Events (by date)
September 26, 2024: Mapping the Field of Literary Translation in Greece by Anthi Wiedenmayer from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
For over 30 years, sociological translation research has been developing an unprecedented dynamic in the study of translator profiles, with the aim of highlighting them as individuals and showing their role in shaping translation flows in different eras.
Within this research framework, falls the project “Translator Portraits”, in which more than 100 interviews have been conducted with translators of foreign-language literature into Greek language since 2016. More than half of these interviews have already been published on a special platform, where data on the life and work of the interviewees is shared in Greek and English.
In the interviews, prominent and lesser-known translators talk about their careers, their experiences in the translation process itself, and their relationship with other agents active in the field of translation, such as editors, publishers, literary critics, etc.
The project is currently being supplemented with detailed data on the Greek production of literary translations in the 21st century. This will reveal both power relations and possible asymmetries in the various language combinations, providing an overview of literary translation in a peripheral country like Greece. Furthermore, the project serves as pedagogical material for students in translation studies, and as promotion for the profession of translation. Moreover, this leads to a better understanding of the literary and cultural reception and ultimately to the emancipation of the reading public.
For the recording of the event, please go to our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/ngTGjrCedsM?si=xMD-0EeYbRUkmgv7
October 17, 2024: Activist Interpreters Facing and Solving Ethical Issues in Healthcare Settings: An Interview Study by Magdalena Bartłomiejczyk from University of Silesia, Katowice
We research activist interpreting triggered by transnational patient mobility. Ciocia Wienia is a Vienna-based activist collective facilitating access to abortion and anonymous births in Austria in response to their unavailability in Poland. Non-professional interpreters provide support and interpretation in abortion clinics and hospitals.
Drawing on a corpus of 13 qualitative in-depth interviews (12 hours of recordings), we explore ethical dilemmas the activist interpreters face, such as whether to transfer accurately or omit/modify a doctor’s utterance that they perceive as judgmental and fraught with abortion stigma. We ask how their translation choices are intertwined with the feminist and pro-choice agenda the collective embraces. We start our discussion with individual ethical dilemmas experienced by our interviewees and recounted in enough detail to enable us to reconstruct possible interpreting strategies. Then we move towards factors and events leading to the development of collective ethical reflection and action and, finally, we show evidence of the emergent normative approach to interpreting specific to Ciocia Wienia.
Our data show that Ciocia Wienia is a closely-knit community of practice that has developed a well-defined, interventionist approach to interpreting, strongly informed by their pro-choice and pro-women agenda. Questions pertaining to interpreter ethics are important for the group; they are openly discussed in regular plenary meetings as well as between individual activists. The activist interpreters adopt highly interventionist and sometimes very visible strategies, including direct confrontation or negotiation with clinic staff, and take much leeway to use an array of strategies of divergent rendition. The activist interpreters’ main goal is to support and protect the women they assist; however, they may also run the risk of impairing patient autonomy and service providers’ control over the interaction.
The lecture will largely be based on the following paper: Bartłomiejczyk, M., Pöllabauer, S. & Straczek-Helios, V. (2024). “The heart will stop beating.”Ethical issues in activist interpreting: The case of Ciocia Wienia. Interpreting, on-line first.
For the recording of the event, please go to our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/Js2D0hEopKs
Events (by date)
February 3, 2023: ‘’History, Memory, Postmemory: Transdisciplinary Possibilities for Critical Language Teacher Education’’ by Andrea Mattos
Click here for the presentation slides
This talk will discuss the influence of historical events on language teacher professional development in Brazil based on the concept of postmemory. As stated by Hirsch (1997), postmemory “characterizes the experience of those who grow up dominated by narratives that preceded their birth, (…) shaped by traumatic events” (p. 22). The author uses the concept in the context of the Holocaust, but other traumatic events around the world may also be examined through such lenses: the two World Wars, the Chornobyl nuclear accident in Ukraine, the experiences of indigenous peoples in the Residencial Schools in Canada, the Atomic Bombs in Japan, and many other examples. In Brazil, the Military Coup of 1964, which set off more than 20 years of military dictatorship, still impacts all areas of our daily life, including education and language teaching. We believe that resorting to memory to help confront and problematize our historical events may create space for a type of education that tries to avoid the errors of the past and aims at constructing better social futures. The aim is to look at the critical potential of postmemory to promote awareness of traumatic historical events, problematizing the relationship between life stories, memory, and postmemory as tools for resistance and critical education.
Bio: PhD in Linguistic Studies from the University of Sao Paulo (2011) and M.A. in Applied Linguistics from the Federal University of Minas Gerais (2000), in Brazil. Former Visiting Scholar (2009) and Pos-doc Fellow (2014) at the University of Manitoba, in Winnipeg, Canada. Professor of Applied Linguistics at the School of Languages and Linguistics, at the Federal University of Minas Gerais, in Brazil, and coordinator of the Centre for Critical Studies on Languages, Literacies and Education, a registered group at the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).This paper is supported in part by a productivity grant from the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) (Process n. 308243/2020-0).
Events (by date)
February 16, 2022: “Algonquian place names in Canada: a gateway to understanding relationships to the territory, its use and stewardship before and after the arrival of Europeans.” By Danielle E. Cyr, Senior Researcher, York University, CLRC
Canadian place names (toponyms) are based primarily on three types of sources:
1 – Aboriginal sources, primarily from the Algonquian family of languages.
2 – European sources from the colonial period.
3 – Euro-Canadian sources from 1867 on.
This conference will focus on Aboriginal sources of Algonquian origin, analyzed during a research project spanning almost twenty years. After having exposed the main problems related to such research as well as the methodology developed to understand them, we will show the extent and the historical depth of this toponymy on the Canadian territory. We will conclude by briefly discussing the importance of this study in the field of land claims and financial compensation related to the usurpation of Aboriginal territories by governments and the raw materials industry.
March 11, 2022: “Postmemory, Affect, and Multilingual Identity in Language Teaching: A Duoethnography “ by
Anwar Ahmed, Assistant Professor, DLLL, York University
Brian Morgan, Senior Scholar, Department of English, Glendon College
Attention to emotions and an ‘affective turn’ has become an area of growing research interest in language teaching. A key component of this affective turn is a recognition that emotions are socially constructed, semiotically mobilized, and deeply embedded in power relations (Anwaruddin 2016; Benesch 2012). In this presentation, we wish to extend this perspective by exploring the social and affective influences of postmemory on multilingual identity negotiation in schools and public spaces. Postmemory, the narrativized intergenerational transfer of often traumatic experiences, can be a complicating factor in students’ language learning motivation and their responses to innovative curricula utilizing heritage languages or translingual pedagogies. The presenters will also discuss how they came to understand their topic by way of duoethnography (Norris & Sawyer, 2012) a dialogic research methodology increasingly utilized in language teaching and language teacher education.
April 20, 2022: “Pourquoi rééditer l’histoire du Canada de Gabriel Sagard?” by Marie-Christine Pioffet, Professor, Department of French Studies, Glendon College
April 27, 2022: Le français québécois dans l’espace public du réseau Facebook by Fiona Patterson, doctorante, Programme de doctorat en Études francophones, Université York
Events (by date)
January 13, 2021: Challenges and Strategies in Quijos Linguistic and Cultural Revitalization in the Ecuadorian Amazon by Etsa Sharupi Tapuy et Cheryl Martens
Click here for the recording and the power point presentation.
This presentation will discuss the challenges of the linguistic and cultural revitalization of the Quijos Nationality in Ecuador. First officially recognized as a nationality group by the Ecuadorian state in 2013, this talk examines Quijos communication processes concerning self-determination and the resurgence of the Quijos linguistic, cultural, and political project. This talk will reflect on the radio programming Kayu Ayllu Shinalla in Napo Province and the radio’s expansion via digital means. The talk will also consider the challenges encountered in interactions with technocratic gatekeepers in developing the Quijos online presence and the techno-politics of knowledge construction and visibility on the Internet.
Revitalisation de la langue et de la culture Quijos en Amazonie équatorienne : défis et stratégies
Cette conférence abordera les défis de la revitalisation linguistique et culturelle de la nation Quijos en Équateur. Elle examinera les processus de communication concernant l’autodétermination et la résurgence du projet linguistique, culturel et politique des Quijos, et s’attardera sur la programmation de la radio Kayu Ayllu Shinalla dans la province de Napo et sur son expansion par des moyens numériques. La conférence portera aussi sur la technopolitique de la construction de la connaissance et de la visibilité sur Internet : seront notamment soulignés les défis rencontrés lors des interactions avec les Gatekeepers comme les modérateurs de Wikipedia pour développer la présence en ligne des Quijos.
Desafíos y estrategias en la revitalización lingüística y cultural de los quijos en la Amazonía Ecuatoriana
Esta charla examinará los desafíos de la revitalización lingüística y cultural de la Nacionalidad Quijosa en el Ecuador. Sólo reconocida oficialmente como grupo de nacionalidad por el Estado ecuatoriano en 2013, esta charla considera el uso de las herramientas de comunicación digital en la organización comunitaria de los Quijos, y en la defensa del territorio. También se discuten los procesos de comunicación relacionados con el empoderamiento y el resurgimiento del proyecto lingüístico, cultural y político de los Quijos. Esta charla reflexionará sobre la programación de la radio Kayu Ayllu Shinalla en la provincia de Napo y la expansión de la radio a través de los medios digitales. En la charla también se examinarán los desafíos que se plantean en las interacciones con los guardianes tecnocráticos en el desarrollo de la presencia en línea del Quijos y la tecnopolítica de la construcción de conocimientos y la visibilidad en el la red.
February 3, 2021: Cross-Generational Change in Heritage Languages in Toronto By Professor Naomi Nagy from the Linguistics departments of University of Toronto
Click here for the recording.
The Heritage Language Variation and Change project (Nagy 2009, 2011) is based on intergenerational comparisons (i.e., how many generations since the family immigrated to Toronto?) of speakers in language diaspora in Toronto. I will discuss some differences between the results of experimental studies and our variationist sociolinguistic studies based on spontaneous speech. The focus will be on the picture we see of intergenerational differences, as well as differences between homeland vs. heritage varieties. In general, greater linguistic stability is illustrated by the variationist approach than experimental methods. The data are from studies of Voice Onset Time (VOT), case marking, and null subject pronoun variation (listed at http://projects.chass.utoronto.ca/ngn/HLVC/1_5_publications.php). The languages discussed include Cantonese, Faetar (a Francoprovençal variety spoken in southern Italy), Italian, Korean, Polish, Russian and Ukrainian.
More about Professor Naomi Nagy
Naomi Nagy is a Professor of Linguistics at the University of Toronto. Her area is sociolinguistics, with particular interest in understanding language contact through variationist sociolinguistic approaches. She directs the Heritage Language Variation and Change (http://projects.chass.utoronto.ca/ngn/HLVC/) Project which examines variation in 10 languages spoken in Toronto, including Faetar, an endangered Francoprovençal variety. Goals of this project include documenting cross-generational variation in heritage languages, via digital recordings and time-aligned orthographic transcriptions of conversations, ethnic orientation questionnaires, and elicitation tasks. Cross-linguistic comparisons allow the development of a generalised understanding of contact-induced language change and helps push the field of variationist sociolinguistics to expand beyond its monolingually-oriented core.
She has published recently in Asia-Pacific Language Variation, International Journal of Bilingualism, International Journal of the Sociology of Language, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, Journal of Phonetics, Journal of Sociolinguistics, Language Documentation and Conservation, Language Learning, Language Variation and Change and Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism. She co-edited Social Lives in Language—Sociolinguistics and multilingual speech communities with Miriam Meyerhoff, andissues of the Canadian Journal of Linguistics (Variation at the Crossroads: Advancing theory by integrating methods, with Michol Hoffman) and the International Journal of the Sociology of Language (Francoprovençal: documenting contact varieties in Europe and North America, with Jonathan Kasstan). She is currently advising/supervising PhD students conducting variationist analyses of Ciociaro, Arabic, Inuktitut, Tagalog and Uruguayan Portuguese.
References
Nagy, N. 2009. Heritage Language Variation and Change in Toronto.http://projects.chass.utoronto.ca/ngn/HLVC/
Nagy, N. 2011. A multilingual corpus to explore geographic variation.Rassegna Italiana di Linguistica Applicata 43.1-2:65-84.
See also: http://projects.chass.utoronto.ca/ngn/HLVC/1_5_publications.php
February 10, 2021: Sign Languages in Canada’s Anglophone, Francophone and Indigenous Communities by Elaine Gold
The Canadian Language Museum’s most recent exhibit ‘Sign Languages of Canada’ includes six languages: American Sign Language, Langue des signes québécoise, Maritime Sign Language, Inuit Sign Language, Oneida Sign Language and Prairie Indian Sign Language. Dr. Gold will describe the process of creating the exhibit and what the team learned about the history of sign languages in Canada, the relationships between them, and the work being done to maintain those that are endangered. The presentation will include contemporary and archival videos of the different languages.
February 24, 2021: Signing Black in America by
Carolyn McCaskill and Ceil Lucas, Gallaudet University
Robert Bayley, University of California, Davis
Joseph Hill, National Technical Institute for the Deaf/Rochester Institute of Technology
Click here for the recording!
Our guests will first present the Black ASL project and the documentary Signing Black; a Q & A period will then follow the showing of the documentary.
Signing Black in America is the first documentary about Black ASL: the unique dialect of American Sign Language (ASL) that developed within historically segregated African American Deaf communities. Black ASL today conveys an identity and sense of belonging that mirrors spoken language varieties of the African American hearing community. Different uses of space, hand use, directional movement, and facial expression are ways that Black ASL distinguishes itself as a vibrant dialect of American Sign Language. The African American Deaf community is now embracing their unique variety as a symbol of solidarity and a vital part of their identity.
Sign language interpreters will be present during this event.
March 24, 2021: Linguistic change across the lifespan: juste and so in Welland spoken French by
Raymond Mougeon & Françoise Mougeon from Glendon College of York University; and
Katherine Rehner from University of Toronto Mississauga
Click here of the recording!
A common assumption is that grammatical or phonological change is driven by children and that speakers’ grammar or phonology remains stable after late adolescence (Sankoff, 2019). Consequently, it has also been assumed that adults are unlikely to participate in ongoing cases of phonological or grammatical change. While these assumptions have, until recently, remained largely unverified, a new research strand has begun to scrutinize this topic by focusing on cases of ongoing grammatical or phonological change by examining speech data from different points in adult speakers’ lives to verify if they are participating in the change. With respect to French, G. Sankoff and her associates have carried out this kind of research based on corpora collected in Montreal that include both panel speakers (individuals recorded twice, in 1971 and in 1984, or three times, in 1971, 1984 and 1995) who provide data on change across the lifespan and trend speakers (socially stratified speaker samples recorded once in 1971 or 1984) who are used to establish community-level patterns of variation and change. Such patterns constitue a useful backdrop in the analysis of the linguistic behavior of the panel speakers. These Montreal studies examined three cases of morphosyntactic change and one case of phonological change and found that the panel speakers participated in the case of ongoing phonological change and in one of the three cases of morphosyntactic change.
As part of a project investigating change in Montreal and in Welland spoken French from the 1970s to 2010s, the present study, focusing on Welland French, is akin to those of G. Sankoff. It examines change across the lifespan using a combination of panel and trend speakers, and it examines two cases of morphosyntactic change (the rise of restrictive adverb juste ‘only’ and of conjunction so ‘therefore’). However, it also has several distinctive features. First, since it examines change over a forty-year period (1975 to 2012-15), several of the panel speakers had retired one or two decades prior to the second recording, allowing us to capture patterns of change observable later in the speakers’ lives—an issue not documented in previous research. Second, while Montreal and Welland French are genetically-related varieties, French in Welland is a minority language experiencing much more intense contact with English, thus allowing us to consider the relative importance of these languages in the panel speakers’ educational and occupational histories and identity, as explanatory factors for interindividual similarities or differences in their (non-)participation in change. Third, while the cases of change examined in Montreal are driven by higher SES speakers, in Wellland, the rise of juste and of so are driven by lower SES speakers. Our study adduces evidence of individual participation in BOTH cases of change, though it shows a much higher proportion of panel speakers participating in the rise of juste than of so. In our discussion of factors accounting for these findings, we point out that while both juste and so have been favored by lower SES speakers, so, as a borrowing from English, has met with much stiffer resistance among higher SES speakers than juste, and hence so is a more stigmatized vernacular variant.
References
Sankoff, Gillian. 2019. Language change across the lifespan: three trajectory types, Language, (95), 2, 197-229.
April 14, 2021:
Déjeuner-causerie 12 h 00 – 13 H 30
Philippe Bourdin (et dORIN URITESCU), avec la participation de Martin Maiden (Université d’Oxford)
Philippe Bourdin nous parlera du dernier article rédigé avec notre regretté collègue Dorin Uritescu (décédé il y a exactement un an) :
« Sur le comportement insolite d’une flexion roumaine »
Click here for the recording
Comme celui des autres langues romanes, le système verbal du roumain entendu au sens large distingue entre deux types d’éléments chargés, entre autres, de coder la personne et le nombre : les flexions suffixales et les pronoms clitiques. Les flexions sont inséparables de leur support verbal : pensons par exemple au suffixe -èrent de chantèrent en français. Quant aux clitiques, ils manifestent par rapport à leur hôte verbal une autonomie un peu plus grande, quoique limitée : pensons à je et à la dans Je la vois. On parle de « cliticisation » pour désigner le processus qui a transformé des pronoms anciennement autonomes, notamment en français, en clitiques. Il s’agit au fond d’un processus d’assujettissement qui, selon de nombreux linguistes, relèverait d’un phénomène bien plus général, appelée « grammaticalisation » : les éléments qui appartiennent à la grammaire d’une langue avaient, à un stade antérieur de son histoire, un statut lexical. Or, il se pourrait que dans de nombreuses variétés populaires du roumain il faille parler non pas d’assujettissement, mais au contraire d’émancipation.
Le phénomène se manifeste essentiellement à la 2ème personnel du pluriel de l’impératif, par exemple dans les deux traductions de l’impératif Plaignez-vous ! du français. La forme courante en roumain standard est plângeți-vă : -ți est le suffixe flexionnel qui code la 2ème personne du pluriel, vă est le pronom clitique de la 2ème personne du pluriel, qui est donc ici réfléchi. La structure de plângeți-vă est parallèle à celle de plaignez-vous en français, avec le suffixe flexionnel -ez et le clitique réfléchi vous. Fait insolite, on entend, dans de nombreuses régions de la Roumanie, non pas plângeți-vă, mais plânge-vă-ți. Ce qui est insolite, c’est que le -ți se soit libéré de la tutelle étroite que devrait « normalement » exercer sur lui son support verbal. Là est l’émancipation. Mais alors, si assujettissement veut dire grammaticalisation, ne faut-il pas considérer qu’émancipation veut dire dégrammaticalisation ?
La question concerne au premier chef le roumain. Cependant, la soulever et en discuter, c’est apporter une contribution, modeste, aux débats, très animés depuis une vingtaine d’années, que suscite l’idée même que la dégrammaticalisation soit un processus concevable en linguistique historique.
« Sur le comportement insolite d’une flexion roumaine » (Ph. Bourdin et D. Uritescu), article à paraître dans les Actes du 29ème Congrès International de Langue et Philologie Romanes (Copenhague, 1er-6 juillet, 2019)
References
Sankoff, Gillian. 2019. Language change across the lifespan: three trajectory types, Language, (95), 2, 197-229.
October 7, 2021: Language Ecology, Contact, and Shift at Baawating: Indigenous Peoples and Language during Early Canadian Settler State Formation by Sean Meades
Research focused on the macro-trends in Canadian language policy (LP) has largely focused on two broad trajectories: (a) the processes of accommodation of Anglophone and Francophone communities (including the limitations of Canada’s policy of bilingualism for French-speaking or official-language minority communities) (Martel & Pâquet, 2010; Morris, 2010; Cardinal, 2015); and (b) the ongoing exclusion of The Other (i.e. “immigrant” and Indigenous communities) within Canada’s existing LP framework (Haque, 2012; Haque & Patrick, 2015; Patrick, 2018). This research turns its focus to the place of language in the state formation processes of Canada that preceded its “Bilingualism within a multicultural framework,” and its place in settler/Indigenous relations and processes of colonization. Building on the paradigm of the Anishinaabe Seven Fires prophecies and a framework that emphasizes the interplay of language practices, beliefs and management in a social ecology, this work offers a case study of the specific experiences of Indigenous peoples in the communities surrounding Baawating (at the junction of Lake Superior and Lake Huron) to exemplify: (a) how Indigenous individuals adjusted their language choices in response to institutional language policy? (b) How Canadian Indian Policy more generally affected those language choices? (c) How these choices impacted relations between Indigenous and settler peoples? And (d) how local language practice, belief, and management processes have been impacted by the surrounding socio-economic, physical, political, and cultural environments? The study uses a mixed-methods approach that combines content analysis of language policy documents, historical records, demographic data and interviews of local Indigenous residents on their experiences of language choice and use to triangulate the interplay between macro-level LP, ideologies of language, and language shift. The research demonstrates the interconnection of LP with social, economic, political and technological domains and their corresponding influence on the linguistic choices available to Indigenous peoples, which precipitated large-scale language shift. Furthermore, it illuminates how language has ‘stood-in’ for race in the construction of idealized national subjects within a liberal order since at least the early twentieth century in Canada.
November 3, 2021: Variation in Heritage Learners’ Written Spanish: Subject Personal Pronouns and Discourse Connectedness by Robert Bayley & Cory L. Holland from University of California, Davis
Spanish pronominal subjects may be realized overtly or as null, e.g. yo/Ø. hablo ‘I speak.’ Variation in Spanish subject personal pronouns (SPPs) has been studied for many years and the factors that condition such variation are well known. Among the most widely examined influences is co-reference, i.e., whether the subject is co-referential with the subject of the preceding tensed verb. Studies have found that subjects that are co-referential with the preceding subject are more likely to be null than when there is continuity of reference (e.g. Bayley, Greer & Holland 2017; de Prada Pérez 2020; Flores-Ferrán 2007). However, other studies suggest that a binary distinction between co- and switch reference fails to capture the full complexity of this constraint (e.g. Bayley & Pease-Alvarez 1997; Geeslin and Gudmestad 2011; Otheguy, Zentella 2012). Those studies found that SPP variation was conditioned by a multi-stage variable of discourse connectedness. This study extends that work to essays elicited from Spanish heritage speakers. Multivariate analysis shows that a multi-factor variable of discourse connectedness provides a more fine-grained account than a binary model of switch reference. Results also indicate that heritage writers’ choices between null and overt SPPs are conditioned by a complex array of other constraints. Finally, results suggest that SPP variation in the writing of heritage language speakers is relatively unaffected by contact with English.
Biographie
Cory Holland has a PhD in Linguistics from the University of California, Davis. She is a research associate at UC Davis and a freelance data scientist working on AI language projects. Her areas of interest include sociolinguistic variation, dialects of the western US, and teaching English to both humans and computers.
Robert Bayley is a Professor of Linguistics at the University of California, Davis. He is a sociolinguist who has conducted research on variation in English, Spanish, ASL, Chinese, and Italian Sign Language as well as ethnographic research in Latinx communities in California and Texas. He was President of the American Dialect Society (ADS) and is a fellow of the Linguistic Society of America and the ADS.
December 1, 2021: « Enjeux en santé cognitive et en démence pour les communautés francophones en milieu minoritaire: initiatives du Consortium national de formation en santé (CNFS) – volet Glendon » par Geneviève Quintin, Directrice adjointe du Centre de santé cognitive de Glendon/Co-coordonnatrice, CNFS
Le CNFS-volet Glendon a été mis sur pied dans le but d’améliorer l’accès à des ressources éducatives en français dans le domaine de la santé cognitive et du vieillissement pour les francophones en situation minoritaire. Cette présentation discutera des initiatives du CNFS-Glendon concernant la formation continue des professionnels de la santé francophones déjà établis, la concentration en neuropsychologie cognitive pour les futurs professionnels et d’autres initiatives pour faciliter la dissémination des connaissances sur la prévention et la gestion de la démence. Nous adresserons aussi les défis particuliers, tant du point de vue de la recherche que du traitement clinique, que pose le travail dans le domaine de la santé cognitive des francophones en situation minoritaire.
Events (by date)
September 16, 2020: Ian Martin – Limits to Linguistic Decolonization in Canada : the Case of Bill C-91
Click here to view the recording of the presentation and the Power point slides
September 24, 2020: Susan Ingram – Where are we now? The cultural translation of David Bowie’s Lazarus
Two months before his death in January 2016, David Bowie had the pleasure of attending the New York première of his first musical, Lazarus, which followed the fate of Thomas Newton, the character he had played in his first film, The Man Who Fell To Earth (1976, dir. Nicholas Roeg). The misadventures of an alien who found himself in a hostile environment and ended up an incarcerated alcoholic had resonated with Bowie when he made the film, as it came at the end of his drug-addled America period, after which he had fled for the healing anonymity and productivity of Berlin. After his death, to the surprise of many, Bowie’s musical quickly found its way onto German-language stages. Of the over a dozen productions that have since taken place, only the first two in New York and London, where Michael C. Hall played Newton, were entirely in English, until the show premiered in Melbourne in May 2019.
In this paper Susan Ingram examines the appeal of Lazarus for German-speaking audiences by analyzing four of the musical’s 17 songs: “‘Heroes,’” “Where Are We Now?,” “This Is Not America,” and “Valentine’s Day.” She argues that because Bowie already laid the groundwork for such work by returning to the first album in his Berlin triptych in his penultimate album The Next Day, this translation work has been able to follow suit and has encouraged each production to be performed in such a way as to maximize affective intensity for local audiences.
Please check the link to the recording of the event here!
October 21, 2020: Robert Papen – Le mitchif…La langue métissée des Métis: une langue autochtone vraiment pas comme les autres!
Retrouver la présentation de Professeur Papen ici : Presentation1
Il existe au Canada une langue tout à fait unique au monde, appelée le mitchif. Cette langue hybride est un mélange curieux de français et de cri, langue amérindienne de la famille algonquienne et parlée par moins de mille locuteurs métis de l’Ouest canadien. En mitchif, les groupes nominaux sont issus du français et les verbes sont issus du cri (des Plaines). Le français dont il s’agit est une variété de français laurentien, le français metis, qui se distingue des autres variétés par son ancienneté et par ses caractéristiques uniques.
Je définirai ce qu’on entend par ‘langue hybride’ et résumerai l’histoire des Métis de l’Ouest, pour ensuite faire état de la situation actuelle. Je présenterai par après un conte en mitchif et décrirai la structure grammaticale générale de cette langue, en soulignant certains des aspects les plus étonnants. En conclusion, je discuterai de l’importance du mitchif pour l’étude du contact des langues et pour l’étude du français laurentien.
Robert Papen a été professeur titulaire au Département de linguistique de l’UQAM de 1978 à 2003, lorsqu’il a pris sa retraite. Il a été directeur du département de 1990 à 1994.
Le professeur Papen (PhD, U. Californie, San Diego) est sociolinguiste de formation et il s’intéresse surtout au contact des langues et aux langues en contact. Sa thèse de doctorat porte sur les créoles de l’océan Indien, mais très tôt, il s’est intéressé aux langues parlées par les Métis de l’Ouest canadien. Il a publié de nombreux articles sur le français des Métis et sur le mitchif, la langue hybride franco-crie, unique aux Métis de l’Ouest. Le professeur Papen a également publié sur les Métis francophones de l’Ontario, sur le français standard du Québec, sur le français de la Louisiane, sur le fransaskois, etc. Plus récemment, il vient de publier un article avec Davy Bigot de l’Université Concordia, sur le français du village de Casselman en Ontario et son dernier article est sous presse aux États-Unis, portant sur les langues parlées par les Métis du Canada.
November 18, 2020: “At the Edges of Empathy: Journalistic Ethics and Translation in Sarah Glidden’s Rolling Blackouts (2016)”-Eva C Karpinski
This presentation looks at the role of translation in comics journalism through the prism of difficulties involved in reporting on war and trauma stories from outside one’s own culture, language, religion, and class. It brings under scrutiny professional expectations for a journalistic practice to be “informative, verifiable, accountable, and independent” (Glidden), expectations which are exacerbated by the challenges posed by contradictory politics, unequal power dynamics, guilt, cultural ignorance, and multiple mediations involved in creating and transmitting a “newsworthy” story. In the global news context, journalistic translational decisions are always imbricated with power inequalities and operate as a double-edged technology of knowledge production: they can open up new channels of understanding and communication; and equally well, they can reinforce the status quo and reify existing geo-political structures of domination (Bielsa and Bassnett 6). Glidden elaborates a meta-critique of journalism as a translational practice, grounded in an ethics of transcultural encounter that is performatively enacted as risking one’s own vulnerability.
Click here for the recording!
Events (by topics)
Nota Bene: Three major events were cancelled due to the covid-19 crisis:
- The 11th annual Graduate Student Conference in Translation Studies
- Two full day conferences – rescheduled for Oct. 2020 (see Objectives for upcoming year).
Language ecology
- National Colloquium: Canada’s Indigenous Languages Policy and Bill C-91 (December 6-8) (P.I. investigator Ian Martin, Glendon Linguistics Program and CRLCC member)
Presenters and participants from across Canada voiced current best practices, but also additional needs in their communities. Presentations were live-streamed, recorded and made accessible to participants on CRLCC’s website.
The event was registered with UNESCO as one of Canada’s responses to the UN Year of Indigenous Languages. https://yfile.news.yorku.ca/2019/12/11/glendon-hosts-colloquium-to-address-indigenous-language-legislation/
“Brown Bag Lunch” talks
- “Language, Identity, and Heritage Preservation in Singapore and Vancouver”, by Justin Kwan and Jean Michel Montsion from the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada and YCAR (January 15) – Presentation was made accessible on our Website and a follow-up is planned for next year.
“A Multilingual Dictionary for Mambila, a Minority Language from West-Central Africa”, by Bruce Connell, Linguistics Program and CRLCC member (March 4). Attendants discussed a possible conference on African Languages next year.
Translation, interpreting, and knowledge exchange
CRLCC sponsored two (2) public lectures organized by the Research Group on Translation and Transcultural Contact (associated with one of CRLCC’s clusters) on September 26, International Translation Day:
- “Translation and Indigenous Languages”, by elder Shirley Williams (Trent University, York University alum)
- “Poetry and Translation: On the Translation of Seymour Mayne’s Wind and Wood into French, Portuguese and Spanish”, by María Laura Spoturno (Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Argentina), organized by Maria-Constanza Guzman.
- “Brown Bag Lunch” talks:
Lyse Hébert (School of Translation, CRLCC) discussed her “(re)(de)-colonizing” translation into French and Spanish of the poem “History Lesson” by Indigenous writer Jeanette Armstrong (February 12).
- Jennifer Hartog (Independent researcher, CRLCC) conducted a discourse analysis of an interaction between doctors and patients speaking different languages and requiring the help of an interpreter (February 26).
Second or multiple language acquisition
- Public lecture on Brazilian Literacy Policy organized by Brian Morgan, CRLCC member, and Coordinator Glendon ESL:
“Language Education in Contemporary Brazilian Educational Policies: Teachers between Conflicting Epistemologies” by Ana Paula Dubuc (Faculty of Education University of Sao Paulo) (November 14)
Dr. Vinicio de Macedo, Vice Dean of USP’s Faculty of Education, attended and met with Glendon Associate Principal Research in the context of the Internationalization/Partnership Development between Glendon College/York University and Brazil.
Workshop on podcasts and FSL teaching organized by Marie-Elaine Lebel (FSL, CRLCC):
“Le balado (podcast) comme dispositif et objet d’enseignement du français langue seconde”, by Francis Langevin, UBC (Okanagan) (November 12)
Plurilingual scholarly writing
- James Corcoran (new CRLCC member, ESL and Applied Linguistics /York) presented his research (books) and writing workshops:
“Plurilingual Scholarly Writing for Publication: Politics, Practices, and Pedagogies” (Brown Bag Lunch talk: November 1) The talk led to discussions with FGS on (credited?) workshops for Glendon International Graduate students. (See also Let’s talk sessions below.)
Other events hosted collaboratively with other Glendon research bodies
- Public talk, co-sponsored by the Groupe de Recherches en Études francophones, francophiles et en français,
“Histoires d’Oka”, by Isabelle St Amand, Queen’s University National Scholar (organized by S. Rosienski-Pellerin, February 10).
The Oka standoff was examined in relation to film and literary narratives, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous.
- One of CRLCC’s “Brown Bag Lunches” hosted a talk organized by Glendon Linguistics program and Department of Multidisciplinary Studies:
“Autour de Convenit, Il convient, Conviene, et de leurs cousins en grec ancien et en anglais – ou comment relativiser la nécessité”, by Philippe Bourdin (Linguistics Program, Glendon)
Knowledge mobilization – On line book launch
CRLCC, in collaboration with the Robarts Centre for Canadian Studies, is organizing an online book launch on May 21 (originally planned on site for April 16):
Gabriel Levine’s Art and Tradition in a Time of Uprisings (MIT Press)
with special guest Cheryl L’hirondelle (métis, and interdisciplinary artist) and visuals by Annie Katsura Rollins.
Levine (CRLCC, Drama Studies) examines collective projects that reclaim and reinvent tradition in contemporary North America, both within and beyond the frames of art.
Facilitating graduate students’ research
- Let’s talk sessions
Following J. Corcoran’s talk (above), Glendon international graduate students expressed the need for more guidance regarding research and plurilingual scholarly writing. CRLCC organized 4 (bi)weekly workshops (“Let’s talk”) around the following topics: Do you understand the research expectations of your program/university? Do you feel your cultural and linguistic backgrounds influence your approach to research?
- Graduate student Aleksandar Golijanin (Faculty of Education) shared the results of his research with Glendon undergraduate students in French Studies (4th year):
“Apprentissage des langues secondes et feedback : Différences attitudinales entre les apprenants et les enseignants de cultures nord-américaine, européenne et asiatique” (March 10)
Fall-Winter-Summer 2018-2019
September 27, 2018.
Organizer: Lyse Hébert, CRLCC member
Translation Day.
Keynote speaker: Raj Chetty.
“Translating Jacques Viau Renaud’s Black Internationalist Testimony”
Assistant professor of English at St. John’s University in Queens, NY, Raj Chetty specializes in Caribbean literature across English, Spanish, and French, with a focus on black and African diaspora. His current project, titled “On Refusal and Recognition”: Disparate Blackness in Dominican Literary Culture, studies blackness in Dominican literary and expressive cultures from the 1940s through the present. The book analyzes street and popular theater, baseball and literature, 1960s literary and cultural journals and groups, and includes studies of Aída Cartagena Portalatín, Junot Díaz, Jacques Viau Renaud, and Frank and Reynaldo Disla. It is under advance contract with SUNY Press’s “Afro-Latinx Futures”series. Chetty is the co-editor of a special issue of The Black Scholar on “Dominican Black Studies,”and his essays on C. L. R. James, Eric Walrond, Reynaldo Disla, Una Marson, and Frank Disla have appeared in Callaloo, Anthurium, Palimpsest: A Journal on Women, Gender, and the Black International, Afro-Hispanic Review, and Meridional: Revista Chilena de Estudios Latinoamericanos.
October 2, 2018
Organizer: Alejandro Zamora, CRLCC member
From Digital to Paper (and Back): The Genealogy of a Cyberpoet*’
In this presentation-recital/performance, Professor Escaja will explore the genealogy of her poetry beyond the page: from the creation of a Cyborg identity to the construction of book-projects that involve art, technology, electronics and robotics, as new ways of understanding and experiencing poetry in the new millennium.
Tina Escaja (Alm@ Pérez) is a destructivist/a cyber-poet@, digital artist and scholar based in Burlington, Vermont. As a literary critic, she has published extensively on gender and contemporary Latin American and Spanish poetry and technology.
The presentation will be in English with simultaneous translation into Spanish.
October 24, 2018
Organizer: Julie McDonough Dolmaya, CRLCC member and director of the CRLCC
Research Group on Translation and Transcultural Contact
From ‘personal’ to ‘public’: Translating birth-stories as counter-narratives
The talk will study the role of translated personal narratives in the production and dissemination of knowledge within maternal and neonatal health. Birth stories are noteworthy examples of such knowledge and experience being passed from one person to the next, one generation to the next, and one language and culture to another. This presentation will discuss the importance of examining birth stories shared online and in print among parents as resources for birth preparation. Narrative theory will be adopted to examine how personal narratives are circulated with a view to challenge the deeply ingrained public narratives on women’s bodies and social position within a given society. This presentation will then examine a key text within the natural/positive birth movement and its Turkish translation: the American midwife Ina May Gaskin’s classic work Guide to Childbirth (2003, translated into Turkish in 2014), which includes 126 pages of stories of births that took place at The Farm Midwifery Centre in Tennessee in the 1970s, dating back to a time when birth outside a hospital setting was regarded as unconventional in the United States.
Dr. Şebnem Susam-Saraeva is senior lecturer in Translation Studies at the University of Edinburgh, She has published extensively ongender and translation, retranslations, translation of literary and cultural theories, research methodology in translation studies, and translation and social movements on the internet. She is also the co-vice president of the International Association for Translation and Intercultural Studies (IATIS) and serves on the Steering Committee of the ARTIS initiative (Advancing Research in Translation and Interpreting Studies).
November 21, 2018
Organizer: Stéphane Couture, member of the CRLCC
La pluralité des savoirs dans Wikipédia. Les cas du portail franco-ontarien et de la version en langue autochtone atikamekw.
Cette conférence interroge la présence en ligne des savoirs minoritaires et non occidentaux. Elle abordera les conditions de diffusion des savoirs sur la plateforme Wikipédia, en s’appuyant sur un projet mené en partenariat avec Wikipédia Canada et la nation autochtone atikamekw ainsi qu’un autre sur le portail franco-ontarien de Wikipédia. Elle s’attachera plus particulièrement aux enjeux sociaux, politiques et techniques des pratiques de savoir sur Wikipédia.
Intervenant: Nathalie Casemajor, Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS)
January 23, 2019
Organizer: Julie McDonough-Dolmaya, member of the CRLCCC
English translations of Tao Te Ching/Dao De Jing (Book of the Ways and the Virtues): A Brief History
Abstract. No one would dispute that the Christian Bible and the Islamic Koran are the most translated texts in the world in terms of the number of languages translated into.
Here is a phenomenal case study of the most translated text into one single target language: English – Tao Te Ching/Dao De Jing (Book of the Ways and the Virtues), the essential text for ancient Chinese philosophy and spirituality.
The presentation will focus on the brief history of the continued endeavour of translating this masterpiece of ancient Chinese wisdom.
Intervenant: Xiaoping Song
January 29, 2019
Organizer: Julie McDonough-Dolmaya, member of the CRLCCC
Canadian Aboriginal Literary Works and Translator Neutrality
Abstract: This talk will consider what motivates translation of Aboriginal oral and written literature in Canada from the point of view of translator neutrality. Early translations of Aboriginal orality, not yet categorized as literature, were often produced by ethnographers or those who considered themselves to be ethnographers. Despite the scientific basis of ethnography, the translations produced were not always objective and neutral, although the situation improved in the latter part of the 20th century. More Recent translations have been produced by translation studies scholars who consciously aim to produce what they consider to be ethical translations. Joseph-Charles Taché, José Mailhot, Lianne Moyes and Valerie Henitiuk are the translators who will be discussed, along with their translation products. The following question underpins the presentation: Are there times when neutrality is an option, an obligation or an ethical error when translating Aboriginal oral and written literature?
Intervenant: Denise Merkle, Université de Moncton
February 14, 2019 (**This event was POSTPONED due to an emergency by the speaker).
Organizer: Gertrude Mianda, Chair of the Tubman Institute
Le racisme et la reitération de la déshumanisation exclavagiste dans le système de santé canadien: une question d’ethique féministe appliquée.
Chercheuse et professeure études féministes et de genre, Agnès Berthelot-Raffard est docteure en philosophie politique et éthique sociale de l’université Panthéon-Sorbonne et de l’Université de Montréal). Ses recherches s’inscrivent dans les champs de la philosophie féministe, de la philosophie Africana et des études philosophiques sur la race. En 2017, dans l’optique de diffuser ce champ peu connu dans la philosophie et les études féministes francophones, elle a créé et enseigne depuis le premier -et unique cours universitaire accrédité de la francophonie entièrement dédié à l’étude de la pensée féministe noire (dispensé à l’UQAM au Québec, à l’Institut de Recherches et d’études féministes).
Agnès Berthelot-Raffard is a researcher, and professor of Feminist and Gender studies. She held her PhDs in political philosophy and social ethics (Université Panthéon-Sorbonne et Université de Montréal). Her works are focused on Feminist philosophy, Africana philosophy, and philosophy of race. In the lode of her research, she created the first and only accredited university course in the francophone world devoted entirely to Black Feminist thought (UQAM, Montreal, Quebec at the Institut de Recherches et d’Études feministes).
February 28, 2019
Organizer: Yann Allard-Tremblay, Chair of the Glendon Indigenous Affairs Council
Jeremy Dutcher: Inaugural Speaker for the Glendon Indigenous Affairs Council Annual Confererence
Jeremy Dutcher is a classically trained operatic tenor and composer who takes every opportunity to blend his Wolastoq First Nation roots into the music he creates, blending distinct musical aesthetics that shape-shift between classical, traditional, and pop to form something entirely new. Dutcher’s debut release, Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa, involves the rearrangement of early 1900s wax cylinder field recordings from his community. The conference will be followed by a reception from 5pm to 7pm in the BMO Skyroom.
This conference is part of the initiatives suggested by the Glendon Indigenous Council. The Glendon Indigenous Council, over the last year, produced an action plan to propose concrete ways of acting on the Glendon Indigenous Strategy. One of the proposed actions was to hold a yearly cycle of conferences by Indigenous speakers from diverse backgrounds including, but not limited to, scholars, activists and artists. This is the first of these conferences.
March 2, 2019
Organizers: MA students in Translation, Glendon Campus
Keynote speaker for the Glendon Graduate Student Conference in Translation Studies
Michael Cronin, Trinity College Dublin
Translators are not simply language technicians; they bring something crucial and significant to translation: their identities. But to what culture does their identity belong?
Can a translator belong to any single cultural identity? Can translation be an identity?
As Ivana Hostová (2017) notes, the concept of identity made its formal début in translation studies in the mid-1990s and its popularity as a research topic has been growing ever since. This year’s graduate student conference will explore the various intersections between translation and identity: the pitfalls and triumphs of cultural translation in an age of globalisation, the role of translators as cultural mediators in the process of intercultural communication, the issues of hybrid identity, as well as perceptions of identity through the prism of gender.
March 4, 2019
Organizers: Elena Basile and Gabriel Levine
Talking Treaties: A symbol-Making workshop on Land, History and Relation
Avec Ange Loft and Victoria Freeman du théâtre Jumblies.
Two events of 3 hours each, designed to engage Glendon students and community members in conversations about the treaty history of the Toronto area and the ongoing ethical obligations towards honouring relations and sharing the land, engendered by that very same history. The events will be coordinated by Victoria Freeman and Ange Loft, respectively historian and artistic director of Jumblies Theatre, Toronto’s most prominent community-based theatre organization. The first event will consist of a participatory and performative installation in the Canadian Language Museum on March 4, whereas the second event will be a Theatre Creation Workshop in the autumn 2019, in the Glendon Theatre.
Both events are designed as experiential and dialogic learning activities for COMS 2100 Language, Media and Communication (with enrollment of 25 students) and DRST 4622
Current Intercultural Performance Practices (with an enrollment of 12 students), with the additional participation of up to interested community members from Glendon at large.
Ange Loft is a multidisciplinary theatre artist and performance-maker from Kahnewake Mohawk Territory, whose performance work has met with wide acclaim. Her project Talking Treaties, with Jumblies Theatre, is a multi-year community-based creation process culminating in a large-scale outdoor pageant at Fort York in June 2017, involving Indigenous and non-Indigenous performers and collaborators. Further information about Ange Loft’s work can be found here: http://angeloft.tumblr.com
Victoria Freeman is a historian, freelance writer and community organizer, who works on supporting indigenous/non-indigenous decolonization in Canada. She is the author of Distant Relations: How my Ancestors Colonized North-America (McLelland and Steward, 200) and is the co-writer with Ange Loft of The Talking Treaties Spectacle. More information on Victoria Freeman’s work can be found here: https://victoriafreeman.ca/about/bio/
April 1, 2019
Organizer: Julie Dolmaya-McDonough, CRLCC member
“Coco and the case of the disappearing Spanglish: Negotiating code-switching in the
English and Spanish versions of Disney and Pixar’s animated film”
Intervenant: Remy Attig
Brown Bag Lunch Research Talk Series
(Reverse chronological order)
May 8, 2019
Isabelle Zaugg
Global Language Justice in the Digital Sphere: The Ethiopic Case
We currently face unprecedented rates of extinction of minority and indigenous languages and scripts, and digital technologies appear to be contributing to their decline. Scholars predict 50-90% of languages will become extinct this century, while only 5% of languages will attain digital vitality. This presentation investigates what can be done to close this digital divide through an instrumental case study of Unicode inclusion and the development of supports for the Ethiopic script and its languages, including the national language of Ethiopia. Mixed methods include observation of digital governance institutions, archival research, a content analysis of script and language choices on social media, and interviews with Ethiopic digital pioneers. This presentation concludes with recommendations to strengthen supports for digitally disadvantaged languages, from inclusion in the Unicode Standard, to grassroots coding within and on behalf of digitally-disadvantaged language communities, to advancing the idea that supporting linguistic diversity is Silicon Valley’s corporate social responsibility.
April 24th, 2019
Professor Julie Mcdonough- Dolmaya
Translation in Canadian Municipalities: Reflections on the Toronto.ca website
According to the 2016 Canadian census, the City of Toronto has a population of 2.73 million. While the vast majority of the city’s residents speaks one of the country’s two official languages, 43.8% of Torontonians have a non-official language as a mother tongue, and 26% speak a language other than English at home. This means that many of the city’s residents likely prefer to access municipal information in a langauge other than English. But, if the city decides to translate certain documents into non-official languages, which ones should be targeted: those with the greatest number of speakers, those in danger of disappearing (such as indigenous languages), those that have the greatest number of professional translators, etc. (cf. Patten 2001, Pool 1991)?
In this presentation, I will discuss the City of Toronto’s Multilingual Information Provisions Policy, which came into effect on August 2, 2017, and the Toronto.ca website, which provides information on various municipal policies and services in multiple languages. My research is inspired by three studies: one by Lyse Hébert (2017), which studied Toronto’s previous language policy, one by Jiménez-Crespo (2012), which discussed the degree of localization of US non-profit websites, and another by Carroll (2010), which examined translation in the municipal websites of Japan. I will focus particularly on the following questions: which pages and documents are available in a language other than English? Which language communities are targeted by these translations and how do these compare to the number of Toronto residents who speak these languages at home? And finally, how do the languages and texts chosen for translation reflect the city’s translation policy? When concluding, I will briefly discuss questions of linguistic justice and consider how the City of Toronto’s website could be made more linguistically accessible without greatly increasing the costs of language services.
April 17th, 2019
York Hall- B209 – CRLCC meeting room
Elena Basile
In the “pore (pour) of languages”: displacements and tears of self-translation in the work of Nathanaël
This presentation explores questions of self-translation as they accrue around the dispersal of selves and languages in the work of Nathanaël, a bilingual (French and English) auteure whose work defies genre and gender expectations, obstinately performing a poetics of radical refusal of identity and its discursive imbrications in hegemonic politics of naming and belonging. Specifically, I will discuss some issues that are emerging from a bilingual anthology of the auteure’s work, which I am presently putting together for a US literary publisher, Nightboat Editions. Hailing from diasporic Sephardic ancestry dispersed between Morocco, France and Canada, and living by choice in a space of gender dissonance, Nathanaël’s work pointedly explores questions of erasure and displacement attendant to the movement of self-translation as it gives rise to divergent processes of “equivocation” – of the name, of the body and of writing itself. In my presentation I plan to loosen some conceptual threads tightly wrapped around the name, the body and writing, in an attempt to render visible the existential aporias and epistemological indeterminacies that take hold when one attends carefully to the reasoned madness of translation and its ever shifting boundaries.
April 10th, 2019
PROFESSOR IAN MARTIN
Towards an Observatory of Indigenous Languages Policy in the Americas. ( PPT available here: Toward an Indigenous Language Policy Index Brown Bag April 10, 2019)
2019 has been designated by the United Nations as the Year of Indigenous Languages, and this talk is part of Glendon’s effort to mark this significant year. Inspired by such ‘observatories’ as the Queen’s Global Democracy Observatory, the proposed Observatory of Indigenous LP would be a scholarly research project that monitors the evolution of Indigenous LP in all the countries of the Americas. The Observatory would provide information about Indigenous language policies in a standardized format that would aid comparative research and contribute to the creation and development of Canada’s and other countries’ legislation on Indigenous LP. In its present state of ‘towardness’, the Index has been designed with the purpose of evaluating the current Canadian federal government promised response to the Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action #13, #14 and #15, by applying the principles expressed in the TRC report to evaluate Indigenous language policies at the national/federal level in selected countries of the Americas. Also, in search of an index, we have drawn upon the Canadian experience with the protection of Official Language Communities in minority contexts, and sub-national legislation such as Nunavut’s Inuit Language Protection Act (2008), and existing provincial legislation (such as in B.C.) on Indigenous languages. An example of LP at the level of Indigenous Nation – the Kahnawa:ke Language Law – is included as well as a glance at two non-American Indigenous legislative measures: the Sámi Language Act and the M version of this talk has been delivered at the IAAL conference in Rio de Janeiro (August 2017), the FLACSO International Studies Conference in Quito (August, 2018), the Giidwewinanan/No Lang Indigenous LP Conference, Thunder Bay (May, 2017).
It’s appropriate that this talk be presented under the auspices of the CRLCC, since the contact between Euro-origin culture and language(s) and Indigenous culture and language(s) of the Americas could arguably be said to have been the ‘Big Bang’ of language and culture contact/conflict in the history of the world. It is certainly the only example of language/culture contact which has been claimed to have given rise to a such changes in planetary ecology as to warrant defining the contact as producing a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene.
March 13, 2019
Altaf Qadeer (Ph.D.)
When Languages Travel To The Hearts Of The World For Centuries.
Concise Oxford English Dictionary and the changing trends of multilingualism (Some Urdu/Hindi lexemes in the Concise Oxford English Dictionary )
Where: Canadian Language Museum ( Click here for directions)
Abstract
The expanding universe of languages with multilingual dimensions has some intriguing interactions. Languages go through many changes in the frames of cognitive-net, social-net, linguistic-net, internet, i.e., multiple-nets.
Lexemes fly with multidisciplinary wings in various multilingual spaces.
A brief study of Urdu/Hindi lexemes in various editions of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary (COED) provides some data for diachronic and synchronic analyses. The changing descriptions of some words in the COED indicate the influences of various social and historical changes. Multilingualism is increasing in many forms and frames.
Multicultural cities have language speakers of various languages and their communication back-home can be a powerful resource for multitudinous purposes.
Languages have fascinating influences at local, national and international forums. There is a possibility to think about the ways in which we can play an important role to empower social, cultural, educational, linguistic, economic, scientific and cultural growth through the multilingual power of Canada. The deep understanding of these factors can also give Centre for Research on Language and Culture Contact (CRLCC) some possible pathways to explore further.
March 21, 2019
Where: Canadian Language Museum ( Click here for directions)
Visual literacy: a social semiotic approach to analyzing magazine covers in a foreign culture
Isis Pordeus
Federal University of Minas Gerais
“Within a simple cover of a newspaper [or magazine], there is a professional work in the selection of small and apparently insignificant details, which, nevertheless, are decisive in the communicative action.” (CF – a student in the research project)
“Literacies are legion.” (Lemke, 2004)
Abstract
We live in a world populated with images: illustrated magazines, newspapers, comic books, videos and movies. In my experience as a teacher of foreign languages – English and Portuguese – I have always tried to guide my students into exploring what images can communicate. Nothing is accidental in an image used in advertisements,newspapers, magazine covers or text books’ illustrations. Becoming media critical in a foreign culture (and in one’s own culture) is essential to uncover meanings not ‘directly’ accessible to the reader as in a text, for example. Social semiotics (Kress & Van Leeuwen, 1996) allied to insights on visual communication (Jewitt & Oyama, 2001) offer invaluable support in helping learners to read images critically. This presentation reports on an activity conducted with learners of Portuguese as an Additional Language. The learners were presented to theory on Social Semiotic Analysis of Visual Communication and some examples before receiving samples from magazine covers to analyze. The results indicate that the students were able to derive powerful readings from the combination of images and text, going beyond initial expectations.
Keywords: Media Critical; Portuguese as an Additional Language; Social Semiotics; Visual Communication.
March 27th, 2019
Where: Canadian Language Museum ( Click here for directions)
Eva C. Karpinski
Associate Professor – School of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies
LA & PS
“Unsettling Settler Biopower through Multilingual Eco-Ethnography and Indigenous Oral Histories”
My presentation focuses on two published oral history narratives collected among Indigenous communities in the North: Lorelei Anne Lambert Colomeda’s Through the Looking Glass: Breast Cancer Stories Told by Northern Native Women (1996) and Ila Bussidor and Üstun Bilgen-Reinart’s Night Spirits: The Story of the Relocation of the Sayisi Dene (2000). In both cases we are dealing with hybrid translations of traumatic experiences; both texts preserve traces of multilingualism and combine personal, ecological, anthropological, and biopolitical discourses with the use of innovative epistemologies and methodologies rooted in Indigenous traditions. I want to explore the productive potentialities of multilingualism in these authors’ engagements with Indigenous communities, and examine in particular how they work together with their respondents towards challenging and unsettling the colonial matrix.
February 14, 2019
Professor Daniel Ferraz
University of São Paolo- Brazil
Where: Canadian Language Museum ( Click here for directions)
Brazilian education “under attack”: On the urgency of critical literacies
This talk problematizes contemporary language education in Brazil in the face of the recent neoliberal and neoconservative political context. In doing so, we ask: Where do we place critique within the curriculum in neoconservative times? What is left to teachers in their commitment to educate critical citizens? Do critical literacies suffice?
To respond to these questions, a set of contemporary snapshots are brought to the fore,unveiling all the anguish brought up by the complex politics of “us” versus “them”. Some understandings of Critical Literacies (CLs) within the field are then reviewed, preparing the terrain for the reading of ourselves in relation to our theories and practices. To conclude, I outline a few orientations which seek to relocate CLs beyond the dichotomic view of the micro versus macro as a formative strategy in dealing with our frustrations in such complex times.
January 23, 2019
Professor Elaine Gold
Canadian Language Museum and Language outreach
Research and Outreach: Planning Exhibits for the Canadian Language Museum by
Elaine Gold
One of the goals of the CLM is to “introduce the public to the scientific study of language and to current language research in Canada”. In this talk I will describe different ways in which the CLM has attempted to fulfill this part of its mandate over the past eight years. We have put a lot of thought into how to make linguistic concepts accessible to those who might have little or no background in the field. I will illustrate the talk with examples from our exhibit panels currently on display in the gallery. I would then like to open the discussion to the group: how could the CLM help you inform a wider public about your research?
January 9, 2019
Karla De Souza Araujo
Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia de Pernambuco (Brasil)
“Advisor-Advisee Relationships in MA Studies: The Hermeneutics of Facticity and Encounters of Being”
In the context of MA studies, the relationship established between the advisor and the advisee may have several configurations, which motivates the question: how can scholarly advising and mentorship promote spaces for building knowledge? This presentation considers the results of a PhD thesis in Linguistics, developed at a Brazilian University, based on a case study of MA students and their advisors. The study is rooted in two theoretical traditions: on the one hand, Bakhtin’s philosophy of language (1997, 2002) and on the other, Heidegger’s hermeneutics of facticity (2003, 2012), which have become intertwined, allowing us to observe how subjects discursively construct the narrative of their relationship. We also refer to ergology (SCHWARTZ, 1998 and FAÏTA, 2002), through which we work with and through the notion of academic orientation as an activity. We conclude advising, as an activity, is a space for the possibility of change, and its vocation is to foster encounters and openings of being.
December 12, 2018
PROFESSOR AURELIA KLIMKIEWICZ
LA VOIX EN TRADUCTION ET LE PRINCIPE POST/DIALOGIQUE
La voix introduit une dynamique dialogique dans le processus de traduction et de ce fait rend visible/audible la participation du sujet traduisant dans la co/production du sens étant donné que « Le sens se répartit entre diverses voix » (Bakhtin 84 : 323). Mais capter la voix du sujet traduisant va au-delà d’une simple refonte du statut ontologique de la traduction (invisible-visible, passif-actif) : cela permet de mettre en scène la relation entre le propre et l’étranger et du même coup d’analyser les modalités d’articulation entre ces deux instances telles qu’elles se manifestent dans le processus de traduction. Dans cet exposé, la réflexion sera menée à partir des approches narratologique (objectivité) et herméneutique (subjectivité) et débouchera sur les problèmes de traduction/réception dans le cyberespace. Différents exemples de traduction et retraduction seront discutés pour illustrer le propos.
November 28, 2019.
Bruce Connell
-Co-hosted with Multidisciplinary Studies, Glendon Campus
Reconstructing Tone: Mambila, Mambiloid, Bantoid and Beyond
Connell’s scholarship is motivated by an interest in historical linguistics and phonetics.
In this work, Connell systematically studies the Mambiloid languages, spoken in a region that spans the Nigeria-Camerooon border, north of the Cameroon Grassfield.
Mambiloid is a Bantoid group comprising some 35 different lects or language varieties; it is related to the Bantu languages that cover most of the southern half of Africa. In the literature, Mambiloid languages are under-described — only extended word lists exist for the great majority of Mambiloid lects. All are tone languages, with complex tone inventories. Specifically, Mambiloid languages have either three or four lexical tone registers, which combine to create a number of contours. Through the systematic study of the tones across different lects, Connell seeks to reconstruct the system of lexical tone that existed in proto-Mambiloid. The empirical materials are drawn from more than 800 items for most Mambiloid lects, from Connell’s own field work, as well as additional data from other researchers. The evidence suggests support for the reconstruction of a two-tone system in Proto Mambiloid which was on the cusp of evolving into one of tree tones, and has now evolved into one of four tones in several present-day Mambiloid languages.
May 8, 2019
Senior Common Room – Petit Salon – 317 York-Hall
3rd floor
ISABELLE ZAUGG
Institute for Comparative literature and Society
Columbia University
Postdoctoral Research Scholar
Communication, Media Studies, Semiotics Science and Technology Studies
Global Language Justice in the Digital Sphere: The Ethiopic Case
Abstract
We currently face unprecedented rates of extinction of minority and indigenous languages and scripts, and digital technologies appear to be contributing to their decline. Scholars predict 50-90% of languages will become extinct this century, while only 5% of languages will attain digital vitality. This presentation investigates what can be done to close this digital divide through an instrumental case study of Unicode inclusion and the development of supports for the Ethiopic script and its languages, including the national language of Ethiopia. Mixed methods include observation of digital governance institutions, archival research, a content analysis of script and language choices on social media, and interviews with Ethiopic digital pioneers. This presentation concludes with recommendations to strengthen supports for digitally-disadvantaged languages, from inclusion in the Unicode Standard, to grassroots coding within and on behalf of digitally-disadvantaged language communities, to advancing the idea that supporting linguistic diversity is Silicon Valley’s corporate social responsibility.
About the author
Isabelle A. Zaugg’s research interests revolve around language & culture, media, art, and digital technologies in the global public sphere. Her research investigates the relationship between digitally-disadvantaged languages and patterns of mass extinction of language diversity. Her dissertation research approached global concerns through a case study focused on the Ethiopian and Eritrean languages that utilize the Ethiopic script. It addresses the extent to which the script and its languages are supported in the digital sphere, including tracing the history of its inclusion in Unicode. It concludes with policy, governance, and advocacy recommendations to better support digitally-disadvantaged languages, in turn supporting their long-term survival.
Zaugg earned a PhD in Communication and an MA in Film & Video from American University in Washington, DC. She earned a BA in Art Semiotics from Brown University and is an alumna of the United World College of the Adriatic. Zaugg is a two-time Fulbright Fellow to Ethiopia and began her scholarly engagement and also spent a year studying at Addis Ababa University in the Brown in Ethiopia program. She is currently a Mellon-Sawyer Seminar Postdoctoral Fellow in “Global Language Justice” at the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society at Columbia University. She is also an affiliated researcher at Addis Ababa University’s Academy of Ethiopian Languages and Cultures, and an Associate Member of the Centre for Research on Language and Culture Contact at York University, Toronto.
Talking Treaties
A symbol-Making workshop on Land, History and Relation
with Ange Loft and Victoria Freeman from Jumblies Theater
Monday, March 4th, 2019 from 1 pm to 2 pm
BMO conference room- Glendon Hall
Note that the event is in 2 parts.
Public lecture – All welcome
1 pm to 2 pm
Workshop – By RSVP only.
2 pm to 4 pm
If you are interested in participating in the workshop, please RSVP to crlc_crcl@glendon.yorku.ca before February 25th 2019.
“Translating Jacques Viau Renaud’s Black Internationalist Testimony”
Speak by Raj Chetty
York-Hall A300
September 27th, 2018
6:30 pm
Every year, the School of Translation, in partnership with the Association of Translators and Interpreters of Ontario, celebrates International Translation Day. This year we have also received generous support from the Principal’s Office, the CRLCC, CERLAC and the Tubman Institute.
The Glendon Community is invited to attend the event on the evening of Thursday, September 27th. Our speaker will be RajChetty, Assistant Professor at St. John’s University, Queen’s, NYC. His talk, titled Translating Jacques Viau Renaud’s Black Internationalist Testimony, will be in English.
The poster for the event is attached and we invite you to share it with your students. Space is limited. If you plan to attend, please RSVP to Véronique Lim (traduction@glendon.yorku.ca).
An assistant professor of English at St. John’s University in Queens, NY, Raj Chetty specializes in Caribbean literature across English, Spanish, and French, with a focus on black and African diaspora. His current project, titled “On Refusal and Recognition”: Disparate Blackness in Dominican Literary Culture, studies blackness in Dominican literary and expressive cultures from the 1940s through the present. The book analyzes street and popular theater, baseball and literature, 1960s literary and cultural journals and groups, and includes studies of Aída Cartagena Portalatín, Junot Díaz, Jacques Viau Renaud, and Frank and Reynaldo Disla. It is under advance contract with SUNY Press’s “Afro-Latinx Futures”series. Chetty is the co-editor of a special issue of The Black Scholar on “Dominican Black Studies,”and his essays on C. L. R. James, Eric Walrond, Reynaldo Disla, Una Marson, and Frank Disla have appeared in Callaloo, Anthurium, Palimpsest: A Journal on Women, Gender, and the Black International, Afro-Hispanic Review, and Meridional: Revista Chilena de Estudios Latinoamericanos.
PAST EVENTS (2017-2018)
Fall-Winter-Summer 2017-2018
March 23, 2018 at 9.30am: Mini-colloque de linguistique française le 23 mars prochain au Collège Glendon que nous espérons marquera le début d’une nouvelle tradition. Ce colloque donnera l’occasion aux étudiants de premier cycle de Glendon et de l’Université de Toronto se spécialisant en linguistique française de présenter leurs travaux achevés ou en cours dans un contexte scientifique et devant un auditoire élargi. Nous encourageons les soumissions de résumés pour des communications orales ou affichées (voir l’appel à communications en ici) qui seront évalués par un jury composé d’étudiants de 3e cycle et de professeurs. En plus des présentations estudiantines, une conférencière invitée, la Professeure Katherine Rehner, ancienne étudiante de Glendon, professeure agrégée à l’Université de Toronto à Mississauga, prononcera une conférence intitulée « Connecting the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages and the Diplôme d’études en langue française to FSL Teaching and Learning in the Canadian Context: An Applied Linguistics Perspective ». La conférence sera bilingue. To know more about the conference and presentations; click here
March 2, 2018. How languages and emotions affect the heart and mind of multilingues by Jean-Marc Dewaele. 11 am in YH-A301 Jean-Marc Dewaele (PhD in French linguistics, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, 1993) is professor of Applied Linguistics and Multilingualism at Birkbeck, University of London. He does research on individual differences considering psycholinguistic, sociolinguistic, pragmatic, psychological and emotional aspects of Second Language Acquisition and Multilingualism. He has published a lot on the topic of emotion, including a monograph (2013) entitled Emotions in Multiple Languages and a number of studies with Peter MacIntyre (Cap Breton University) on Foreign Language Enjoyment and Foreign Language Anxiety.
November 30, 2017. On Movement and Freedom by Gita Hashemi. Thursday November 30, 4 to 6 pm in YH-A102 Speaking about her performance project « Declarations I: On the Move” that took place from February to April, 2016 as a journey along the “refugee route” in Europe, Gita Hashemi will reflect on the pivotal functions of language and translation in her work and in the movement of bodies across contentious terrains.
November 21, 2017. Chinese Citizens’ use of media, Then, Now and Next by Yin le. Tuesday November 21st, from 11 am to 12pm , Glendon Hall, BMO Conference room, Glendon Campus. Professor YIN Le, Director of the Department of Media Studies, School of Journalism and Communication, (Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing) analyzes trends in media use among Chinese citizens. The researcher presents a critical account of the transformation of traditional media in China and talks about the impact of the development of its new media industry (digital TV, social media such as WeChat, micro-blogs, advertising and information sources) and how their uses generate significant societal changes.
November 14, 2017. Alula for posterity (autobiography of translation) by Nathanaël. Tuesday November 14, 6:30 to 8:30 pm York Hall A301, Glendon Campus « Translation is a name by which a work falls into competition with itself. » Such is one of the claims of this talk which proposes itself as a (disobedient) taxonomy of screaming, in which the cinema is summoned to its mute appeal. This event was made possible by the generous support of The Mark Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies (University of Toronto); the Centre for Feminist Research (York University, Keele Campus); the Centre for Research in Language and Culture Contact (Glendon College); Professor Alain Baudot (GREF, Glendon College).
May 3, 2017. Opening of the new exhibit of the Canadian Language Museum. Read between the lines: 150 Years of Languages in Toronto.
June 2017. CRLCC Translation Research Summer School. Topic: Audiovisual Translation. Coordinator: Aurelia Klimkiewicz.
August 8-10, 2017. Association of French Language Studies Conference. Glendon College. Conference website.
September 19, 2016. Ceremony to announce the collaboration between Glendon College and the Canadian Language Museum. Glendon Gallery, September 19, 2016. 5:00pm – 8:00pm
October 31, 2016. Lecture: “Language Policy in Peru and the future of the Quechua language” (via Skype) with professor Serafín M. Coronel-Molina (Indiana University). Organized by Ian Martin (Glendon, A204 6:00 pm-7:20 pm.)
November 18-20, 2016. First CRLCC International Conference on Language and Culture Contact. Glendon College. Website and program.
Nov. 18, 2016. Presentation of The Glendon Truth and Reconciliation Declaration on Indigenous Language Policy (2016) as part of the CRLCC International Conference. A short version of the Declaration is available in English, French, Inuinnaqtun, Inuktitut, Mohawk (Kanien’kéha) and Ojibwe (Anishinaabemowin). The complete version is available in English here. Glendon and the CRLCC would like to acknowledge and thank the translators of the Declaration: Lyse Hébert (FRA), Tuppitta Qitsualik (INN), Veronica Dewar (INU), Pat Ningwance (OJI) and Jocelyn Jamieson (MOH).
November 23, 2016. “Le second degré, l’ironie du discours” Prof. Denis Saint-Amand, Université de Namur (Belgique). Department of French Studies, Glendon. 12pm-3pm, YH A 218.
February 6, 2017. Faculty workshop: Conceptualizing Globally Networked Learning (GNL) Courses/activities: Pedagogy, Technology & Partnerships. Organized by York’s GNL project coordinator Dominique Scheffel-Dunand (1:00 to 3:00 p.m., room YH-A222) The CRLCC co-sponsors this event. Read more about the event here
February 8, 2017. Workshop: Visual Design for Public Presentations. Presented by Philippe Theophanidis (10am to 11am., YH-170). This event is sponsored by the Glendon Research office. The Communications program and the CRLCC co-sponsor this event. Read more.
March 1. 2017. Roundtable: Student-Faculty Roundtable on Global Dialogues as “21st Century Competencies” Learning. Organized by York’s GNL project coordinator Dominique Scheffel-Dunand (2 – 4 p.m. at Keele campus, Kaneff Tower 519) The CRLCC co-sponsors this event. Read more about the event here
March 9, 2017. Book launch and reception: The Embedding Apparatus: Journalist Surveillance during the War in Iraq. Author: Aimé-Jules Bizimana. Translator: Evan Light. (3:00-5:00 p.m.) Coordinator: Evan Light. The CRLCC co-sponsors this event.
March 18, 2017. Glendon Graduate Translation Conference. Translation at the Border: Crossing, Conflict and Creation. Conference website
March 22, 2017. Patterns of Patronage: An Istrian Family of Dragomans as Patrons of Arts (5pm to 6pm)by Aykut Gurcaglar. Read the abstract and Speaker’s bio here
March 28, 2017. Challenges in teaching Chinese-English Translation: from process to product (4.30pm to 5.30pm) by Xiaoyan Wan. This is a RGTTC and CRLCC Lecture. Read the speaker’s bio here
April 27, 2017. CRLCC public lecture. A Multilingual Nation : Translation and Language Dynamics in India. Public lecture by Rita Kothari. Co-sponsored with: York’s Centre for Asian Research (YCAR), York’s Faculty of Graduate Studies (FGS), York’s Graduate Program in Humanities, Glendon’s School of Translation, Glendon’s Linguistics and Language Studies Program.
Fall-Winter-Summer 2015-2016
September 25, 2015. Journée d’étude sur Gabriel Sagard et les missions récollets en Nouvelle-France. Musée de Sainte-Marie-au-pays-des-Hurons. Event organizer: Marie-Christine Pioffet (York University) program
October 22-23, 2015. Sociolinguistics conference: New Ways of Analyzing Variation. University of Toronto (NWAV 44). York contact person: Philippe S. Angermeyer.
November 6, 2015. A conversation with scholar and translator Ellen Elias-Bursać. Glendon, Fireside Room, Friday, Nov. 6th, 1 p.m.
November 9, 2015. Public lecture: “The exchange of information between human and nonhuman primates.” Speakers: Tea Avdylaj, Megan Joyce, Jim Benson, from the Glendon Bonobo research project. Glendon, York Hall, 304, Monday Nov. 9th, 5 p.m.
November 27, 2015. Projets de recherches littéraires et linguistiques, journée d’étude des programmes de 2e et de 3e cycle en études françaises et francophones (Glendon). Organizers: Marie-Christine Aubin and Swann Paradis. This event is part of the CRLCC Student Research Series.
November-December 2015. Itinerant exhibit to mark 400 years of French presence in Ontario. Organized by the Ontario Museum Association (Office of Francophone Affairs) and exhibited at Glendon’s Frost library from mid-November through December.
January 28, 2016. Public lecture. Yves Gambier. “La traduction audiovisuelle (TAV) : son impact en traductologie.” Centre of Excellence, A100, 6:00 p.m.
February 9, 2016. Public colloquium: Indigenous Language Policy Implications of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Canada and the Related Responsibilities of Post-secondary Institutions. Organizers: Maya Chacaby, Amos Key Jr., Ian Martin, and Jean Michel Montsion. Glendon Hall, Glendon College, February 9, 2016 from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm
March 4. Workshop. Intercultural Communication and Globally Networked Learning (GNL). Dominique Scheffel-Dunand. 9:30-11:30am. Glendon Hall 115.
March 5, 2016. Glendon Translation Graduate Conference. Website. This event is part of the CRLCC Student Research Series.
March 23. Table-ronde: La place du français dans l’éducation postsecondaire en Ontario / Roundtable: The place of French in Post-secondary Education in Ontario. Horaire/Time: 11h-12h45. 23 mars/March 23, 2016. Location: A100 – Centre of Excellence, Glendon College, York University/ A100 – Centre d’excellence, Collège Glendon, Université York. Program.
March 31-April 7, 2016. New exhibit of the Canadian Language Museum “A Tapestry of Voices: Celebrating Canada’s Languages!” Wilson Lounge, New College, University of Toronto.
April 19, 2016. Public lecture. Raymond Mougeon. “Patterns of change in the speech of the minority Francophone community of Welland, Ontario: from 1975 to 2015” Glendon College, York University. Time: 6:00 pm. Room: York Hall A201. Abstract.
May 11-12, 2016. International conference: “Beyond linguistic plurality: The trajectories of multilingualism in translation”. Co-organized between the CRLCC’s Research Group in Translation and Transcultural Contact (RGTTC) and the Department of Translation and Interpreting Studies at Boğaziçi University. Istanbul, Turkey.
Summer 2015
Glendon students (Bonobo human discourse) presentating the result of their studies at the
42nd International Systemic Functional Congress in Aachen Germany, July 2015
Translation Research Summer School
June 22 to 26 at Glendon
Winter 2015
Conversation with Anton Antonov ( Associate Professor National Institute of Oriental Languages and Civilisations — INALCO– France)
April 28, 2015 at 2 pm Fireside Room
Sixth Annual Graduate Conference in Translation Studies
March 14, 2015 at Glendon
Workshop: Translation and Multilingualism (all day)
February 17, 2015
Glendon
Workshop – November 7, 2014 November 7, 2014:
Language and Power/ La langue et le pouvoir **
(Communication in French with synthesis in English)
2140 Vari Hall, Keele, Université York University
2:00-4:00pm / 14h00 – 16h00 Refreshments will be served/Des rafraîchissements seront servis (Sponsored by French Studies and History (LA&PS, YorkU), and the Centre for Research on Language and Culture Contact (Glendon, YorkU))
** Note: Les 3 conférenciers de la table ronde du 7 novembre interviendront également au Colloque « Francofugies et Francopéties Langues et sociétés au Canada et en France au XXe siècle », un Colloque international et pluridisciplinaire le 8 novembre 2014, au Collège Universitaire Glendon, qui se tiendra dans la Salle du sénat (8h45-16h30). for more information open the document – CRLCC-Workshop series-2014-2015-Nov7-VF
Colloque – November 8, 2014 Description de l’événement : Le colloque international sur les francofugies et francopéties en France et au Canada au XX e siècle se tiendra au Collège universitaire Glendon les 7-8 novembre 2014 à Toronto. Piloté par une équipe chevronnée de l’Université York composée du professeur Marcel Martel, d’Alban Bargain, professeur contractuel au département d’histoire, et de Serge Miville, doctorant en histoire, cet événement mettra en contact des chercheurs qui travaillent sur les minorités nationales et les petites sociétés afin de favoriser le croisement des recherches des deux côtés de l’Atlantique. Ce colloque promet d’attirer l’attention, non seulement d’universitaires canadiens et français, mais aussi d’autres pays, car les participants traiteront largement de la problématique des petites sociétés et des groupements nationalitaires. Avec une attention particulière aux minorités canadiennes et françaises, il sera possible d’attirer l’intérêt des individus et des médias sociaux et traditionnels. La langue et la culture sont des sujets qui demeurent au cœur de l’actualité, que ce soit au Canada, en France, ou ailleurs. Du mythe biblique de Babel aux conflits territoriaux et linguistiques de nos jours, ces deux termes intrinsèquement liés l’un à l’autre sont connectés à l’humanité tout entière, non seulement spatialement, mais aussi chronologiquement. D’ailleurs, les études monographiques sur la langue et l’identité, tout en ayant le mérite d’analyser des cas particuliers, ne permettent pas les comparaisons entre divers contextes socio linguistiques .C’est la raison pour laquelle un colloque pluridisciplinaire et international permet d’étudier le sujet en question. Ce projet explore deux phénomènes contradictoires et complexes : la francofugie et la francopétie en France et au Canada. Bien que ces deux néologismes, inspirés des termes « centrifuge » et «centripète », peuvent prêter à sourire, ils traduisent deux réalités ancestrales et consubstantielles au français depuis sa genèse. Langue composite, comme c’est le cas, après tout, de la plupart des idiomes, le français fut, dès sa création, promu par certains et remis en question par d’autres, selon les projets nationaux défendus. Ainsi, la volonté de renforcer la présence de la langue française comme dénominateur commun national peut être nomméefrancopétie, par opposition à la francofugie, dont le but est de limiter (voire d’éliminer) l’influence de cette langue afin d’en promouvoir une seconde ou de consolider des assises culturelles par rapport à la métropole. Ainsi, depuis les premiers pas de la langue française, ont cohabité, d’une part des tendancesfrancopètes, et, d’autre part, des velléités francofuges. Le but de la francopétiea consisté à défendre le français dans son intégrité linguistique, à utiliser la langue comme lieu de vivre ensemble sociétal et même de l’outiller en tant que forme de résistance à caractère nationalitaire contre les forces culturelles dominantes. Pour ce qui est de la francopétie, ses origines sont multiples. Parmi ces dernières, on peut relever : la promotion d’idiomes ou de dialectes régionaux, un pragmatisme économique, purement idéologique, une résistance culturelle et/ou régionale, ou autre. Dans ce sens, les francopétieset lesfrancofugies s’inscrivent à même la dynamique des petites et grandes sociétés qui conditionnent tant leurs légitimités, leurs portées que leurs champs d’action possibles. Il faut préciser que ces deux notions sont fluides et ont bien évidemment évolué avec le temps, au gré des circonstances. En ce sens, la mise en commun de chercheurs dont les intérêts sont les groupements francophones canadiens qui ont la prétention de former une petite société et les groupements non francophones de l’hexagone qui ont le même objectif est toute l’originalité de la démarche proposée. Le format« atelier », que nous proposons aux participants d’adopter, permet ainsi à chaque participant de produire un texte substantiel qu’il présentera et qui sera discuté par un groupe qui l’aura déjà lu. La discussion et la mise en commun entre des chercheurs d’horizons multiples seront facilitées par le format, car la méthode encourage la prise de connaissance des textes, afin de surmonter les défis que posent la pluridisciplinarité des chercheurs ainsi que les écarts générationnels et culturels. En effet, ce colloque accueille de nombreux chercheurs chevronnés ainsi que des jeunes et des étudiants qui sont des nouveaux venus dans le monde académique. L’un des intérêts de ce colloque à format réduit – il y aura treize chercheurs- consistera à consolider et, dans certains cas, à créer des ponts entre des traditions universitaires et disciplinaires qui n’ont pas souvent l’occasion de réunir leurs recherches. Ainsi, la création ou le renforcement d’axes thématiques va contribuer à réconcilier des milieux qui se connaissent peu. De là l’idée d’un atelier, au cours duquel les spécialistes auront le temps d’affiner leurs connaissances et s’exposer à des horizons de recherches et des points de vue originaux qui va leur permettre d’approfondir leurs analyses. Les organisateurs ont déjà contacté les chercheurs qui ont montré un enthousiasme hors du commun pour ce projet. Certains ont même déjà incorporé le langage et les néologismes présentés dans le résumé que nous leur avons envoyé (voir, en particulier, les résumés de Jean-Baptiste Coyos et celui de Fa ñch Broudic). Le débat s’avérera donc passionnant, profond, et aura, à n’en point douter, un certain impact au Canada et ailleurs. for more information about the program please open the document–francophonie- colloque 8 nov 2014
Workshop November 19, 2014 – room A304 York Hall at Glendon Heather Lotherrington’s paper, will engage the audience on Life logging or the dynamic journalling of private life moments. The intention of collecting and analyzing data in Lifefogging is to support an evolving framework describing new communicative competencies embedded in Language and culture contact in the classroom.