Postdoctoral Research Associate

Unlocking your career. Be part of something bigger.

Here at the University of Edinburgh there’s a career for everyone. We can offer opportunities for you to develop in your career and make a real difference in the communities around us whilst contributing to the world at large. Our people come from a wide range of backgrounds, each bringing their abilities and experiences to our organisation.

The University of Edinburgh is a world-class organisation. We look for the best in the field across all disciplines and provide a working environment where academics can develop their careers and passion for their chosen subject area. We offer the full range of academic roles and have a genuine focus on our student’s performance and wellbeing.

The successful candidate will work alongside Co-I Dr Lisa Gotthard to contribute to the project ‘INTSAYT: Investigating and Treebanking Scots and Yiddish Together’ funded by the ESRC. The researcher will conduct research within morpho-syntactic variation and change in the history of Scots, and the methodology of annotating parsed corpora (treebanks), contributing to the development of new ideas, approaches, concepts and techniques.

This post is a full-time (35 hours per week), fixed term post for 36 months available from January 2027.

Informal enquiries may be made to Dr Lisa Gothard (l.gotthard@ed.ac.uk).

View the full job description (opens in a new browser tab)

As a valued member of our team, you can expect:

• A competitive salary.
• An exciting, positive, creative, challenging and rewarding place to work.
• To be part of a diverse and vibrant international community.
• Comprehensive Staff Benefits, including generous annual leave entitlement, a defined benefits pension scheme, a wide range of staff discounts, family-friendly initiatives, and flexible work options. Check out the full list on our staff benefits page and use our reward calculator to discover the value of your pay and benefits.

The University of Edinburgh holds a Silver Athena SWAN award in recognition of our commitment to advance gender equality in higher education. We are members of the Race Equality Charter, and we are also a Stonewall Proud Employer, actively promoting LGBTQ+ equality.

We particularly welcome applications from eligible candidates from under-represented groups, including racially minoritised individuals and all gender identities.

Prior to any employment commencing with the University, you will be required to evidence your right to work in the UK. Further information is available on our right to work webpages .

The University may be able to sponsor the employment of international workers in this role. This will depend on a number of factors specific to the successful applicant.

The closing date for applications is 5 October 2026.

Unless stated otherwise the closing time for applications is 11:59pm UK time. If you are applying outside the UK the closing time on our adverts automatically adjusts to your browsers local time zone.

We ask you to include a cover letter into the online application portal, along with a CV. These documents must be uploaded in all cases. We invite candidates to use their cover letter to highlight professional and personal experiences that are relevant to role.

Applicants do not need to submit references when applying, however we do ask that the names and contact details of 3 potential referees be included as part of your CV or cover letter. We will seek letters of reference for those shortlisted for interview unless specifically stated otherwise on the application form.

As a School we acknowledge that people’s career paths are rarely linear and welcome applicants to expand on their professional and personal journeys where appropriate.

More information on how to submit your application can be found here.

As a world-leading research-intensive University, we are here to address tomorrow’s greatest challenges. Between now and 2030 we will do that with a values-led approach to teaching, research and innovation, and through the strength of our relationships, both locally and globally.