Languages Local to You

What’s on offer?

Returning this autumn during the ESRC Festival of Social Science, The Languages Local To You Returns event will take the form of a thought-provoking photo exhibition and follow-up roundtable event, capturing and reflecting on multilingual life in modern Britain. 

This engaging and interactive exhibition, which welcomes visitors of all ages, will showcase the shortlisted, runner-up and winning photos from the 2023 group of students. Visitors to the exhibition will also have the chance to engage in a language quiz (based on multilingualism in the UK) and win prizes! 

There will also be an exciting and informative roundtable event on Wednesday 15th November at 14:30 GMT. This event aims to celebrate the diversity of languages and their impact on education.

The event will take place at the AI Arena in the South West Institute of Technology on North Park Road, Exeter, EX4 4RN (University of Exeter Streatham Campus).

During the roundtable, we will explore various topics related to multilingualism, the landscape of teaching and learning languages in the UK today, minority language education, and the opportunities and challenges of multilingualism in education. We have invited renowned experts in the field who will share their insights and experiences.

What’s it about?

The Languages Local to You photo exhibition is the culmination of a competition, which saw secondary school pupils across the UK snapping a vast array of objects including shop signage, street signs, menus, graffiti and wall art, as part of a project which celebrates the importance of linguistic diversity and multilingualism in the UK. This project was started in 2022 and followed with a second edition in 2023, which you can read more about at: https://news.exeter.ac.uk/faculty-of-humanities-arts-and-social-sciences/national-photo-competition-and-exhibition-celebrates-linguistic-diversity-in-the-uks-landscape/.  

As a collateral event during one of the exhibition days, we will hold a roundtable discussion (in hybrid format) on Wednesday 8th November, around the theme of multilingualism and linguistic diversity in schools. As the Languages Local to You project was a collaboration between the University of Exeter and the Association for Language Learning in 2023 as well as teachers from the participating schools, members from these will be present. Teachers of winning and runners-up Southwest schools involved in the 2023 competition will also be invited. Current roundtable speakers which we are planning to host include Liz Black (Association for Language Learning and project partner); Virgina Lam (Roehampton University), Layal Husain (University of East London), Claire Louot (Plashet School), Many Jenkins (Rokeby School), and Kristine Horner (University of Sheffield). This roundtable event is open to all, and will be of particular interest to language teachers and education practitioners.  

Who’s leading the event?

The roundtable discussion will be chaired by Katy Humberstone, PhD Candidate in Languages, Cultures and Visual Studies at the University of Exeter. The list of speakers are as follows:

Liz Black, President of the Association for Language Learning (ALL).

Gabriela Meier, Associate Professor in Language Education (Exeter).

Francesco Goglia, Associate Professor of Migration and Multilingualism (Exeter).

Kensa Broadhurst, PhD Candidate at the Institute of Cornish Studies (Exeter), teacher of Cornish, and former MFL teacher.

You can find more information about this ongoing project over on Twitter: @LLocal2You.   

Open to

All are welcome, and no prior knowledge of multilingualism is needed! 

Event Booking details

eventbrite booking link to follow

Scheduling information

Languages Local to You exhibition on multilingualism in the UK - Friday 10th - Wednesday 15th Nov, XFi Study Space (XFi Building, Business School on Streatham Campus).

Collateral roundtable event on Multilingualism and Education - Wednesday 15th Nov, AI Arena/SWIOT room (Inside the South West Institute of Technology, Streatham Campus).