Andia Mavromati

Born in Cyprus, an island with an intriguing and complex linguistic scenery, Andia has always been fascinated by languages. Her parents inflicted her passion for languages, as her mother speaks Hungarian and her father, who is in love with classic languages taught her Ancient Greek and Latin from a young age. For as far as she remembers herself, she was curious as to why people spoke differently than one another, and was enthralled by the way people spoke in different areas of the island. At the age of 17, she noted down unknown words to her from the Cypriot Greek dialect in a notebook she still carries with her! Back then she even tried to create her own alphabet of the dialect, which did not, until then, have a written from. She is currently a PhD candidate of Linguistics at the University of Cyprus. She obtained a Bachelor’s degree in English Language and Literature from the University of Cyprus, but her passion for languages did not stop there. She proceeded with a second Bachelor’s Degree in Turkish and Middle Eastern studies, with a major in History and Politics and a Master’s Degree in Applied Linguistics. She currently works as an English teacher at the Ministry of Education and Culture and she is also an accredited examiner for official English examinations.

Being an active citizen is top priority for her, as she believes that the endeavour to empower people to change things that affect them is significant. She is currently a Member of the Educational Council of European Youth Parliament representing Cyprus and she is the Vice President of the University of Cyprus Alumni Association. She is also a science communicator and gives lectures and workshops for children and young adults. In 2016, she participated in the national competition of Famelab Cyprus, where she was nominated as a runner-up. Her research interests revolve around the areas of Sociolinguistics and Psycholinguistics with focus on Language Acquisition and more specifically bilingualism and bidialectalism, language policy and language contact, especially between Cypriot Greek and Cypriot Turkish.