ISPEV@L – Interfaces of physical and virtual spaces for language learning and research

The ISPEV@L 2025 international symposium seeks to explore the interfaces between physical and virtual spaces, and the new directions in second-language acquisition research and practice that emerge from these interfaces. 

This event, supported by the LIDILE team is being organized to coincide with the inauguration of the Espace des Langues, a multimodal language learning and research center. The Espace des Langues aims to facilitate and encourage interaction between language learners, practitioners and researchers, between communities and practices. It comprises a language resource library, an exhibition space, an immersive room, a virtual world and a modular space for experimental pedagogy, informal learning and creative practices.

The symposium aims to promote reflection on new directions in pedagogy and research. Many new directions reflect the growing influence of open science, corpora, digital tools and artificial intelligence. Others stem from recent interest in the design and layout of learning spaces, and their influence on the ways in which people meet and interact to teach, learn and conduct research.

We will be honored to welcome for the plenary lectures:

Mike Baynham, Emeritus Professor of TESOL at the University of Leeds. 

https://othersideofhope.com/otmt-1.html# 

Marion Tellier, University Professor of FLE didactics at Aix-Marseille University and affiliated with the Laboratoire Parole et Langage (CNRS). 

https://cv.archives-ouvertes.fr/marion-tellier

This event is intended to bring together teachers, researchers, librarians, etc. and to be open to new epistemologies and emerging ontologies. We are seeking proposals for presentations, round tables, workshops and posters on the following themes: 

Axis 1: Physical spaces for learning and research

Drawing on a spatial perspective of language acquisition (Benson, 2021), we focus on the spaces of language teaching and learning at university in order to identify the opportunities and constraints present there, as well as the pedagogical challenges and creativity that result. We wish to explore the links between experiences and teaching-learning spaces (Alba et al, 2020; Christou et al, 2023; Danon, 2015). What are the effects of space, layout and equipment on the choice of pedagogies and learners' experiences? If interactions are at the heart of language acquisition and learning processes (Rivens Mompean and Macré, 2017), how do spaces contribute to the variety and quality of didactic and learner-to-learner interactions? Whether as part of a course or in open access, how can a space suggest uses and how do users take advantage of these possibilities (Amann, 2022)? What influence do representations of language learning and teaching have on the way in which spaces are used, and vice versa? What if the space freed us from representations by suggesting other ways of doing things, other activities that take into account, for example, the embodied nature of language, creative expression and social learning?

Axis 2: Virtual worlds and possibilities

Online language learning environments, programmes and tools challenge notions of space and territory (Benson, 2020; Guichon et al., 2022) as well as the problem of creating a presence at a distance (Jézégou, 2014). Real-world experiences are referenced and applied to the conceptualisation of virtual worlds. Both experienced and novice users of virtual worlds may use terms and expressions that refer to physical experience when describing their experiences in a virtual world. This linguistic use can be studied in relation to issues of user embodiment and interaction between users, objects and spaces in virtual worlds. A variety of types of spaces can exist in virtual worlds, each suggesting related meanings and representations (educational escape games, virtual tutoring sessions, etc.). How do virtual representations of physical spaces and the layout of virtual spaces themselves contribute to these new learning environments? Can the immersive potential of this type of environment and a possible “speech-gestuality co-expressivity” (Lapaire, 2013) be manifested through users' awareness of their presence in these spaces? If so, how do they signal this awareness through references to movement and the body? Do users of virtual worlds experience a form of embodiment in these environments, which aim to imitate the real world, and how does this affect language learning as a form of “situated cognition” (Duthoit, 2022)?

Axis 3: Physical/virtual interactions

The new hybrid pedagogical and collaborative spaces are pushing us to consider human-human and human-machine interactions. By creating new conditions of possibility, imagination and fabrication, these spaces raise the question of the process of their narration. Physical/virtual interactions offer hybrid ergonomics, particularly within immersive rooms that offer the possibility of combining gestures. They affect all levels of language description and articulation (pronunciation, phonology, script generation, etc.).

These interactions give rise to an innovative conception of our bodily envelope and the tensions that animate it in a phenomenological way (Hansen, 2006): immobile we interact, silent we speak, without being seen we see, without touching we collide.

New textualities are encouraged by multimodality, moving from handwriting (pencil) to digital writing (keyboard, touch screen). For example, there is the question of adapting non-Latin scripts to transliteration systems or phonetic and/or orthographic transcriptions, in a pedagogical context (Haralambous, 2014; Allanic, 2017) and corpus linguistics (Pinon, 2010).

How can/should our disciplines (applied linguistics, sociolinguistics, discourse analysis, gestuality, translatology, narratology, grapholinguistics, etc.) position themselves in relation to these new interactions?

The symposium will provide an opportunity to consider the following questions:

• What epistemologies are needed for these new realities?

• What research methodologies (hybrid analyses of discourse, digital ethnographies, etc.) for digital environments?

   

• What links can be identified between learning spaces and the characteristics of induced learning?

   

• What are the physical and virtual implications of a given practice?

   

• What advantages and flexibility can socio-technological environments and new hybrid spaces such as immersive rooms and virtual worlds offer?

   

• What role should documentary resources and librarians play?

   

• What bridges should be built between university and non-university communities (third places, participatory science, etc.)

   ?

• How can we include and enhance linguistic diversity?

• What place should be given to gamification, artistic and cultural practices, and the body in movement?

   

Scientific coordinators

Franck Barbin (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

William Kelleher (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

Marie Varin (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

Organising committee

Franck Barbin (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

Clara Destais (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

Fanny Hervé-Pécot (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

William Kelleher (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

Anne Prunet (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

Marie Varin (Université Rennes 2, LIDILE)

National scientific committee

Clara Destais (Université Rennes 2)

Salam Diab-Duranton (Université Grenoble-Alpes) 

Yannis Haralambous (IMT Atlantique) 

Faisal Kenanah (Université de Caen) 

Catrin Peterson (Université Rennes 2)

Elisabeth Richard (Université Rennes 2) 

Adam Wilson (Université de Lorraine) 

Sévérine Wozniak (Université Lumière Lyon 2) 

International scientific committee

Joseph Dichy (Université Canadienne de Dubaï) 

Nelly Foucher Stenklov (NTNU Trondheim, Norvège) 

Uri Horesh (Université de St Andrews, Écosse) 

Priscilla Ringrose (NTNU Trondheim, Norvège) 

Jean Marguerite Jimenez (Université de Calabria, Italie)

Agata Rozumko (Université de Bialystok, Pologne) 

Daniela Francesca Virdis (Université de Cagliari, Italie) 

Cathrin.ruppe [at] fh-muenster.de (Cathrin Ruppe) (Université des Sciences Appliquées de Münster, Allemagne)

Conference languages: French, English

The conference will be held exclusively in person.

Application procedures

Submit your paper or poster proposal by 17 March 2025 on the website: https://ispeval.sciencesconf.org/ 

Send it in parallel to marie.varin [at] univ-rennes2.fr (marie[dot]varin[at]univ-rennes2[dot]fr)

Please include the following information:

• Name and affiliation of the speaker
• Abstract of 450 words with 5-7 keywords

• Methodological approach used

   

• Suggested bibliography
• File title format: ISPEV [at] L_NAME.docx (ISPEV[at]L_NAME[dot]docx)

Registration fees

• Affiliated researchers: 80 euros
• Researchers not affiliated to a research unit: 60 euros
• Students, PhD students outside Rennes 2: 25 euros
• Students, PhD students Rennes 2: free of charge