Dear Langscape members,

please, find attached the following announcement of the conference “The Future of Multilingualism in the German Education System” taking place in Berlin between the 3rd and 4th of March 2016.

Detailed information: sprachen2016.de

Although half the world’s population is multilingual and the number of multilingual citizens in Germany is steadily increasing, multilingualism is still perceived not as an opportunity but as an obstacle on the way to a successful societal integration. Furthermore, multilingualism is beneficial in many ways and is a huge resource for today’s society. Being capable of speaking three languages is one of the primary education policy goals of the European Union and the support of multilingual development offers a solid basis for the further course of life.

Roughly twenty percent of the population in Germany uses one more language other than German within their families. Thus, hundreds of thousands of children in Germany are raised multilingually. The number of people who use Russian and Turkish along with German in everyday life is the highest.

German educational institutions have reacted fairly slowly to the fact that more and more children are being raised multilingually. Even though there are many bilingual kindergartens and schools in which bilingual education incorporates the languages spoken in Germany, education in the language of origin still remains at the margin nationwide. In this situation, the demand is considerably greater than the supply and is certainly not limited to Turkish and Russian.

It is the goal of the conference »The Future of Multilingualism in the German Education System: Russian and Turkish in Focus« to make a scientific and pedagogical-methodical contribution to current research and to the implementation of Turkish and Russian in the educational context. The conference aims at fostering the exchange between experts from the fields of multilingualism research and education policy, and from educational institutions and migrant associations. Thereby, the awareness of the benefits of multilingualism will be promoted and a positive attitude towards multilingualism and multilingual language acquisition among children will be reinforced. Scientific knowledge will be made more accessible for more immediate implementation.

In plenary presentations with invited speakers and numerous workshops, current issues in multilingualism will be discussed and presented to a broader public; examples for »good practice« will be introduced. The participation of international researchers enables intense discussions of various aspects of multilingualism and the experience of various countries can be shared. For instance, the issue of the necessity of regular language assessments and their particularities in multilingual children will be raised and the significance of holistic/crosslinguistic language support in early childhood and in kindergarten will be discussed, as well as the role of a home language, bilingual literacy, intercultural competence and the potential of language support programs in schools.

Dear friends and colleagues in Langscape,

Please find below the call for papers for a conference on Languages and Cultures organised by the Languages and Cultures Department at Sheffield Hallam University. The organizers hope to welcome many colleagues from within and outside the UK.

Kind regards,

Bettina Kaiser

Languages and Cultures in 21st Century Transnationality CFP
Languages and Cultures at Sheffield Hallam University,
City Campus, Sheffield, S1 1WB
Friday 9 and Saturday 10 September 2016
Abstract deadline: 31 March 2016

The concept of transnationality is increasingly common currency in the globalized world.
Modern Languages, both implicitly or explicitly, deals with the transnational aspects of cultures and, as a discipline, it is hence ideally suited to have societal impact on the construction of transnational education. Intercultural citizenship, in particular, is becoming a sine qua non in the Twenty-First Century. Modern Languages poses multicultural and multilingual questions about identity, subjectivity and alterity of past, present and future. As academics we represent institutional power and theoretical knowledge; we are mediators between theoretical processes of conceptualization and practical moments of interpretation; information brokers and hence in the fortunate positions to bring about social change.

The aim of the conference is to bring together scholars from Applied Linguistics, Intercultural Studies and European Cultural Studies to create intercultural and interdisciplinary synergies that go beyond national borders, linguistic silos or academic canons, and thus echo practices of human mobility. Themes of particular interest in the three streams include, but are not limited to:

Applied Linguistics:
·       CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning), technology-enhanced learning, film as teaching tool
·       language acquisition, language planning
·       learner autonomy, student engagement
·       multilingualism, translation
·       discourse analysis

Intercultural Studies:
·       citizenship, identity, multiculturalism, nationhood, race
·       intercultural awareness, communication, competence, education, management
·       tourism, postcolonialism
·       international student migration

European Cultural Studies:
·       the transnational currency of popular cultural products
·       translations, transpositions, transmediality
·       synergies/dialogues across national cultures
·       intersections of culture with other fields/disciplines (history, law, literature, sociology, technology)
·       dialogues across sociocultural strata (e.g. popular and elite cultures)
·       fluidity of identity

We invite proposals for 20-min papers; proposals for panels are also welcome. 250-word abstracts should be submitted by 31 March 2016 to Dr Anja Louis at: a.louis@shu.ac.uk Abstracts should include the author’s name, affiliation and email address.

Please specify ‘Languages and Cultures Conference’ in the subject of your email.
We will acknowledge receipt of all abstracts submitted. If you do not receive a reply from us within two weeks, you should assume we did not receive your email.

Dear LANGSCAPE members,

please, find attached the announcement of the next DILTEC event:

DILTEC colloque international

“Ethique et responsabilité pour la didactique des langues au XXIe siècle”

October 21 and 22, 2016

Sorbonne Nouvelle-Paris 3, Paris

Ethique 1er appel colloque diltec 2016 final avec bonne adresse

Kind regards

Bettina Kaiser