Seminar: Welcoming Through Languages Group: Politics of welcoming...

Abstract: The Grupo de Acolhimento em Línguas (GAL) [Welcoming Through Languages Group] was created by Prof. Ana Cecilia Cossi Bizon (University of Campinas) at the beginning of 2020, with the intent of being an assembly of voluntary translators and interpreters that could provide access to information to crisis migrants (Baeninger and Peres 2017). The Group soon became active as the Covid-19 pandemic hit and the City Hall of Campinas understood the need for the translation of texts that would inform the city’s migrants of their rights. Throughout the year, GAL ended up translating a number of different pamphlets and leaflets, and also helping with the creation of informative videos, all in 7 different languages: Arabic, English, French, Haitian Creole, Lingala, Spanish and Swahili (Bizon and Deus 2021). Some of the materials were also translated to Warao, a Brazilian indigenous language. After 2020, GAL began to be contacted by different institutions and started to build a network with nearby cities. Today, among the institutions the Group works with, there are: schools of Early Childhood Education, Human Rights Secretariats from 4 different City Halls and Social Assistance Reference Centres. The talk will focus on the challenges, opportunities and next steps of the Group considering languages as a politics of welcoming.

 

Bio:  Verônica Carvalho de Deus is a PhD student at the Department of Applied Linguistics, in the University of Campinas (Campinas, Brazil) and a visiting researcher at the Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology, in the University of Birmingham (Birmingham, UK). She holds a master's degree in Applied Linguistics, a bachelor's degree in Modern Languages, and a teaching certificate on Portuguese as a Second/Foreign Language, all from University of Campinas. As a member of the research group "IndisciPLAr: Portuguese as an Additional Language from an undisciplinary perspective", her research interests include Social Policy, Linguistic Policy, Human Rights and Community Translation and Interpretation.