to look forward (pp. 123-137). Australia: Australian Literacy Educators' Association.
2014 Caldwell, D. (2014). A comparative analysis of the rap and the sung voice: perspectives from systemic phonology, social semiotics and music studies. In W. Bowcher, & B. Smith (Eds.), Source details - Title: Systematic phonology: recent studies in English (pp. 235-263). UK: Equinox Publishing.
2011 Caldwell, D., & Zappavigna, M. (2011). Visualising multimodal prosody. In Source details - Title: Semiotic margins: meaning in multimodalities (pp. 229-242). UK: Continuum.
2011 Caldwell, D. L., & Zappavigna, M. (2011). Visualizing multimodal patterning. In S. Dreyfus, S. Hood, & M. Stenglin (Eds.), Source details - Title: Semiotic margins: meaning in multimodalities (pp. 229-243). UK: Continuum.
2010 Caldwell, D. (2010). Making many meanings in popular rap music. In A. Mahboob, & N. Knight (Eds.), Source details - Title: Appliable linguistics (pp. 234-251). UK: Continuum.
Scopus3
2009 Caldwell, D. (2009). Making metre mean: identity and affiliation in the rap music of Kanye West. In M. Bednarek, & J. Martin (Eds.), Source details - Title: New discourse on language: functional perspectives on multimodality, identity, and affiliation (pp. 59-80). UK: Continuum.
Scopus7

Year Citation
2023 Strambi, A., Cropley, D., & Caldwell, D. (2023). Exploring the potential of NLP for automated assessment of creativity. In LAK Companion Conference Proceedings: Towards Trustworthy Learning Analytics (pp. 29-32). US: ACM.
2012 Caldwell, D. (2012). To swear or not to swear: the challenge of hip-hop in the language classroom. In S. Fan (Ed.), Conference proceeding: International Conference: Innovative Research in a Changing and Challenging World (pp. 366-374). Australia: Australian Multicultural Interaction Institute.
2008 Caldwell, D. L. (2008). The Rhetoric of Rap: A Challenge to Dominant Forces?. In Australian Systemic Functional Linguistics Association Congress. Australia.
1992 ABE, K., ANTILOGUS, P., ASTON, D., BAIRD, K., BEAN, A., BIENZ, T., . . . YUTA, H. (1992). INITIAL PERFORMANCE OF THE SLD CHERENKOV RING IMAGING DETECTOR SYSTEM. In IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE Vol. 39 (pp. 685-689). NM, SANTA FE: IEEE-INST ELECTRICAL ELECTRONICS ENGINEERS INC.
DOI WoS2
1991 ABE, K., ANTILOGUS, P., ASTON, D., BAIRD, K., BEAN, A., BIENZ, T., . . . YUTA, H. (1991). PERFORMANCE OF THE FRONT END ELECTRONICS AND DATA ACQUISITION-SYSTEM FOR THE SLD CHERENKOV RING IMAGING DETECTOR. In CONFERENCE RECORD OF THE 1991 IEEE NUCLEAR SCIENCE SYMPOSIUM AND MEDICAL IMAGING CONFERENCE, VOLS 1-3 (pp. 763-766). NM, SANTA FE: I E E E.
DOI
1991 ABE, K., ANTILOGUS, P., ASTON, D., BAIRD, K., BEAN, A., BIENZ, T., . . . YUTA, H. (1991). INITIAL PERFORMANCE OF THE SLD CHERENKOV RING IMAGING DETECTOR SYSTEM. In CONFERENCE RECORD OF THE 1991 IEEE NUCLEAR SCIENCE SYMPOSIUM AND MEDICAL IMAGING CONFERENCE, VOLS 1-3 (pp. 480-484). NM, SANTA FE: I E E E.
DOI

Courses I teach

  • EDUC 1112 English Curriculum: Language (2025)
  • EDUC 3062 English Curriculum: Text Production (2025)
  • EDUC 5260 English Education (Primary) (2025)
  • EDUC 5259 English Education (Junior Primary) (2024)

Date Role Research Topic Program Degree Type Student Load Student Name
2025 External Supervisor Improving Argumentative English Writing Skills in Chinese Undergraduates: A Comprehensive Investigation into Rhetorical Practices Using a Genre-Based Approach Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Full Time Mrs Shanshan Liang
2025 Co-Supervisor Improving Argumentative English Writing Skills in Chinese Undergraduates: A Comprehensive Investigation into Rhetorical Practices Using a Genre-Based Approach Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Full Time Mrs Shanshan Liang
2024 Co-Supervisor Towards a Dialogic School Culture: An historical analysis through case study research Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Full Time Mrs Barbara Mary Fitzgerald
2023 Co-Supervisor 144 - Experiences of Language Teachers in using AI Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Part Time Ms Ke Hyang Lee
2019 Co-Supervisor - - Doctorate Part Time Ms Julie Fay Gale
2018 Co-Supervisor Investigating young children's use of semiotic resources when participating in, and communicating about, their digital game play Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Part Time Ms Therese Lovett
2016 Co-Supervisor Supporting the digital citizens of tomorrow: an analysis of pre-service teachers' training in multimodality and multiliteracies. Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Part Time Ms Sarah Forrest
2015 External Supervisor The Role of Case-Based Learning in the Development and Demonstration of Clinical Reasoning in Undergraduate Medical Education Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Part Time Ms Helen Fraser
2015 Principal Supervisor An examination of the practice of teaching for critical comprehension in a whole school context. Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Part Time Mrs Kerry Josephine Gehling
2015 Co-Supervisor The Role of Case-Based Learning in the Development and Demonstration of Clinical Reasoning in Undergraduate Medical Education Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Part Time Ms Helen Fraser

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