A public talk exploring Language and identity, titled ‘Speak that I may know thee’ will be delivered at the John Mackintosh Hall (JMH) on Thursday 20^th April at 6:30pm. The event which is being supported by Gibraltar Cultural Services and the University of Gibraltar, as well as by the Gibraltar National Book Council, is part of the work by a team researching Gibraltar English. Prof Elena Seoane, University of Vigo, and Prof Cristina Suárez-Gómez, University of the Balearic Islands, have a background in English Historical Linguistics and in 2010 created the research group ViEW (Varieties of English Worldwide). They have been researching Gibraltar English since 2015 and are compiling the Gibraltar component of the International Corpus of English.    

The talk at the JMH which is free, discusses linguistic prejudice, based on social and ideological power relations, and the need to understand that language is an essential part of our individual and collective identity, and as such it needs to be cherished, studied, and preserved. 

Elena and Cristina are also behind the publication currently being created of Gibraltarians and their Language: twenty-one linguistic biographies, a book collaboration between themselves and local author and Book Council member M.G. Sanchez, and a number of prominent Gibraltarian authors, journalists and educators. The new book will explore Gibraltarian attitudes to language in the shape of twenty-one ‘linguistic biographies’. Each biography will contain a ‘narrative’ of the featured person’s relationship to language.

Tickets can be booked on buytickets Language and identity: ‘Speak, that I may know thee’ - Buy Tickets Gibraltar

Note to Editors

http://lvtc.webs.uvigo.es/people/elenaseoane

https://view0.webs.uvigo.es/team/cristinasuarez