36.1905, Confs: 8th International Conference on Ecolinguistics (France)

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-36-1905. Thu Jun 19 2025. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 36.1905, Confs: 8th International Conference on Ecolinguistics (France)

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Date: 18-Jun-2025
From: Catrin Peterson [catrin.peterson at univ-rennes2.fr]
Subject: 8th International Conference on Ecolinguistics


8th International Conference on Ecolinguistics
Short Title: ICE 8
Theme: Practising bio-cultural and multilingual diversity in
ecolinguistics

Date: 09-Jul-2026 - 11-Jul-2026
Location: Rennes, France
Contact: Catrin Peterson
Contact Email: catrin.peterson at univ-rennes2.fr
Meeting URL: https://ice-8.sciencesconf.org/

Linguistic Field(s): General Linguistics

Submission Deadline: 01-Oct-2025

The 8th International Conference on Ecolinguistics will take place
from 9th to 11th July 2026 in Rennes, France. We want to discuss and
practice approaches to the ecolinguistic commitment for sustainable
futures and ecojustice with a special focus on multilingual and
multisensory encounters. ICE 8 aims to provide a dynamic and
stimulating space for sharing ecolinguistic research and practices.
Ecolinguistics, a discipline first consolidated in the 1990s and a
research field which has been rapidly expanding in the last ten years,
takes special interest in language and ecology, with a particular
attention to the interconnections between language and natural
ecology. However, terms such as language, nature, or ecology have
different connotations for researchers and schools of thought. By
exploring the role of language in the life sustaining interactions of
humans, other species and the physical environment, ecolinguists
question boundaries and definitions of and between language and
non-language, humans and non-humans, or humans and environment.
Moving beyond traditional sociolinguistic concerns that have tended to
use ecology as a metaphor for theorizing language contact and change,
ecolinguists investigate how human linguistic activity impacts the
wider ecological relationships of interdependence that human beings
inhabit and depend on for their well-being and survival (Steffensen
2024). This ‘inclusive’ (Cornips 2019) perspective of ecolinguistics
calls for approaches to language research that reconceptualize
language, not as an anthropocentric capacity that separates humans
from the more-than-human world, but as an earthly practice that
entangles human beings with other species and ecosystems we share the
planet with in myriad ways. This work is important as ever as we find
ourselves living through what environmental scientists describe as a
‘polycrisis’ involving a nexus of escalating ecological catastrophes
brought about by extractive and exploitative modes of human relations
with the earth. Recognizing the immensity of the environmental
challenges we face today, ecolinguists are shedding light on the
diversity of linguistic practices that shape human interactions with
natural ecologies. These include relationships of control and
commodification as well as of care and flourishing cohabitation. While
early work focused primarily on critical analyses of environmental
texts, contemporary ecolinguistics has expanded to include:
Studies of how multisensory and embodied discourse mediates real-world
encounters between human and non-human actors;
Explorations of how emerging ecomedia and digital linguistic practices
make beneficial ecological actions, identities and communities more or
less possible;
Posthumanist and post-anthropocentric approaches to linguistics that
investigate language itself as an ecological phenomenon co-constituted
through diverse human relationships with other species and places;
Decolonial and Southern approaches in ecolinguistics that examine how
local and Indigenous languaging practices work outside of dominant
colonial language ideologies that have historically served to sever
human relations from the wider ecological contexts they depend on.
Cognitive perspectives that view language, not as a bounded entity
located inside the head, but as a distributed activity that only
emerges from the dynamic interactions among human and non-human
bodies, minds, and their shared ecological contexts.
By bringing these various theoretical and methodological approaches
into conversation, ICE 8 aims to explore how different
conceptualizations of the language-ecology relationship can inform
both scholarly understanding and practical responses to contemporary
environmental challenges. We particularly welcome contributions that:
Bridge traditional discourse analytic approaches in ecolinguistics
with newer theoretical frameworks including multisensorial, material,
embodied, posthumanist and digital approaches
Study how language mediates situated human interactions with other
species and ecosystems
Investigate how decolonial and Southern environmental knowledge and
values manifest in speaking and listening practices, and consider
Indigenous and non-Western theoretical perspectives on language and
discourse
Explore interdisciplinary approaches combining linguistic analysis
with insights from environmental sciences, anthropology, cognitive
science, and other relevant fields
Examine historical and contemporary discourses in promoting
environmental awareness and activism
Analyze the role of language ideologies in challenging or reinforcing
destructive human relationships with nature
Develop new theoretical and methodological frameworks for
understanding language-ecology relationships.
The conference will bring into conversation and joint practice
ecolinguistic approaches fostering diversity, including language
diversity and bio-cultural diversity. The conference aims to be
multilingual, multimodal, and multisensory. Therefore, the organising
committee is dedicated to two guiding principles. First, we plan a
creative and active conference. This means adding discussion time,
workshops, artistic performances, and excursions alongside more
classic presentation formats. Second, our aim is to make ICE 8 a truly
multilingual conference, so we will experiment with translation and
interpretation. We are particularly looking forward to receiving
contributions in marginalised languages in academia, including
regional languages and minority languages. Further, we encourage
contributions that are well-grounded in ecological issues and
questions.
During ICE 8, we are also interested in imagining answers to the
following questions and discussing the following subjects, either in
the form of individual presentations, workshops, dialogue, or artistic
contributions:
 - How can we enable perspectives for action and positive change in
our contemporary world?
 - How can we move past eco-anxiety to climate hope?
 - How can we introduce new stories of development?
 - How can we enable the participation in ecolinguistic research of
those not included in academia (children, elderly, non-humans)?
 - What role can we attribute to AI and new digital technologies in
establishing new stories and positive change?
 - How can we de-center accounts of ecolinguistics from different
regions and language-backgrounds?
 - What place could we assign to multispecies communication and
multispecies ethnography in ecolinguistics?
 - How do environmental activists, scientists and ecolinguists work
together?
 - How can language policies rely on or include ecolinguistic
principles to foster multilingualism and a knowledge of the
environment that would help protect it?
 - How does or can language (re)shape social-ecological power
relations?
 - How does the concept of eco-translation (as defined in Cronin,
2017) travel and make a contribution to theories and practices of
translation that can induce ecological thoughts and behaviours?
 - How should we teach ecolinguistics and/or include ecolinguistics in
the teaching of other subjects?
Multilingual Conference Approach:
As it may be relevant to show that we can both make a plea for
multilingualism and experience it ourselves, the double objective of
the following suggestions is having the participants in the conference
hear languages other than French and English, and also ensuring
inter-comprehension between the largest possible number of
participants. We suggest therefore several means of making the
conference truly multilingual to authors and moderators:
Depending on available interpreters or facilitators, organisation,
budget, and declared wishes of attendants:
We may offer workshops in French and English.
Some discussions or workshops could take place in one language and be
reported to the rest of the participants in French or English.
We will offer on-site or remote interpretation for some paper
presentation sessions or individual talks. In such cases,
presentations and/or any preparation document should be sent in
advance to the organisers for interpreters (the deadline will be
communicated when the submissions to be interpreted are accepted by
the scientific committee).
If the latter possibility proves too difficult or expensive to offer
for some languages or if they find it more convenient, authors
themselves could make their talk multilingual in several ways:
Flipped conference: You could decide to record your talk before the
conference, in English, French, German, Italian or Spanish, and send
the video before 19th December 2025, so that it could be subtitled
into French and/or English, perhaps German, Italian and/or Spanish, by
students of the Master’s Degree in Translation and Interpretation of
Rennes 2 University. Authors of such videos commit themselves 1) to
limit the duration of their video to 15 min., 2) to send the script of
their video through the website of the conference to make subtitling
easier; 3) to be available for an exchange with participants during
the conference in July 2026, either on site or online.
Own interpreter: You can come with your own interpreter, who will
interpret consecutively (more or less long parts of the discourse)
into French or English for the audience. You should then announce it
in your paper proposal, and the programme would provide more time for
such presentations.
Multilingual presentations: You can offer conferences in one language
with a slide presentation in another, and even change these languages
at one point in the presentation.
Possibilities of being active during the conference:
The organisers invite participants with and without their own
contribution. All participants are invited to join one or several
workshops. Workshop topics could include:
Co-creative Restorying Practices
Climate Hope
What do we want to eat in 2050? – Creative writing workshop
Multispecies language landscapes
Corpus-assisted approaches to ecolinguistics
New stories "fresco"
For participants who wish to offer more, there are several other
possibilities.
With an individual presentation:
Participate with a prerecorded and translated presentation; answer
questions either remotely or during a live, on-site panel
Participate with a presentation on site
Organise a workshop
Organise a dialogue or conversation
Participate in workshops (registration with conference registration)
Participate in dialogue (registration with conference registration)
Do you want to give a presentation, organize a workshop or topical
conversation? Please provide us with an abstract by 1st October 2025!
Please note: the names and contact details of the author(s), organiser
or organising team should be provided in the submission form of the
website. They should not in any case be mentioned in the abstract,
since it will be blind-reviewed.
Individual presentations should not exceed 20 minutes. The abstract of
up to 300 words should provide details on the content of the
presentation in relation to the conference theme, specify the mode of
presentation (prerecorded, on site) and the language or languages of
presentation.
Workshops can last from two hours to a full day. The abstract of up to
500 words needs to include the following information: mode (in-person,
online), language(s) and translation / interpreting requirements,
equipment needed, duration of workshop, approximate number of
participants.
Dialogues and conversations are topical debates moderated by one or
two persons. They should last one or two hours and are supposed to
tackle a concrete question or problem. The moderator may invite one to
four guests who will make a contribution to spark a wider discussion.
The abstract of up to 300 words needs to include the following
information: main issue addressed, mode (in-person, online),
language(s) and translation  / interpreting requirements, envisaged
duration of discussion, approximate number of participants.
Artistic contributions are welcome. Please send us a short, informal
email, spelling out your idea and how it could enrich the conference.
We will try our best to accommodate creative and artistic
contributions.
While selected parts will be open to online participants, it will not
be a fully hybrid event.
For a complete list of references, please visit the conference
website.



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