2024 Blended Intensive Programme: Language Contact Phenomena

The final programme has been updated on 27th February 2024.

We created a roadmap / timeline of the events taking place within this seminar, including the online elements.

Travelling to Konstanz

Konstanz is easily reached by train. The main station is called "Konstanz Hauptbahnhof", where the majority of public transport busses stop.

If you travel by plane, the closest airport to Konstanz is Zurich Airport (ZRH, Switzerland), where you may take a train to Konstanz Hauptbahnhof. Trains leave every half hour and take between 1:06 (direct trains) and 1:15 (1 change) hours to Konstanz. Train timetables may be found on the website of the Schweizer Bundesbahnen (Swiss national train service) .

An alternative airport would be Stuttgart Airport. Depending on the connection, it would take between 2 h 42 min and 3 h 43 min to get from Stuttgart  to Konstanz by train.

Yet alternatively, you could also fly into Frankfurt Airport (FRA) and take a train to Konstanz. Depending on the type of connection, the trip would take between 4 and 6 hours. Train timetables may be looked up and tickets booked through the website of the Deutsche Bahn (German railway).
 

How to get to the Youth Hostel from

– the main train station in Konstanz
– the central bus station "Europabrücke" (Europe Bridge) – both documents include taxi contacts (just in case).

Travelling from the main train station to the Youth Hostel

Either, you take any bus from "Bahnhof" (main train station) to "Sternenplatz" and change into bus 4/13, leaving there every 30 minutes (X:03,  X:33 during the day until 21:03 then only once an hour again at 22:03 etc., last bus at 1:03) get off at "Jugendherberge" and go for a walk to the Youth Hostel, OR
from the main train station you walk to "Stephansschule" to catch the 4/13 directly, get off at "Jugendherberge" and take the short walk to the Youth Hostel.

Travelling from the Youth Hostel to the University

Get onto the bus 4/13 at "Jugendherberge" (where you got off at your arrival), busses leave at X.12 and X:42, and get off at "Egg/Universität", one stop later. From there, walk up the hill and cross the wooden bridge, looking at the university building. You enter the university at building part G 1 and make your way to K 7 (on day one of the seminar period, we will wait for you at the entrance to G 1 and guide you).

Map of relevant locations, stations and venues of the prograqmme.

The reading list contains the compulsory readings as well as recommendations/further literature for the individual seminar slots/topics. The compulsory readings have to be read by the beginning of the on-site seminar week, they form the basis for discussion.

• Reading list

Documentation of the virtual meetings:

• Slides general presentation 24.01.2024
• Presentation/slides meeting 8.12.2023

Further materials are available in the shared cloud folder (participants only).

Content

The seminar will provide an introduction to theories and models of L1, L2 and L3 acquisition. Furthermore, we will discuss language contact related topics such as reverse cross-linguistic influence, i.e., influence directed from the foreign language into the L1. For example, we will ask the question if the globally dominant L2 English can affect both the vocabulary and grammar of domestically dominant but globally small L1s. We will cover different speaker groups (foreign language learners with a single L1, but also bilingual populations) and language combinations including English, Icelandic, Norwegian, and German.

Learning objectives

The students will be familiarized with different theoretical approaches to first and multilingual language acquisition and the respective terminology. They will discuss and present current research topics in L2/L3 language acquisition and studies on language contact and get insights in state-of-the-art research methods. Further, they will be acquainted with a range of factors that influence the acquisition and the development of first and foreign languages.

Target group: advanced B.A. students, M.A. and PhD students

Language of instruction: English

Course credits: Participants will receive between 9 and 10 ECTS points for their active participation, depending on the credit requirements of their degree programmes at their home institution. Awarded credit amounts will be based on the type (and volume) of assessment completed (a presentation during the mini-conference and research-oriented paper).

Participants taking the course as an additional course (outside their curriculum) will receive 3 ECTS credit points and complete only a part of the assessments.

Konstanz is a holiday destination and accommodation quite expensive. This is why rooms (dorms, single rooms with shared bathroom facilities as well as a few single rooms with ensuite bathrooms) have been reserved for the mobile participants from Iceland, Norway and Poland. Reservations were made in the Youth Hostel Konstanz 
(the rates for 2024 are € 48 per night per person, + energy tax of € 3 per day per person)

Cost per person per number of nights:

• 7 nights: € 357
• 8 nights: € 408
• 9 nights: € 459

It is each participant’s personal responsibility to make sure they are well and fully covered with health, accident and liability insurance during their stay.

Nevertheless, we strongly recommend that you get in touch with your insurance company to check whether or not you would have to add anything to your police in order to be well-covered during your stay with us. When doing so, please also enquire whether or not your insurance policy would cover a transport home during a pandemic. In the past two years we had to learn (with our own outgoing students) that a lot of policies actually rule out this scenario.

We need to emphasise that participants will not be insured through the University of Konstanz for the duration of their stay with us in April. As our short-term visitors will not be enrolled as students, the university will not cover any insurance aspects for our participants.

BIPs follow the general Erasmus+ logic when it comes to funding their participants,  i.e. it is the sending institution of a mobile participant or lecturer that will provide a mobility grant/lump sum for travel. According to the Erasmus+ programme guide for 2021, mobile participants (students) of a BIP will receive € 70 per day (mobility phase up to 14 days). This lump sum may be combined with a so-called top-up for participants with "fewer opportunities" (€ 100, definition of "fewer opportunities is country-specific) and/or a top-up for "green travel" (environmentally friendly travel, € 50, plus up to 4 extra days of funding à € 70).

Mobile participants will receive their Erasmus+ grant from their home institution and will have to hand in the following documents to report on their mobility phase:

– letter of admission (proving they were accepted by the host institution to the programme),
– learning agreement (documenting the academic nature and study-relevance),
– confirmation of stay (confirming the dates of the mobility phase),
– confirmation of participation (equivalent to a transcript of records for their academic achievement, basis for credit transfer).

As documentation of the mobility and its learning outcomes, for every mobile student sending and receiving institution as well as the student themselves need to sign a learning agreement. Students have to add information on their host institution and the contact / responsible person with respect to their academic programme followed abroad. Please include 

Anja Christ / Melanie Hochstätter,
Universität Konstanz
Universitätsstraße 10
Postfach 185
78464 Konstanz, Germany

erasmus.humanities@uni-konstanz.de

in both instances.

Contact details of responsible persons at the sending institutions (a mobile students home institution) will be communicated to the participants.