4 March 2016

Clifton Hill House, University of Bristol

An interdisciplinary conference on sociolinguistics, anthropology and sociology.

Registration ¦ Travel and Accommodation

Keynote speaker: Professor Ben Rampton (Kings College London)

Language learnt in London: Breaking the mould in sociolinguistics and second language acquisition

Sociolinguistics and second language research are often biased in the portraits they produce, either romanticising the speakers they investigate (sociolingistics) or emphasising deficits (SLA). This is because they fail to engage with ‘total linguistic fact’ – the fact that linguistic communication always involves a dynamic interplay between linguistic form, social interaction and ideology, all operating together. In this lecture, I will focus on the English used by a migrant who started to use the language in his late 20s, and I will try to overcome this bias, attempting an account that is better tuned to the superdiversity in contemporary London.

Provisional Programme 

09:00	Registration
09:30	Welcome by Professor Susan Harrow, Head of the School of Modern Languages, University of Bristol
10:00	Plenary Lecture: Professor Ben Rampton, Kings College London  Language learnt in London: Breaking the mould in sociolinguistics and second language acquisition
11:00	Morning coffee
11:30	Andrew Bradley (Sheffield) Catalan and Valencian llengua i literatura textbooks as ideological products: a cross-comparative and synchronic study
12:00	Claire Ashmore (Sheffield Hallam) “Neither here nor there”: Perceptions of place and the Chesterfield dialect
12:30	Barry Kavanagh (Tohoku) Sociolinguistic factors that influence the bringing up of biracial bilingual
13:00	Lunch
14:00	Hanna Limatius (Tampere) Fashionable Communities of Practice: Language Use in Style Blogs
14:30	Piotr Wegorowski (Cardiff) ‘Have you listened to the recordings? Are they hilarious?’: Humour in the workplace
15:00	Alarna Samarasinghe (Bristol) The effect of social transmission biases on human cultural evolution: a case of accent and prestige
15:30	Afternoon Tea
16:00	Joshua Bengough-Smith (Sheffield) Linguistic practices in Renaissance France
16:30	Tim Jacob-Owens (Bristol) Interference or Integration? (In)visible Language Contact on the Island of Amrum
17:00
17:15	Eleanor Robertson (Multilingual Matters): How to turn a PhD into a book  Followed by Sherry!
18:30	Closing remarks
	reserve Kinga Kozminska (Oxford) How can locality be linguistically expressed? – A study of linguistic practices of modern Polish migrants in the UK.

Registration

Online registration for the conference is now available (inclusive of all refreshments):

• Early Bird: If you register by 28 February 2016, the fee will be £30
• Registration fee (from 29 February): £50
• UoB Postgraduate: £10

Travel and Accommodation

The conference venue is in Clifton and you can reach it easily with bus number 8 from the train station. 

There are local hotels located near the conference venue.  The nearest youth hostel is about a 25-minute walk away.  The following hotels may offer a discount if you mention that you are in Bristol on university business: 

• Avon Gorge Hotel
• Clifton House
• Regency Hotel
• Victoria Square

For further information, please get in touch with the conference organiser (nils.langer@bris.ac.uk).

Organising Committee: James Hawkey, Fiona Jordan, Nils Langer, Damien Mooney

In association with 

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