Tag: Minho (Page 1 of 2)

New Camões Lectureship at the University of Konstanz

June 6, 2022 / Sophie Bennett

From left to right: Dr. Fátima Silva (Camões Institute), Dr. Filipa Gonçalves (Konstanz), Professor Georg Kaiser (Konstanz), and Professor Cristina Flores (HL2C, Minho).

Thursday, May 5, 2022, marked World Portuguese Language Day and the creation of a new Lectureship for the teaching of Portuguese at the University of Konstanz. The event included a lecture by Professor Cristina Flores, HL2C Vice Director, exploring the theme “Portugiesisch in der Diaspora: Erwerb und Erhalt einer Familiensprache” (Portuguese in the diaspora: Learning and Preservation of a spoken language in a family context). The new Portuguese Lectureship is co-funded by the Camões Institute and the University of Konstanz, and will be based at the Department of Linguistics (Fachbereich Linguistik/Sprachlehrinstitut).

HLAW 2022: Thank you, Lisbon, and see you in Amherst!

June 6, 2022 / Sophie Bennett

HLAW organizers and keynotes. From left to right: Professor Peter Austin (SOAS), Professor Sílvia Melo-Pfeifer (Hamburg), Professor Jason Rothman (Tromsø), Professor Ana Lúcia Santos (HL2C, Lisbon), Professor Naomi Nagy (Toronto), Professor Cristina Flores (HL2C, Lisbon), Professor Luiz Amaral (HL2C, Amherst).

The Heritage Languages Around the World (HLAW) conference took place between May 18-20, 2022, at the University of Lisbon, one of the HL2C founding institutions. The meeting was originally scheduled to take place in 2020 but had to be postponed due to the pandemic. But it was well worth the wait! HLAW 2022 was a joyful and uniting event that brought together leading scientists and students from linguistics, psychology and education to share novel research in the domain of heritage language research.

Many congratulations to the organizers, Ana Lúcia Santos, Cristina Flores, Hugo Cardoso and Luiz Amaral, for a wonderful event, and thank you to the Centro de Linguística (CLUL, The University of Lisbon), Centro de Estudos Humanísticos (CEHUM, The University of Minho), the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and the Camões Institute, for supporting this important event.

The conference remains a regular event of the Heritage Language 2 Consortium (HL2C), and we already look forward to the next edition of HLAW, to take place at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in June 2024!

The participants of HLAW 2022. Thank you to the organizers, keynotes and all those who attended to make this a special event. See you in Amherst for HLAW 2024!

International Conference on Heritage Languages Around the World in two weeks!

May 4, 2022 / Sophie Bennett

Only two weeks remain until the International Conference on Heritage Languages Around the World (HLAW), an exciting event taking place in person which brings together various research perspectives on heritage languages in order to contribute to a better understanding of the effects of language development and education in immigrant and minority language communities around the world.

Dates and location: 18^th to 20^th May 2022, University of Lisbon.

Organisers: HL2C members Ana Lúcia Santos (Lisbon), Cristina Flores (Minho), Luiz Amaral (UMass Amherst) and Hugo Cardoso (Lisbon) and by their respective institutions, Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, Centro de Estudos Humanísticos da Universidade do Minho, the Portuguese Program and the Heritage Language Research Group at UMass Amherst.

Programme: The programme is available here. The four keynote speakers are as follows

Peter Austin (University of London)
Issues and challenges in language endangerment and heritage languages: some Australian examples
Sílvia Melo-Pfeifer (University of Hamburg)
At the interface of heritage language learning and teacher education: motorways, short-cuts and no-go areas
Naomi Nagy (University of Toronto)
Promoting linguistic and cultural diversity through Heritage Language Sociolinguistics
Jason Rothman (University of Tromso)
Theoretical Epistemology and Methodology in Heritage Language Bilingualism

How to register: To register, please consider the payment information available on the website and fill in the form available here.

For more information, please see the HLAW website or contact heritage.languages.conference@gmail.com.

Conference: Principles and Practices of Training in Foreign Languages

April 26, 2022 / Sophie Bennett

On 20^th and 21^st June 2022, the IV Conference on Principles and Practices of Training in Foreign Languages will take place at the Auditório da Escola de Letras e Ciências Humanas, The University of Minho, organised by the directorates of the Masters in Spanish as a Second Language/Foreign Language, Portuguese and German Studies, and Portuguese as a Second Language/Foreign Language. Its purpose is to bring together students from these courses and from other ELACH Masters, as well as researchers and teachers interested in issues related to foreign languages and the learning, acquisition and teaching processes that underlie them. Thus, these Conferences are, since their first edition, a space for reflection and debate, with a multilingual, multicultural and intergenerational focus.

HL2C YouTube Channel now online!

March 11, 2022 / Patrick Rebuschat

HL2C YouTube Channel now online

It is a pleasure to announce that the HL2C YouTube Channel is now up and running. We are using this channel to share video content of activities involving the Consortium and its constituent partner institutions.

You can access our channel by clicking this link.

We grateful to the speakers of our HL2C Seminar Series for their stimulating talks and for agreeing to share the recordings with the wider heritage language and second language community. Thank you also to Luiz Amaral, who suggested the creation of this channel, and to Sophie Bennett for editing the videos and co-managing the channel.

We hope you enjoy the YouTube Channel!

Congratulations to HL2C Vice Director Cristina Flores: Habilitation (agregação)

February 25, 2022 / Patrick Rebuschat

Congratulations to HL2C Vice Director Professor Cristina Flores for successfully concluding her Portuguese Habilitation (agregação) examination earlier this week. The Habilitation is the highest university degree in European countries such as Germany and Portugal, requiring excellence in research, teaching, and academic leadership.

The public examination took place on February 21 and 22, with a panel consisting of Professor Isabel Ermida (Chair, Minho), Professor Anabela Gonçalves (Lisbon), Professor Georg Kaiser (Konstanz), Professor Jürgen Meisel (Hamburg), Professor Patrick Rebuschat (Lancaster University), and Professor Augusto Soares da Silva (Católica). The panel commended Cristina for her outstanding track-record in research, teaching and service and approved the candidate unanimously.

Standing, from left to right: Professor Anabela Gonçalves (Lisbon), Professor Cristina Flores (Minho), Professor Isabel Ermida (Minho), and Professor Augusto Soares da Silva (Católica). Participating via Zoom, on screen, from left to right: Professor Patrick Rebuschat (Lancaster University), Professor Jürgen Meisel (Hamburg), and Professor Georg Kaiser (Konstanz).

HL2C Seminar: Montserrat Comesaña (Minho), The representational nature of grammatical gender: The relevance of language transparency

February 16, 2022 / Sophie Bennett

We are pleased to announce the next HL2C seminar, taking place on Thursday 24th February from 3pm-4pm GMT (Dublin, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London).

Presenter:

Montserrat Comesaña (Minho)

Title:

The representational nature of grammatical gender: The relevance of language transparency

How to join:

Our seminars are free to attend. Simply sign up to the HL2C Mailing List to receive the link to join us via Microsoft Teams link. You do not need a Teams account to access the talk.

Abstract:

The study of the representation and processing of grammatical gender during noun lexical access in language production has reached controversial results across languages. For Germanic and Slavic languages, a context of agreement has been widely found to be necessary for the emergence of gender competitive effects (e.g., slower responses when two nouns of different gender compete for selection than when these nouns are of same gender –gender congruency effect). For Romance languages, the results are instead puzzling, since some studies find that this context of agreement is necessary, but others do not. Thus, available evidence seems to support the idea that gender nodes would behave differently across language families. The picture is even more clouded with bilingual populations. Late bilinguals who carried out naming and translation tasks showed a gender congruency effect (i.e., faster responses for gender-congruent translation pairs) independently from the language family and the presence of an agreement context. The reason behind the effects obtained with late bilinguals of Germanic languages producing bare nouns (BNs) remains unknown. Here, we will present a series of experiments which are aimed at testing the tenets of a recent hypothesis developed in our lab: the Gender Acquisition and Processing (GAP) hypothesis. This hypothesis explains data discrepancies across studies with native speakers of different languages as a result of differences in the basal activation level of gender nodes due to the disparity in the degree of phonological gender transparency of each language. Also, it explain the findings with late bilinguals as a result of the way second languages (L2s) are learned and used.

Call for papers : Special issue, Diacrítica

December 17, 2021 / Sophie Bennett

Revista Diacrítica has recently published a call for papers for a special issue on “Teaching, learning and acquisition of foreign languages – interconnections”. Diacrítica is a multidisciplinary journal, edited by the Center for Humanistic Studies of the University of Minho (CEHUM), one of the HL2C founding institutions. For questions about the special issue, please email the editors below or visit the journal website.

Submission deadline: February 28, 2022

Online submission: Please follow the link

About the volume:

Editors: Jorge Pinto (CLUL), Lili Cavalheiro (CEAUL), Maria del Carmen Fondo (FLUL), Ana Cea (CEHUM)

Teaching, learning and acquisition of foreign languages – interconnections

The purpose of this thematic volume is to present recent studies that explore relevant issues related to the acquisition, learning, and teaching of foreign languages in different contexts, highlighting the heterogeneity and complexity that characterize them. Regardless of the different target languages on which research is carried out, in many cases their outcomes and implications may be transferred to the teaching and learning of other languages.

As the fields of acquisition and teaching and learning intersect, this volume aims to gather papers that do not exclusively focus on acquisition theories, but also address aspects of linguistics applied to the teaching and learning of foreign languages.

Finally, considering that the foreign language learning/teaching landscape has greatly changed in the last few decades, we expect works that reflect this, especially concerning multilingual contexts of classrooms. For example, the role of previously acquired languages, teachers’ attitudes towards multilingual approaches, and the advantages of a pedagogy which promotes the students’ interlinguistic development (e.g., translanguaging) versus monolingual bias.

In short, this thematic volume adopts a broad approach on the concepts of foreign language acquisition, teaching and learning, namely: 1) how foreign languages may be more easily learned and acquired, 2) which difficulties may arise when learning a foreign language, and 3) how foreign language learning has changed in view of our increasing multilingual society.

Considering the specific focus of this volume, articles related to sign language (e.g., LIBRAS, LGP) will not be considered for submission.

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Título do volume: Ensino/aprendizagem e aquisição de línguas estrangeiras – interconexões

Prazo de submissão: 28 de fevereiro de 2022

Submissão online em:http://diacritica.ilch.uminho.pt/index.php/dia/about/submissions

Apresentação do volume:

Este volume temático pretende reunir estudos atuais que explorem questões relevantes relacionadas com a aquisição, aprendizagem e ensino de línguas estrangeiras em diversos contextos, salientando a heterogeneidade e a complexidade que as caracterizam. Entende-se que, independentemente das diferentes línguas-alvo sobre as quais os estudos são realizados, os resultados obtidos e as suas implicações, em muitas situações, podem ser aplicados ao ensino e aprendizagem de outras línguas.

Como as áreas da aquisição e do ensino e aprendizagem se cruzam, pretende-se congregar trabalhos que não se concentram exclusivamente em teorias de aquisição, mas que abordem também aspetos da linguística aplicada ao ensino e aprendizagem de línguas estrangeiras.

Por fim, considerando que o panorama do ensino e aprendizagem de línguas estrangeiras mudou muito nas últimas décadas, esperam-se trabalhos em que isto se reflita, sobretudo considerando os contextos multilingues das salas de aula. Por exemplo, o papel das línguas previamente adquiridas, as atitudes dos professores em relação às abordagens plurilingues e os benefícios de uma pedagogia que promova o desenvolvimento interlinguístico (e.g. translanguaging) dos alunos versus o preconceito monolingue.

Em suma, este volume temático visa adotar uma abordagem ampla sobre os conceitos de aquisição, ensino e aprendizagem de uma língua estrangeira, a saber: 1) como as línguas estrangeiras podem ser mais eficazmente aprendidas e adquiridas, 2) quais as dificuldades que podem surgir na aprendizagem de uma língua estrangeira e 3) como a aprendizagem de línguas estrangeiras mudou, considerando a nossa sociedade multilingue em crescimento.

Tendo em conta o foco específico do volume, não serão considerados artigos para submissão relacionados com a linguagem gestual (e.g. LIBRAS, LGP).

Editores:

Jorge Pinto (CLUL)

Lili Cavalheiro (CEAUL)

Maria del Carmen Fondo (FLUL)

Ana Cea (CEHUM)

PhD Defense: Joana Zahner da Silva Matos, University of Minho

October 16, 2021 / Sophie Bennett

On Friday, 22nd October, 2021, at 2pm (GMT), Joana Zahner da Silva Matos will defend her PhD thesis in Language Sciences, German Linguistics to a panel at The University of Minho. The PhD defense is a public event, and you can join by clicking on the Zoom link below. For more information, please see below.

Title:

“Kland, Kländer, Klanden? Aquisição do plural por falantes portugueses de alemão língua segunda”

How to join:

The defense will be presented via Zoom. The link to the event is provided below, along with the ID code and Password.

Zoom: Please click here to join. ID: 884 4660 8616. Password: 280633.

Abstract:

In the acquisition of the nominal morphology of German as a first language (L1) plural markers appear early but their stabilisation occurs late, around 6 years of age (Kauschke et al., 2011). As far as the acquisition of German as a second language (L2) is concerned, most empirical studies have focused on the successive acquisition of two languages in childhood (Günay, 2016). These show that L2 children at an initial stage also employ overgeneralization strategies and that the differences with respect to L1 acquisition are quantitative rather than qualitative in nature. The present experimental study focuses on the acquisition of the German plural by native speakers of European Portuguese (EP) who started acquiring German from adolescence onwards. We aim to abstract the pluralization patterns applied by these speakers, identifying the strategies used in the initial phase of acquisition and assessing whether crosslinguistic influence effects are observable. The influence that certain linguistic and extralinguistic factors, such as lexical knowledge, amount and type of exposure to the target language and motivation, may have on the selection of L2 plural morphemes is also analysed.

We tested 120 speakers, divided into three groups: L2 (n=80), 2L1 (n=20) and L1 (n=20). The linguistic tasks applied include a lexical decision test, a plural elicitation task with nonce words and an elicitation task targeting the case system. In addition, a detailed sociolinguistic questionnaire was also applied. The main results show that at an early stage of acquisition L2 speakers employ pluralisation strategies based on frequency criteria and much more gender-based when compared to L1 and 2L1 speakers. Higher proficiency levels, as well as greater exposure to the target language and greater motivation are significantly associated with a progression in pluralisation patterns and the production of later-acquired plurals. The reduced use of the {-s} morpheme, that is the regular plural marker in Portuguese, shows that it was not overgeneralised and that there is no crosslinguistic influence from the L1. The 2L1 speakers are very close to the L1 speakers as far as the use of plural morphemes is concerned. However, as they are returnee speakers, some effects of the reduced exposure to German on the later acquired forms can already be observed, which may be interpreted as effects of language attrition.

Keywords: L2 German; late L2 acquisition; 2L1 returnee speakers; plural.

Members of the PhD committee:

Prof. Isabel Cristina Costa Alves Ermida (President), Escola de Letras, Artes e Ciências Humanas da Universidade do Minho.

Prof. Ana Maria Lavadinho Madeira, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa;

Prof. Ana Margarida Abrantes, Faculdade de Ciências Humanas da Universidade Católica;

Prof. Maria do Pilar Barbosa, Escola de Letras, Artes e Ciências Humanas da Universidade do Minho;

Prof. Cristina Maria Moreira Flores (supervisor), Escola de Letras, Artes e Ciências Humanas da Universidade do Minho;

Prof. Idalete Maria Silva Dias, Escola de Letras, Artes e Ciências Humanas da Universidade do Minho.

HLAW Conference 2022

September 15, 2021 / Patrick Rebuschat

We are pleased to announce the International Conference on Heritage Languages Around the World (HLAW), which will take place at the University of Lisbon in May 2022. The conference is co-organized by Consortium members Ana Lúcia Santos (Lisbon), Cristina Flores (Minho), Luiz Amaral (UMass Amherst) and Hugo Cardoso (Lisbon) and by their respective institutions, Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, Centro de Estudos Humanísticos da Universidade do Minho, the Portuguese Program and the Heritage Language Research Group at UMass Amherst.

For more information, please visit the conference website.

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