Uta Helfrich is Professor of Spanish and French Linguistics in the Department of Romance Philology at the University of Göttingen, Germany.

Her lines of research include diachronic and synchronic aspects of discourse analysis and variational linguistics (e.g. political discourse, journalistic discourse, digital discourses), linguistic change (syntax, semantics and pragmatics), and language awareness and ideologies.

She was a member of the R&D Project The metalinguistic discourse in the Spanish press (1940- today): Multidimensional Analysis and Generic Characterization (METAPRES), funded by the Ministry of Economy and Finance (FFI2015-65917-P, 2016-2019). At present she collaborates in the R + D + i Project Linguistic columnism in the Spanish press since its origins: Multidimensional analysis, characterization and applications (METAPRES-COLING) of the Ministry of Science and Innovation (PID2019-107265GB-I00) and in the Project I + D + i The metalinguistic discourse on "woman and language" in the Spanish press: Analysis of the linguistic debate and its social impact (DISMUPREN) of the Andalusian Research, Development and Innovation Plan (PAIDI 2020) (P18-RT-1300).

She is co-editor of several monographic volumes of the CLAC magazine (No. 62, 64 and 73): Markers of discourse and syntax (2015; together with María Vittoria Calvi), Types of discourse and pragmatics (2015; together with María Vittoria Calvi) and Linguistic attenuation in digital discourses (2018; together with Ana Pano Alamán). She also published a book on Cortesia - politesse - cortesía. La cortesia verbale nella prospettiva romanistica / La politesse verbale dans une perspective romaniste / Verbal courtesy from the romanistic perspective. Aspetti teorici e applicazioni / Aspects théoriques et applications / Aspectos teóricos y aplicaciones (2011; together with Gudrun Held) at the Peter Lang publishing house.

In addition to being a member of the Board of Directors of the Association for Discourse Linguistics (ALD), she is also a member of the Editorial Board of the journal Círculo de linguística applied a la comunicación (Univ. Complutense de Madrid), the Scientific Council of the Internationaler Arbeitskreis Sprache, Geschichte, Politik und Kommunikation, the Scientific Council of Power, Discourse and Society Book Series and of Theoretical and Empirical Linguistics. She organised several panels at congresses and symposiums, including "Europa - zur sprachlichen Dekonstruktion und Rekonstruktion eines Konzepts" at the University of Graz (2019, together with Sabine Heinemann and Judith Visser), "Linguistic ideology, discourse and multilingualism", on account of 42. Österreichische Linguistentagung, Graz 2016 (with Alla Klimenkowa) and "Open Questions in Discourse Linguistics", on account of the 43rd Spanish Linguistics Society Symposium, Ciudad Real 2014 (with Maria Vittoria Calvi). Her expertise concerns institutions such as Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) and Oesterreichische Forschungsgemeinschaft (OEFG), and scientific journals such as Language Circle applied to Communication, International Journal of Latin American Linguistics, Sociolinguistics, Texts in Process, AISPI Carnets, Circula - Revue d'idéologies linguistiques, Zeitschrift für französische Sprache und Literatur, Zeitschrift für Romanische Philologie and Romanistisches Jahrbuch.

He participated as a teacher in various summer courses at the Menéndez Pelayo International University (Santander) on "Journalistic texts as educational material for the teaching of Spanish: articles on the language" (2016, 2017) and on "New perspectives on discourse linguistics in the teaching of second languages"(2014), as well as in the ERASMUS workshop "Intercultural Pragmatics and Translation” (2014, Univ. of Santiago de Compostela) and in the DAAD workshop on the topic "Specialised speech and discourse marking in Romance languages” (2013, University of Milan).