" Language, Culture and Identity in Language Education "in collaboration with Sofia University “St Kliment Ohridski” & The European Centre for Education and Training, Sofia 8–10 /03/ 2013

But what culture ?

In a world strongly influenced as much by (social) media and the Internet as by local environment, is it possible to define our individual cultural background as clearly and easily as once seemed to be the case ?

In a world where we are all encouraged to become plurilingual, where communicating with friends, family and acquaintances in far flung corners of the earth on a regular basis is now commonplace, does the phenomenon of learning a range of languages and experiencing a range of communities impact on our sense of identity ? If so, how should language education professionals respond ?

What bearing does this have, for example, on the notion of linguistic authenticity ? What should a language teacher’s aims be ? Does the “communicative approach” apply to all environments ? Or should we follow the “lexical approach” or a “cultural approach” ? When we design testing materials, do we include sufficient intercultural elements in the tasks or the assessment criteria ? And, if not, should we ? What impact is the rapid development and deployment of the new technologies, and in particular second life, having on the learning styles and sense of identity of the language learner ?

These are just some of the issues that we shall be addressing Our 2013 conference we are honoured to host Michael Byram and Jean-Claude Lasnier, both leading international authorities in this field as guest speakers.

More information

Call for papers

The ICC invites papers and workshop sessions from all those involved in language education : teaching, materials design, testing, teacher training, research, project representatives, as well as employers concerned with language, culture and identity in multilingual and multicultural environments.

The conference focuses on these key issues in language education and will concentrate on areas such as :

Teacher and Learner Identity and implications for the classroom

Intercultural comprehension and expectations in education

ICT and the impact of social media

What is an authentic language user ?

The socio-economic impact of language competence (for example, for groups such as migrants)

As always, the ICC seeks to maintain a balance in contributions between the conceptual and the practical. We would like sessions to be both informative and interactive, enabling practitioners to adopt new ideas put forward by contributors and apply them to their own professional situation.

Send a brief abstract / workshop to 31st January 2013 Sessions are scheduled in blocks of 45 minutes, but double sessions (2x 45’) are also possible, if required.