Call for Papers: International Conference on Language Norms and Usage on Föhr

From 8 to 10 September 2027, the Ferring-Stiftung in Alkersum on the island of Föhr, Germany, will host an international conference entitled “Matching and Contrasting Norms and Usage in Minoritized Language Varieties”. The event will explore the relationship between language norms and actual language usage in minority and regional languages, as well as dialects. The deadline for submitting abstracts is 31 December 2026.

The conference addresses a central question in sociolinguistics: How can linguistic diversity be reconciled with the standardisation of smaller languages? While establishing language norms can help promote and strengthen minority languages, it can also lead to certain linguistic varieties being marginalised, stigmatised or excluded.

The organisers invite contributions addressing topics such as debates on language norms, the development of dictionaries and grammars, intergenerational language transmission, and language use in education and the media. New approaches to describing language use through digitalisation and artificial intelligence will also be discussed.

The conference will feature plenary talks by Silvia dal Negro (Free University of Bozen/Bolzano), Ruth Kircher (European Centre for Minority Studies, Flensburg) and Hans Boas (University of Texas at Austin).

Submission of abstracts: Interested contributors are invited to submit an abstract of 120–200 words in English or German by 31 December 2026 to Robert Kleih, Director of the Ferring-Stiftung, at r.kleih@ferring-stiftung.de.

The organising committee consists of Robert Kleih (Ferring-Stiftung), Nils Langer (Europa-Universität Flensburg), Christoph Winter (Kiel University) and Christoph G. Schmidt (Nordfriisk Instituut).

Further information and the full Call for Papers are available on the Ferring-Stiftung website.