The House of Europe in Rhodes, in collaboration with the Graduate Program of University of the Aegean “Linguistics of Southeastern Mediterranean”, is organizing a conference dedicated to the International Mother Language Day, on Thursday 26th of February 2015, at 20:15, Throne of Helios venue.
The first speaker will be the Associate Professor of the Department of Mediterranean Studies, University of the Aegean, Eleni Karantzola, on the theme of «European Language Policies of native and official languages». The second speaker will be Eleni Skourtou, Professor of the Department of Primary Education, University of the Aegean, on the theme of «The daily life of the mother language/languages: the example of Rhodes».
The International Mother Language Day was established to be celebrated every year on February 21st, following a decision by the UNESCO in 1999. The purpose of the International Mother Language Day is to promote awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism.
The event will be held in the venue of Throne of Helios.
About the speakers:
Eleni Karatzola is an Associate Professor of linguistics (Greek language history). She studied literature and linguistics at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, postgraduate studies on Sociology of Communications at Universite Paris VII and Science studies of Speech at Εcoles des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris, where she completed his doctoral thesis by a three years Onassis Foundation scholarship.
Her research and writing interests concerns the Demotic greek of the era of Ottoman and Venetian rule (16th-17th century), theories of language contact and language change, scripts and language policy with emphasis on literacy and adult education / lifelong learning. She teaches at the graduate program of the Department of Mediterranean Studies “Political, economic and international relations in the Mediterranean”.
She has worked as a researcher at the Greek Language Center (1996-2001), in matters of history of the Greek language and language policy.
At the Department of Mediterranean Studies, she is a coordinator of the curriculum committee, an academic responsible for the elearning WebCT Vista and Open Courses services, responsible for Internships for students who study Linguistics.
She was the chairperson of the Department of Mediterranean Studies for two years (2010-2012) and since 2008 she is the Director of the Laboratory of Linguistics SE Mediterranean, which supports research and teaching needs of Linguistics. She has set up a “Literacy Network” and a study group of early modern Greek.
She has been a Research Fellow of the General Secretariat for Adult Education, the Innovation Network School, the Institute of Education of Unesco and she is a member of the International Research Network for Learning and Multiliteracies. In July 2012 was appointed as the General Secretary of Lifelong Learning and she remained in that position until 2013.
Eleni Skourtou is a Professor at the Department of Primary Education, University of the Aegean. She teaches and does researches in cognitive areas: linguistic and cultural diversity at school, bilingualism, orality and written language, literacy & Multiliteracies, creation of meaning in multilingual environments.
She has worked for the education of bilingual students (immigrants, children from culturally mixed families, children from socially / culturally different groups) in Greek school. In recent years she has focused on schooling Roma children in islands such as Mytilene, Chios, Rhodes, Kos.
Eleni Skourtou has published scholarly articles in Greek and international journals, has edited collective volumes in Greece and abroad, prepared expert reports for the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Interior (Migration Policy Institute). In 2011 was published by Gutenberg’s editions, her book “The Bilingualism in School”.
Eleni Skourtou cooperates with many Greek universities and universities in Germany, Cyprus, Canada, Australia and the USA.
«Current translation pending review – For demonstration only».