The Text and Discourse Analysis Learning Community brings together students from different European universities, offering them an opportunity to put their discourse and language skills into practice in a virtual Language Café.
The Language Café is designed as a series of online meetings of pairs or small groups of students across Eutopia who collaborate to explore discourse and text in use through lively conversation with their peers. Intended for advanced-level foreign language students, the Language Café involves chatting and exchanging opinions on a range of different topics in French, German, Italian, Spanish and English. The virtual meetings are recorded, and the recordings are made available to Eutopia participants to use as research material for discourse analysis projects. This endeavour aims to enrich the students’ learning experience, and eventually grow to involve further collaboration among the students.
Learning Community Activities
Upcoming Activities
Language Café - 18-21 November 2023
EUTOPIA’s Language Café takes place from Monday to Friday 18-21 November
2024. It is an opportunity for learners of French, German, Italian, Spanish and
English (±B1/B2 language level CEFR) to have a virtual discussion to practise their
speaking. We put participants in small groups from different universities in the
EUTOPIA alliance. Participants have the opportunity to converse with their cohorts on any topic they desire. The
conversations are recorded so that students studying Discourse Analysis can
use them afterwards as research material.
Sign up: https://forms.office.com/e/wsBsazYAVQ Modality: Online (MS Teams)
Past Activities
Language Café - an EUTOPIA Languages Week activity 4-7 March 2024
EUTOPIA’s Language Café was an opportunity for learners of French, German, Italian, Spanish and
English (±B1/B2 language level CEFR) to have a virtual discussion to practice their
speaking. We put participants in small groups from different universities in the
EUTOPIA alliance. Participants had the opportunity to converse with their cohorts on any topic they desired. The
conversations were recorded so that students studying Discourse Analysis could
use them afterwards as research material. The Language Café took place during EUTOPIA’s Language Week
from 4-8 March 2024. Modality: Online (MS Teams)
Language Café - November 13th-16th 2023
EUTOPIA’s Language Café took place from Monday 13 to Friday 16 November
2023. It was an opportunity for learners of French, German, Italian, Spanish and
English (±B1/B2 language level CEFR) to have a virtual discussion to practise their
speaking. We put participants in small groups from different universities in the
EUTOPIA alliance. Participants had the opportunity to converse with their cohorts on any topic they desired. The
conversations were recorded so that students studying Discourse Analysis could
use them afterwards as research material. Modality: Online (MS Teams)
Language Café - an EUTOPIA Languages Week activity - March 6th-9th 2023
EUTOPIA’s Language Café was an opportunity for learners of French, German, Italian, Spanish and
English (±B1/B2 language level CEFR) to have a virtual discussion to practise their
speaking. We put participants in small groups from different universities in the
EUTOPIA alliance. Participants had the opportunity to converse with their cohorts on any topic they desired. The
conversations were recorded so that students studying Discourse Analysis could
use them afterwards as research material. The Language Café takes place during EUTOPIA’s Language Week
from March 6th to 10th 2023. Modality: Online (MS Teams)
Languages in Use Week - November 21st-25th 2022 (3rd iteration)
EUTOPIA’s 3rd Languages in use week took place from Monday 21 to Friday 25 November
2022. It was an opportunity for learners of French, German, Italian, Spanish and
English (±B1/B2 language level CEFR) to have a virtual discussion to practise their
speaking. We put participants in small groups from different universities in the
EUTOPIA alliance. Participants had the opportunity to converse with their cohorts on any topic they desired. The
conversations were recorded so that students studying Discourse Analysis could
use them afterwards as research material. Modality: Online (MS Teams) Languages in Use Week March 3rd-11th 2022 (2nd iteration)
EUTOPIA’s 2nd Languages in use week took place from Monday 7 to Friday 11 March
2022. It was an opportunity for learners of French, German, Italian, Spanish and
English (±B1/B2 language level CEFR) to have a virtual discussion to practise their
speaking. We put participants in small groups from different universities in the
EUTOPIA alliance. Participants had the opportunity to converse with their cohorts on any topic they desired. The
conversations were recorded so that students studying Discourse Analysis could
use them afterwards as research material. Modality: Online (MS Teams) Short coverage for EUTOPIA News:See the short article related to the activity.
Languages in Use Week March 3rd-11th 2022 (2nd iteration)
EUTOPIA’s 2nd Languages in use week took place from Monday 7 to Friday 11 March
2022. It was an opportunity for learners of French, German, Italian, Spanish and
English (±B1/B2 language level CEFR) to have a virtual discussion to practise their
speaking. We put participants in small groups from different universities in the
EUTOPIA alliance. Participants had the opportunity to converse with their cohorts on any topic they desired. The
conversations were recorded so that students studying Discourse Analysis could
use them afterwards as research material. Modality: Online (MS Teams) Short coverage for EUTOPIA News:See the short article related to the activity.
How to get involved?
(Students and educators)
Contact the Learning Community assistant: Florian Klauser (florian.klauser@ff.uni-lj.si)
Agnes Pisanski Peterlin is a Professor of Translation Studies at the Department of Translation Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. She received her PhD in linguistics in 2006 from the University of Ljubljana. She is the Head of the English Language Chair at the Department of Translation. She has been the principal investigator of two bilateral research projects with the United States on the role of digital technologies in academic literacy development, and has been involved in a wide range of research projects since her PhD. She has published studies on the translation of texts for specific purposes, contrastive rhetoric, academic discourse, English as a lingua franca, translator training, and online educational tools. She teaches language, culture, and translation courses at the Department of Translation, University of Ljubljana.
Nataša Hirci is an assistant professor at the Department of Translation Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, where she gives lectures on English Phonetics and Phonology, Business English, Slovene-to-English Translation of Promotional Texts, Translation-oriented Text Skills in English and Translation Work Placement. In 2007, she received her PhD in Translation Studies from the University of Ljubljana. Her research interests include translator training, directionality and translation into L2, digital tools and digital collaboration in translation, English phonetics, English discourse analysis and trainee translators’ employability. She is the coordinator of teacher-tutors at the Department of Translation Studies in Ljubljana, and the Department Coordinator in charge of trainee translators’ work placement with translation service providers.
Partner: Ann Vande Casteele (VUB). Email: An.Vande.Casteele@vub.be
An Vande Casteele is Professor of Spanish Linguistics and Foreign Language Acquisition and currently programme director of the BA and MA in Taal- en Letterkunde at Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Her research interests include the acquisition of Spanish, discourse analysis, the processing of reference in L2 and interlanguage pragmatics. She is coordinating an Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership on Pragmatic Competence from a Multilingual Perspective (PRACOMUL), in which the University of Ljubljana is one of the partner institutions.
Partner: Arvi Sepp (VUB). Email: Arvi.Sepp@vub.be
Arvi Sepp studied German and English Philology, Sociology, and Literary Theory in Leuven, Louvain-la-Neuve, Berlin and Gießen. He is Professor of Translation Studies and German at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and Research Fellow at the Institute of Jewish Studies of the University of Antwerp and. He was granted the Fritz Halbers Fellowship Award (Leo Baeck Institute), the Tauber Institute Research Award (Brandeis University), the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture Award, the Prix de la Fondation Auschwitz, the Prize for Research Communication of the Royal Flemish Society of Belgium for the Arts and Sciences, and the Theodor Frings Prize of the Säschische Akademie der Wissenschaften. His research interests center on comparative literature, twentieth-century German (Jewish) literature, literary translation, migration and exile, multilingual literature. He published widely on Translation Studies, Autobiography Studies, German-Jewish literature, and literary theory. He has published the book-length study Topographie des Alltags. Eine kulturwissenschaftliche Lektüre von Victor Klemperers Tagebüchern 1933-1945 (2016) and edited volumes such as Bearing Across. Translating Literary Narratives of Migration (2016) and themed issues such as Periphere deutschsprachige Gegenwartsliteraturen in Europa in Oxford German Studies (48.1, 2019).
Ieva Ieva Stončikaitė is a postdoctoral researcher and English literature lecturer at the Department of Humanities at Pompeu Fabra University (UPF, Barcelona). She holds a PhD (2017) in Cultural & Literary Gerontology from the University of Lleida (Spain). Ieva conducted part of her PhD research at Fribourg University (Switzerland) and TCAS at Trent University (Canada). Her main research areas include literary and cultural representations of ageing, medical humanities, dementia ethics and care, age-friendly higher education, and travel writing. Ieva is actively involved in several research projects, networks, and COST Actions in age studies. She is also a member of the research group CELCA (Center of Literatures and Cultures in English) at the University of Lleida. So far, Ieva has presented her research at over 30 international conferences and delivered several guest lectures and seminars. Her articles appear in journals such as The Gerontologist, Journal of Aging Studies, Educational Gerontology, and Life Writing, and in edited collections with Routledge and Palgrave. In November 2023, Ieva was invited by the UNITED NATIONS International Institute on Ageing to deliver training, organised in collaboration with the University of Malta and Maltese care homes.
Kate Astbury is Professor of French Studies and Head of the School of Modern Languages and Cultures at the University of Warwick. Her research focuses on how culture played an important part in shaping French debates about identity, nationhood and political legitimacy during the French Revolution and First Empire: it did not simply reflect political events but inflected the public sphere and influenced the calculations made by those on the political scene. She has worked closely with English Heritage at Portchester castle for a number of years now, advising on the reinterpretation of the keep, particularly the French prisoner-of-war theatre there between 1810-1814.
Florian Klauser is an administrative and teaching assistant at the Department of Translation Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. He studied German and Japanese (Ba), cognitive science (MSc) as well as philosophy (PhD), and provides organisational, administrative, teaching and research assistance to a wide range of studies and projects, foremost of which is the EUTOPIA Learning community text and discourse analysis. Other odd jobs of his include being a German language teacher, writing tutor and freelance (co-)researcher. He practices empirical phenomenology – specifically the method of second-person in-depth phenomenological inquiry, which he helped develop. His primary research interest is in the experience of belief/knowledge enaction in particular and cognitive phenomenology in general. Outside of his own research, he participates as a trained co-researcher in various empirical phenomenological studies, both as interviewee and interviewer.
Agnes Pisanski Peterlin is a Professor of Translation Studies at the Department of Translation Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. She received her PhD in linguistics in 2006 from the University of Ljubljana. She is the Head of the English Language Chair at the Department of Translation. She has been the principal investigator of two bilateral research projects with the United States on the role of digital technologies in academic literacy development, and has been involved in a wide range of research projects since her PhD. She has published studies on the translation of texts for specific purposes, contrastive rhetoric, academic discourse, English as a lingua franca, translator training, and online educational tools. She teaches language, culture, and translation courses at the Department of Translation, University of Ljubljana.
Nataša Hirci is an assistant professor at the Department of Translation Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, where she gives lectures on English Phonetics and Phonology, Business English, Slovene-to-English Translation of Promotional Texts, Translation-oriented Text Skills in English and Translation Work Placement. In 2007, she received her PhD in Translation Studies from the University of Ljubljana. Her research interests include translator training, directionality and translation into L2, digital tools and digital collaboration in translation, English phonetics, English discourse analysis and trainee translators’ employability. She is the coordinator of teacher-tutors at the Department of Translation Studies in Ljubljana, and the Department Coordinator in charge of trainee translators’ work placement with translation service providers.
An Vande Casteele is Professor of Spanish Linguistics and Foreign Language Acquisition and currently programme director of the BA and MA in Taal- en Letterkunde at Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Her research interests include the acquisition of Spanish, discourse analysis, the processing of reference in L2 and interlanguage pragmatics. She is coordinating an Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership on Pragmatic Competence from a Multilingual Perspective (PRACOMUL), in which the University of Ljubljana is one of the partner institutions.
Arvi Sepp studied German and English Philology, Sociology, and Literary Theory in Leuven, Louvain-la-Neuve, Berlin and Gießen. He is Professor of Translation Studies and German at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and Research Fellow at the Institute of Jewish Studies of the University of Antwerp and. He was granted the Fritz Halbers Fellowship Award (Leo Baeck Institute), the Tauber Institute Research Award (Brandeis University), the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture Award, the Prix de la Fondation Auschwitz, the Prize for Research Communication of the Royal Flemish Society of Belgium for the Arts and Sciences, and the Theodor Frings Prize of the Säschische Akademie der Wissenschaften. His research interests center on comparative literature, twentieth-century German (Jewish) literature, literary translation, migration and exile, multilingual literature. He published widely on Translation Studies, Autobiography Studies, German-Jewish literature, and literary theory. He has published the book-length study Topographie des Alltags. Eine kulturwissenschaftliche Lektüre von Victor Klemperers Tagebüchern 1933-1945 (2016) and edited volumes such as Bearing Across. Translating Literary Narratives of Migration (2016) and themed issues such as Periphere deutschsprachige Gegenwartsliteraturen in Europa in Oxford German Studies (48.1, 2019).
Kate Astbury is Professor of French Studies and Head of the School of Modern Languages and Cultures at the University of Warwick. Her research focuses on how culture played an important part in shaping French debates about identity, nationhood and political legitimacy during the French Revolution and First Empire: it did not simply reflect political events but inflected the public sphere and influenced the calculations made by those on the political scene. She has worked closely with English Heritage at Portchester castle for a number of years now, advising on the reinterpretation of the keep, particularly the French prisoner-of-war theatre there between 1810-1814.
Florian Klauser is an administrative and teaching assistant at the Department of Translation Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. He studied German and Japanese (Ba), cognitive science (MSc) as well as philosophy (PhD), and provides organisational, administrative, teaching and research assistance to a wide range of studies and projects, foremost of which is the EUTOPIA Learning community text and discourse analysis. Other odd jobs of his include being a German language teacher, writing tutor and freelance (co-)researcher. He practices empirical phenomenology – specifically the method of second-person in-depth phenomenological inquiry, which he helped develop. His primary research interest is in the experience of belief/knowledge enaction in particular and cognitive phenomenology in general. Outside of his own research, he participates as a trained co-researcher in various empirical phenomenological studies, both as interviewee and interviewer.
