Multilingualism in the Digital Age Conference – 19 June 2015

The Department of English Language and Applied Linguistics was delighted to host the 1st International Conference on Multilingualism in the Digital Age on the 19th of June 2015. The aim of this conference was to bring together scholars from various disciplines, interested in the investigation of multilingualism and language use in digital media.

Our influential keynote speakers, Professor Alexandra Georgakopoulou (King’s College London) and Professor Yaron Matras (University of Manchester) presented innovative work studying the representation of Eurocrisis on YouTube (Prof Georgakopoulou) and the ownership of language in social media (Prof Matras).

Findings from original case studies were also presented by seven scholars coming from institutions in the UK (e.g. Newcastle, London and Lancaster) as well as from abroad (e.g. Canada, Spain and Italy). Multilingualism was investigated in various digital media including Twitter, Websites, Facebook and video games.  More than 50 delegates from as far as South Africa and Canada attended this one-day event and shared engaging discussions on the topics presented.

Here are some comments from our delegates:

‘Excellent organisation, very friendly environment and it was great to establish academic links’

‘Excellent speakers from all over the UK and abroad. Learned so much in one day’

‘A wonderful and successful conference. We have learned a lot by exchanging ideas with researchers from other countries’

‘Really good day. Do a similar event soon please!’

Because of the great success of this event and the positive feedback we received from the participants we are now planning a second conference next year! The focus will be on Multilingualism and Immigration. Watch the space!

Christiana Themistocleous & Sylvia Jaworska

 

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