2023 Conference

Hispanic? Sociolinguistics at a Crossroads

X International Conference of Hispanic Linguistics

VIII Biennial Meeting of the International Association for the Study of Spanish in Society

University of Liverpool, 8 - 9 June 2023

Conference programme - click here

Book of abstracts - click here

Plenary Speakers

Prof Anna De Fina (Georgetown University)
Dr Miguel Pérez-Milans (University College London)

Book Launch

Professor Rosaleen Howard, Professor Emerita in the School of Modern Languages, Newcastle University, will present her latest book: Multilingualism in the Andes: Policies, Politics, Power (Routledge Critical Studies in Multilingualism).

The launch will include a Q&A with the author and with the series editor, Professor Marilyn Martin Jones, Professor Emerita at the Mosaic Group, School of Education, University of Birmingham.

Deadlines

Submission of abstracts: 30 November 2022
Notification of acceptance: 15 January 2023
Early-bird registration: until 31 March 2023
Late registration: until 30 April 2023

Registration Fees

You can access ticket details and further information at our Eventbrite link.

Early-bird standard rate: £180
Early-bird students and concessions: £120
Late registration standard rate: £220
Late registration students and concessions: £160

Note regarding online participation: We are planning to hold the conference in person. However, we acknowledge that some researchers are usually excluded because of the cost of travel and the exorbitant price of the conferences; as such, we can make arrangements for online/hybrid participation if you are unable to attend. If you cannot participate on-site, or would prefer to present online, please indicate this in your proposal.

Online participation standard rate: £60
Online participation concessions: £40

Conference Theme

At this particular juncture in academic scholarship we are rethinking approaches to research in Hispanic sociolinguistics, prompted in part by the pandemic but also by developments in the wider fields of sociolinguistics and Hispanic Studies. This conference, then, will bring together scholars working in Hispanic sociolinguistics to explore the novel ways in which we do research, especially in light of the challenges of the ongoing pandemic. The event will bring various groups into dialogue, opening the floor to the innovative ways in which scholars can address contemporary research problems and questions and become actively involved in advancing the field of Hispanic sociolinguistics.

The following questions will guide the conference:

Who does the term ‘Hispanic’ include/exclude? While past conferences have sought to foreground both the pluricentric nature of Spanish and the multilingualism of the Spanish-speaking world, how do we respond to wider discussions concerning the limitations of the term ‘Hispanic’ as a potentially homogenising label that reinforces the colonial centre?
How do we foreground/address social justice in our work? As recent linguistics research has sought to foreground the centrality of language in connection to ideas of race and reproducing structural violence (Avineri, Graham, Johnson, Conley Riner and Rosa 2019), how do we as researchers seek to address and further social justice through our work?
How do we address the effects of the pandemic and travel restrictions on sociolinguistic research methods? In light of travel restrictions imposed by the pandemic, as well as longer term technological developments, what new sociolinguistic methods have and should be developed to respond to rapidly changing research contexts?

In addition to keynote presentations and thematic panels, the conference programme will include coffee breaks, extended lunch breaks, a closing reception and an evening meal (all of which are included in the registration fee) to allow for more informal networking opportunities. Please note that we are planning to hold the conference in person.

We invite proposals (for thematic panels and individual presentations) from any of the following linguistic disciplines or approaches, in line with the conference theme:

Sociolinguistics
Sociology of Language
Dialectology
Bilingualism and Language Contact
Pragmatics
Discourse Analysis
Applied Linguistics
Corpus Linguistics
Historical Linguistics
Intercultural Communication
Linguistic Anthropology
Language Teaching and Pedagogy

Submission guidelines

Abstracts should be sent to spanishinsocietysis@gmail.com as a Word attachment containing the title of the paper and a 300 word max. description of the proposed talk, including: the aims, methodology and main findings of the study upon which it is based, as well as a list of bibliographical references. Contact details (name, affiliation and postal/electronic address) should be included only in the body of the email, together with the title of the paper.

If you wish to propose a panel (rather than an individual presentation), please provide the following in one Word document:

title of the panel
name of the person who will chair the panel
names of the speakers
titles and abstracts for each paper

2021 Webinar Series

Full details of the webinar series can be found here

2020 Bursary Competition

Click here for the bursary competition application form.

2019 Conference

Transnational Perspectives on the Study of Spanish in Society

IX International Conference of Hispanic Linguistics

VII Biennial Meeting of the International Association for the Study of Spanish in Society

University of Edinburgh, 5 - 6 September 2019

You can find this conference on the BAAL Sociolinguistic Events Calendar

Confirmed Plenary Speakers

Jennifer Leeman, George Mason University.
Rosina Márquez Reiter, University of Surrey.

Conference Programme (final version) - click here

Deadlines

Early-bird registration: 10 June 2019
Late registration: 6 August 2019

Practical Information

Here you can find all the practical information you need:

Conference Theme

Languages travel and adapt to the new circumstances faced by their speakers. The growth of the Spanish language has always been transnational in nature, insofar as any expansion has been grounded in cultural and economic exchange. Therefore, at this conference, we wish to bring together those with scholarly interests in the situation of the Spanish language in the contemporary world. Almost twenty years into the new millennium, we want to reflect on how Spanish speakers, be they in their countries of origin or in the diaspora, construct and negotiate concepts of community. How is this achieved by recourse to ideas of borders, migration and contact? How do speakers move beyond notions of physical space, and push social, political, cultural and commercial boundaries, in order to break through the limits imposed on them by nations and continents? (Mar-Molinero and Stewart 2006; Foner 2005; Jackson et al. 2004)

We wish to explore the following questions: Are we at present witnessing processes of homogenisation and standardisation of norms and uses, thanks to the global space in which Spanish speakers move and communicate, all made possible by technological advances, and policies of a Pan-Hispanic nature? Or, in fact, do we find ourselves in an unprecedented social situation which allows language to be more pluricentric, local, innovative and 'superdiverse' than ever before? (Lebsanft, Mihatsch and Polzin-Haumann 2012; Zimmermann 2014; Blommaert 2015; Arnaut 2016) Now is the time to debate what methods and research protocols are the most effective at capturing the complexity that arises from such situations. What does it mean to view things transnationally? How can such a perspective benefit the study of the relationships between Spanish speakers in a global world?

These will be the triggers for discussion at our conference which, three years on, will bring everyone together in Edinburgh, in order to celebrate a hundred years of Hispanic Studies at the University of Edinburgh.