Uralic languages and Multilingualism 2011
The Department of Uralic Studies of the University of Hamburg is pleased to announce the conference Uralic languages and multilingualism, to be held from 2nd to 3rd June 2011.
Description
For speakers of Uralic languages the phenomenon of bi- or multilingualism has been commonplace for a long time. Not only numerically, but also regarding the diversity of constellations in terms of interaction contexts and purposes, prestige and legal status (involving also literacy vs. oral tradition), the Uralic languages and dialects represent varied cases of multilingualism.
Within the frame of language contact studies, the problems were traditionally addressed from the langue perspective. Research primarily focused on borrowings at different linguistic levels, i.e. either in lexicon or in grammar. Socio-linguistic investigations and (or, in the combination with) descriptions of the patterns of multilingual communication from a discourse analytic perspective are rather exceptional. The conference aims therefore to encourage new approaches on multilingualism in Uralic idioms.