Dorjana Širola (born 9 June 1972) is a

Croatia Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country in Central Europe, Central and Southeast Europe, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. It borders Slovenia to the northwest, Hungary to the northeast, Serbia to the east, Bosnia and Herze ...

quiz A quiz is a form of mind sport in which people attempt to answer questions correctly on one or several topics. Quizzes can be used as a brief Educational assessment, assessment in education and similar fields to measure growth in knowledge, abil ...

zer,

linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

, anglicist and

software tester Software testing is the act of checking whether software satisfies expectations. Software testing can provide objective, independent information about the quality of software and the risk In simple terms, risk is the possibility of someth ...

. She has been the highest placed woman at the World Quizzing Championship from 2005 to 2011, and again from 2013 to 2018 (losing out in 2012 to Anne Hegerty), with seven overall top 20 finishes during this period. She was also the winner of the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

University Challenge ''University Challenge'' is a British television quiz programme which first aired in 1962. ''University Challenge'' aired for 913 episodes on ITV from 21 September 1962 to 31 December 1987, presented by quizmaster Bamber Gascoigne. The BBC ...

(UC) quiz in 2002 as a member of the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

Somerville College Somerville College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. It was founded in 1879 as Somerville Hall, one of its first two women's colleges. It began admitting men in 1994. The college's liberal tone derives from its f ...

team and the winner of the University Challenge: The Professionals (UCP) quiz in 2006 as a member of the

Bodleian Library The Bodleian Library () is the main research library of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1602 by Sir Thomas Bodley, it is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. With over 13 million printed items, it is the second-largest library in ...

team. She is the only person to have won both UC and UCP and the only person who has won University Challenge twice on two different teams. She also appeared on the BBC series Only Connect with a team called the 'Junipers'. At the European Quizzing Championships she has won Gold (2017), three Silvers (2011, 2012, 2018) and two Bronzes (2014, 2015) with her club "Europalia" (Derk de Graaf (Belgium/Netherlands), Thomas Kolåsæter (Norway), Holger Waldenberger (Germany)), as well as a Bronze in Pairs with Holger Waldenberger (2012). European Quizzing Championships#Pairs champions Since 2015 she has captained the Croatian national quizzing team. She obtained her B.A. in General Linguistics and

English Language English is a West Germanic language that developed in early medieval England and has since become a English as a lingua franca, global lingua franca. The namesake of the language is the Angles (tribe), Angles, one of the Germanic peoples th ...

and

Literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

from the

University of Zagreb The University of Zagreb (, ) is a public university, public research university in Zagreb, Croatia. It is the largest Croatian university and one of the oldest continuously operating universities in Europe. The University of Zagreb and the Unive ...

in 1996; her M.Phil. in English and

Applied Linguistics Applied linguistics is an interdisciplinary field which identifies, investigates, and offers solutions to language-related real-life problems. Some of the academic fields related to applied linguistics are education, psychology, Communication stu ...

from the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

, Trinity Hall in 1998 ; her D.Phil. in Comparative Philology and General Linguistics from the

in 2005; and her MSc in

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

from the

University of Kent The University of Kent (formerly the University of Kent at Canterbury, abbreviated as UKC) is a Collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university based in Kent, United Kingdom. The university was granted its roya ...

in 2016. Her area of research covers

writing system A writing system comprises a set of symbols, called a ''script'', as well as the rules by which the script represents a particular language. The earliest writing appeared during the late 4th millennium BC. Throughout history, each independen ...

s, writing-

phonology Phonology (formerly also phonemics or phonematics: "phonemics ''n.'' 'obsolescent''1. Any procedure for identifying the phonemes of a language from a corpus of data. 2. (formerly also phonematics) A former synonym for phonology, often pre ...

interface;

historical linguistics Historical linguistics, also known as diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of how languages change over time. It seeks to understand the nature and causes of linguistic change and to trace the evolution of languages. Historical li ...

comparative linguistics Comparative linguistics is a branch of historical linguistics that is concerned with comparing languages to establish their historical relatedness. Genetic relatedness implies a common origin or proto-language and comparative linguistics aim ...

, Restsprachen and language variation. Having worked for a decade as a lecturer at the University of Rijeka in

Rijeka Rijeka (; Fiume ( �fjuːme in Italian and in Fiuman dialect, Fiuman Venetian) is the principal seaport and the List of cities and towns in Croatia, third-largest city in Croatia. It is located in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County on Kvarner Ba ...

, she moved to the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

and left academia for a career in IT. She lives in

Canterbury Canterbury (, ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and UNESCO World Heritage Site, in the county of Kent, England; it was a county borough until 1974. It lies on the River Stour, Kent, River Stour. The city has a mild oceanic climat ...

References

External links

Dorjana Širola on Academia.eduDorjana Širola on Facebook
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sirola, Dorjana 1972 births Living people Linguists from Croatia Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb alumni Alumni of Trinity Hall, Cambridge Alumni of Somerville College, Oxford Alumni of the University of Kent Quiz championship players People from Rijeka