Ronjat Symposium 2013:

Around unity and the diversity of languages​​:

Theory and practice of bilingual acquisition and understanding.

Toulouse, Thursday 21 and Friday, November 22, 2013

 IUFM Midi-Pyrénées, Université de Toulouse II – Mirail

IUFM Midi-Pyrénées internal school of the University of Toulouse II Mirail organizing a European conference around the figure of French linguist Jules Ronjat (1864-1925) and the news of his work.

In 1913, exactly a century ago, two theses appear successively. One deals with the syntax of the “modern Provencal dialects”, the other “development observed in bilingual children.”

A precisely defines the Occitan language in French and European context, in a syntactic system clean and in developing the concepts developed by the posthumous work of Ferdinand de Saussure language is both defined by its dialectalisation, its variants, and a “force intercourse” that stabilizes and meets all variants in a common consciousness. Ronjat this ability gives the name of pragmatic understanding.

The other deals with the behavioral and language development of a child (ie, Ronjat Louis, born in 1908) which grows in touch early and Joint two languages: French and German. “How to behave in the presence brought a child two distinct languages ​​also speak to him? “Will it, as linguistic ideology of the time claimed, be delayed in its development? Will it confuse languages, develop language and motor disabilities? Bilingualism is there a “social evil”?

Or language contact it is a natural and normal, an individual and a corporation? Therefore, how to recognize what is a language or another, describe how language contact, how “didactiser” so that it is naturally essential element of the full identity of the individual, of society?

In 2013, academic texts, national, European and advocate for the construction of “plurilingual” inseparable from our integrated companies, at all levels, from school to Europe. What Ronjat pioneering studies, studies ignored because of their modernity and victims of time they have appeared today can bring professional actors of the research and teaching of languages, bilingualism and multilingualism?

Organized under the patronage of two Research Units of the University of Toulouse Mirail (UMR ERSS EFTS and CLLE) and Euro-Region Midi-Pyrénées, the conference welcomes papers from scholars, historians, educationalists, linguists working in the field of study of bilingualism, multilingualism and mutual understanding of the Occitan language and Romance languages ​​especially in their syntactic dimension.

The conference is open to everyone involved in research and teaching students, but also parents and citizens … to the extent of 180 seats in the auditorium of the IUFM Midi-Pyrenees.

It aims to address the linguistic and didactic fields in the horizon of their social and political reality, the language policies.