From November 2 to 4, 2024, the GAL PhD workshop “Methods for the Investigation of Professional Language Practice” will take place in Berlin, sponsored by the Society for Applied Linguistics (GAL) and organized by the ZHAW School of Applied Linguistics. The workshop is aimed at interested doctoral students and master's graduates in the field of applied linguistics. The framework for the workshop is the international science festival Berlin Science Week, which is taking place at the same time.

Call for Papers

The three-day workshop focuses on a coordinated repertoire of methods to sharpen and solve questions about language use in language and communication professions and the professional world. Particular attention is paid to the fact that both research practice and the researched language use practice are increasingly being shaped by artificial intelligence. Each workshop day is dedicated to a sub-topic:

• Day 1: Qualitative case analysis
  
• Day 2: Toolbox of empirical research (including surveys and interviews) with a focus on statistics
  
• Day 3: Corpus analysis
  

Participation is possible over all three days or over one or two of them.

The main idea of the workshop is the flipped classroom: Before the joint course, the participants work individually on the theory and teaching examples - the textbook “Applied Linguistics for Language Professions” (ZHAW, 2024, Mouton de Gruyter) and a MOOC at EdX are available for this purpose. In the course itself, the participants present current research questions and methodological challenges from their projects in short pitches. In coaching sessions, the participants discuss the problem with the group of experts, but also with their peers. Each day of the course begins with a keynote speech by an expert and ends with a joint final discussion. After the course, individual follow-up support is planned (up to eight weeks after the end of the course).

If required, parts of the PhD workshop can be held in hybrid format and/or in English (introductory presentations, selected coaching sessions). The participation fee is 10 euros per course day.

Interested parties should send a short abstract (max. 300 words, excluding references), in which they particularly address the methodological challenges of their research work, to: julia.krasselt@zhaw.ch. Confirmation of participation will be given on October 9, 2024.

Organisation

• Prof. Dr. Julia Krasselt (ZHAW Institute of Language Competence)
• Dr. Ana Kotarcic (ZHAW Institute of Language Competence)
• Dr. Curtis Gautschi (ZHAW Institute of Language Competence)
• Prof. Dr. Daniel Perrin (ZHAW Department of Applied Linguistics)