#IRAAL2020
November 27, 2020
Online
Following the postponement of our IRAAL Annual Conference 2020 at UCD, we are delighted to announce the new #IRAAL2020 Event that will take place via Zoom from 16:00 to 18:00 on Friday, 27 November 2020.
Programme:
16.00. Welcome by Susanna Nocchi, President of IRAAL
16.10. Plenary session: “Twenty-five years of language policies in Ireland and Europe: taking stock and looking forward”, Anna Ní Ghallachair (Maynooth University). See information below.
17.00. Announcement of the IRAAL Postgraduate Award 2020 winners
17.10. Launch of Teanga 27, the journal of the Irish Association for Applied Linguistics: Úna Bhreathnach, Colin Flynn and Stephen Lucek
17.20. Break
17.30. AGM
18.10. End
Attendance is free. Click on this link to register. The link to the Zoom meeting will be sent two days before the event.
Plenary session:
Twenty-five years of language policies in Ireland and Europe: taking stock and looking forward
This presentation will examine language education policies developed over the past quarter of a century involving both Irish and foreign language learning and teaching. It will consider how these policies have affected levels of language competence in Ireland today and offer some thoughts on potential future developments.
Anna Ní Ghallachair took a BA in French and German at NUI Galway, and postgraduate degrees at the University of Brest and the University of Rennes. She studied and taught English at the universities of Bordeaux, Brest and Rennes for six years and also taught Irish at Brest. Having taught Irish, French and German at Letterkenny Institute of Technology for ten years, she was appointed Director of the Language Centre at Maynooth University where she remained for 22 years until it was closed in 2016. She was then appointed Director of the newly formed Centre for Irish Language Research, Teaching andTesting and Head of the School of Celtic Studies at Maynooth.
Her research focuses on multilingualism, the teaching and learning of Irish, language policy, and Franco-Breton literature. She was a member of Coimisiún na Gaeltachta (2000-2002), the language policy working group in the Department of Education and Skills (2008-9), President of IRAAL (2004-2007), Chairperson of Comhairle Raidió na Gaeltachta (2010-2013) and of Údarás na Gaeltachta (2012-2017). She was re-appointed Chairperson of an tÚdarás in January 2018 for a period of five years. She has been a member of other committees in both Ireland and abroad whose focus is the teaching and promotion of languages. Currently, she is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Association of Language Testers in Europe (ALTE) and of the Study of Languages, Literature, Culture and Communication Committee at the Royal Irish Academy.