36.2637, Confs: "COMUNICA. Comunicare all’università oggi: riflessioni teoriche e proposte operative" (Italy)

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LINGUIST List: Vol-36-2637. Thu Sep 04 2025. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 36.2637, Confs: "COMUNICA. Comunicare all’università oggi: riflessioni teoriche e proposte operative" (Italy)

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Date: 03-Sep-2025
From: Elisa Fiorenza [elifiorenza at unime.it]
Subject: "COMUNICA. Comunicare all’università oggi: riflessioni teoriche e proposte operative"


"COMUNICA. Comunicare all’università oggi: riflessioni teoriche e
proposte operative"
Short Title: COMUNICA

Date: 21-May-2026 - 22-May-2026
Location: Perugia (Italy), Italy
Meeting URL: https://www.insulaeuropea.eu/2025/07/24/comunica-2026/

Linguistic Field(s): Applied Linguistics; Discipline of Linguistics;
Text/Corpus Linguistics
Subject Language(s): English (eng)
                     Italian (ita)

Submission Deadline: 31-Oct-2025

Academic communication is configured as a heterogeneous space, in
which different functions coexist: from the specialised dialogue
between peers, to the formative knowledge construction between
teachers and students, up to the divulgative mediation addressed at
non-expert interlocutors. Whatever the disciplinary field, academic
communication is essentially based on the use of language, in its oral
and written forms, to convey and develop concepts and knowledge.
The idea for this conference originated from the activities promoted
by the international inter-university centre LinE – Language in
Education, and in particular by the cluster dedicated to the study of
academic communication, its functions, its effects on teaching and
training, and its linguistic and pragmatic implications.
Academic language can now be considered a specialised variety, used in
academic texts and discourse to facilitate communication and
reflection on disciplinary content. It is an interdisciplinary
language that students and experts must master to communicate
effectively, build critical arguments and share complex cognitive
strategies. This language is used in a variety of communicative
situations, such as lectures, seminars, manuals and scientific
articles, and is essential for a clear understanding and analysis of
study material (e.g. Bailey & Heritage, 2008; Balboni, 2000; Ciliberti
& Anderson, 1999; Desideri & Tessuto, 2011; Mezzadri, 2016; Nagy &
Townsend, 2012; Nation, 2001; Schleppegrell, 2004).
While students need to demonstrate increasing levels of sophistication
in their language skills as they progress in their studies,
practitioners, teachers and researchers also require high levels of
communicative language competence to express specialised content
effectively. Proficiency in the academic language is an indicator of
the ability to carry out scientific reasoning, and is essential for
all students and future professionals, regardless of their mother
tongue (Bialystok, 2001).
Explicit teaching of the academic specialised language is, therefore,
necessary for acquiring cognitive-academic language competence (CALP),
which enables learning and critically processing new knowledge and
developing appropriate communicative strategies (Cummins, 1986). This
competence differs from everyday communicative competence and requires
the acquisition of new disciplinary contents expressed in an
unfamiliar linguistic form (O’Brien & Leighton, 2015).
Nowadays, the importance of academic language is also highlighted with
regards to the increasing internationalisation process in which
universities are now embedded. Knowledge of the constitutive features
of academic language, from the terminological to the structural,
rhetorical and pragmatic, is crucial not only for the success of one’s
studies and research, but also to ensure the effectiveness and
appropriateness of communicative interactions in different
disciplinary contexts.
In parallel, the increasing use of AI-based tools by both students and
lecturers is transforming the way academic content is accessed, as
well as its production and evaluation. The conscious use of AI in the
academic context, e.g. in writing, revision, research and feedback
processes, raises important questions related to communicative
competence, metalinguistic reflection and the redefinition of roles
between technologies and teaching practices. These tools, if
critically integrated into teaching and study, can be a resource for
enhancing academic communication, supporting the acquisition of the
language of study and facilitating the approach to disciplinary
languages.
The conference aims to discuss the issues outlined so far by focusing
on the internationalisation of educational institutions, multilingual
approaches in university didactics, the language used for study and
discipline-specific languages, and the role of English-Medium
Instruction (EMI) and national academic languages, with reference to
practices and contexts of application.
Topics:
a) The role of academic communication in internationalisation
processes
b) Multilingual practices in academic teaching
c) Language of study and languages for special purposes:
characteristics and functions
d) EMI and national academic languages: practices and contexts of use
a) The role of academic communication in internationalisation
processes
Internationalisation is currently one of the most complex and
challenging, yet relevant, processes facing universities. Academic
communication plays a crucial role in making knowledge accessible and
shareable at the crossroads of diverse cultural and linguistic
contexts. Topics of interest include:
- The impact of international mobility programmes on academic
discourse practices;
- Linguistic-communicative strategies effective in dissemination and
international cooperation;
- Language in student mobility projects and transnational education;
- Linguistic features of scientific publishing and conference
presentations.
b) Multilingual practices in academic teaching
The growing linguistic diversity of university students and the
presence of increasingly international academic contexts have made
multilingual practices a fundamental resource in academic programmes.
This section welcomes contributions on:
- Didactic approaches that integrate multiple languages in academic
teaching;
- Strategies for managing multilingualism in the classroom;
- Use of official language(s) and other language systems in academic
discourse;
- The role of translation and language mediation in multilingual
academic contexts, including educational interpreting practices.
c) Language of study and languages for special purposes:
characteristics and functions
The language of study (in both oral and written form), namely the
linguistic register used by students to learn and process disciplinary
content, is an essential component of university education. This
section focuses on:
- The linguistic and textual characteristics of academic textbooks and
teaching materials;
- The continuum of academic discourse between the two polarities of
language of study and languages for special purposes;
- Didactic strategies to facilitate comprehension and production of
specialised texts;
- The role of terminology in the development of conceptual frameworks
of different disciplines and in the learning process;
 - The role of artificial intelligence in the reworking of
disciplinary content and in supporting oral and written comprehension
and production.
d) EMI and national academic languages: practices and contexts of use
EMI is an increasingly widespread phenomenon in universities
worldwide, with a crucial impact on national academic languages and
teaching practices. This section welcomes studies and reflections on:
- Models and strategies for implementing EMI at the university;
- Interferences between English and national languages and their
co-existence in the academic discourse;
- The effectiveness of EMI in the learning and assessment process;
- Assessment strategies in EMI
- Working languages: Italian and English
Format for Abstracts:
Paper proposals may take the form of theoretical reflections based on
existing work, presentations of scientific studies or reflective
accounts of experiences supported by empirical data.
Proposals must include
- the title;
- an abstract of no more than 400 words;
- a maximum of 5 bibliographical references;
- a reference to the corresponding theme(s).
Proposals may be submitted in the language chosen by the authors
(Italian or English), which will also be the language of the oral
presentation. If you are interested in submitting a proposal in
another language, please contact the Scientific Committee.
Proposals must be anonymous. Authors must therefore ensure that they
do not appear in the proposal and cannot be identified by their
project name.
Each author may only submit one proposal; in the case of proposals
with several authors, each author may submit a maximum of one proposal
as sole author and one proposal as co-author.
Proposals must be submitted to the following address:
convegno.comunica2026 at unipg.it
Submission format
Presentations will last 20 minutes, followed by 10 minutes of
discussion. The languages of the presentations are English or Italian.
Calendar:
- 1 September 2025: call opening
- 31 October 2025: abstract submission deadline
- 15 January 2026: notification to authors
- 15 March-20 April 2026: registration opening
- 21-22 May 2026: conference at CLA – University of Perugia
How the Conference Will Be Held:
The conference will be held exclusively in person.
For organisational reasons, requests for remote participation will not
be accepted under any circumstances.
Publication of Contributions:
A collection of contributions will be published in a monographic issue
in a scientific journal, subject to selection by the Scientific
Committee.
Scientific Committee:
Diana Peppoloni, Elisabetta Bonvino, Mariavita Cambria, Sandro
Caruana, Cristiana Cervini, Elisa Fiorenza, Nicola Grandi, Paula
Limao, Yahis Martari, Emanuela Paone, Marco Paone, Fabiana Rosi,
Matteo Santipolo, Andrea Villarini.
Organising Committee:
Diana Peppoloni, Susanna Alessandrelli, Cristiana Cervini, Elisa
Fiorenza, Paula Limao, Yahis Martari, Emanuela Paone, Marco Paone
Bibliographic References
Bailey A. L., Heritage H. M. (2008), Formative assessment for
literacy, grades K-6: Building reading and academic language skills
across the curriculum, Corwin Press, Thousand Oaks.
Balboni E. P. (2000), Le microlanguages scientifico-professionali.
Nature and Teaching, UTET, Turin.
Bialystok E. (2001), Bilingualism in Development: Language, Literacy,
and Cognition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Ciliberti A., Anderson L. (1999), Le forme della comunicazione
accademica. Linguistic research on university didactics in the
humanities, FrancoAngeli, Milan.
Cummins J. (1986), ‘Empowering minority students: A framework for
intervention’, in Harvard Educational Review, 56, pp. 18-36.
Desideri P., Tessuto G. (2011), The academic discourse. Languages and
disciplinary practices, Quattroventi, Urbino.
Mezzadri M. (2016), Studying Italian at university. Perspectives and
tools, Loescher, Turin.
Nagy W., Townsend D. (2012), ‘Words as tools: Learning academic
vocabulary as language acquisition’, in Reading Research Quarterly,
47, pp. 91-108.
Nation I. S. P. (2001), Learning vocabulary in another language,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.O’Brien L. M., Leighton C. M.
(2015), ‘Use of increasingly complex text to advance EL’s knowledge
and academic language’, in Literacy Research: Theory, Method, and
Practice, 64, pp. 169-192.
Schleppegrell M. J. (2004), The language of schooling: A functional
linguistics perspective, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.



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