Languaging Diversity 2021 “The Linguistic Construction of Emotional Challenges in a Changing Society”

Background Following the six successful events hosted by the Universities of Naples (2013), Catania (2014), Macerata (2016), Cagliari (2017), Antwerp (2018) and Teruel (2019), the seventh edition of the Languaging Diversity conference (LD2021) will be organized by the University of Lille, France. Due to the COVID-19 ongoing pandemic, the event will be held exclusively online via the virtual conference management platform Underline. Languaging Diversity is the itinerating conference of the I-Land Interuniversity Research Centre, an international independent and interdisciplinary center for advanced studies in Linguistics, Social Sciences and the Humanities with a focus on the key notions of identity and diversity, from a linguistic, cultural, and gender studies perspective, in and across cultures. Conference theme “The Language Construction of Emotional Challenges in a Changing Society” Focus The 7th edition of the Languaging Diversity conference focuses on the new emotional challenges that result from the most recent social transformations, and on the way such experiences are represented in discourse. The extreme social innovations of this century, which are fundamentally altering the way we live, work, and relate to one another, find manifestation in new forms of: private and public communication (computer-mediated or face-to-face); political involvement and democratic participation, labour relations and mobility patterns, education and learning styles, ethical and environmental awareness, legal liability, and healthcare practices. In their scale and complexity, these social transformations inevitably generate novel emotional experiences that require to be expressed in language. Some of these emotions, be they negative or positive, are so novel that they still lack a specific linguistic designation, or discursive representation. Conversely, some pre-existing constructions used to express emotions may be ‘ageing' due to the incredible speed of contemporary social change, and need to be made purposeful again in the light of the processes of variation and/or re-contextualization of the genres within which they occur. The LD2021 conference convenors invite papers and posters that investigate the intersection of emotion, communication and social change. The papers and posters presented at the LD2021 conference will explore the linguistic expression of emotion(s) at the different levels of linguistic description (phonological, morphological, syntactic, lexical, semantic, pragmatic, discursive), and in texts and contexts related to traditional and digital genres in different domains, including (but not restricted to) health, medicine and science, media, politics, the law, academia, the world of corporate and institutional work, education and learning. Given the high transdisciplinary nature of the LD2021 conference theme, innovative methodological approaches in relation to the macro thematic frameworks listed below are particularly welcome. Subject areas Discourse Analysis; Critical Discourse Analysis; Systemic Functional Linguistics; Multimodal Semiotics; Corpus Linguistics; Corpus-based discourse studies; Genre Analysis; Pragmatics; Semantics; Cognitive Linguistics; Construction Grammar; Phonetics; Phonology; Psycholinguistics; SLA; Sociolinguistics; Sociolinguistics of Globalization; Intercultural Communication; World Englishes (EIL, ELF); Language crossing; switching, and mixing; Language variation and language change; Linguistic anthropology; Ethnographic approaches to language; Translation Studies; Media Studies; Specialized languages; Forensic Linguistics. Thematic frameworks LD2021 welcomes proposals addressing the linguistic representation of emotional challenges within one of the following (non-exhaustive) thematic frameworks: • Digital innovation and transformation • Creating inclusive societies with digital technology • ICT for education, learning and inclusion • (Over-)Digitalization of the private sphere • Information manipulation: democracy and fake news • Online violence: cyberbullying, digital drama and hate speech • Disagreement and conflict • Climate action and the environment • Sustainability and the bioeconomy • Health, demographic change and wellbeing • Palliative care • Death and bereavement • End-of-life law and assisted dying • Ageing and age-specific issues • Digital technology for sexual and reproductive health • Affect and sexuality • Taboo concepts, curse words and profanity • Pornography, obscenity and censorship • Gender equality and gender justice • Social exclusion, discrimination, inequalities and their relation to mental health • The rise of the shared/collaborative economy and new forms of social inclusion • Emerging legal issues in the 21st century • Artificial intelligence and the law • Intellectual property in the digital age • Identity-related crime • Legal and ethical issues in healthcare