Author: isabelcrespiriutort

Our students spend two weeks in Mallorca

Around 30 students of Catalan from all over the world (United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, Poland, Mexico, Brasil, Bosnia, Cuba, etc.) had the chance of spending two weeks in Mallorca, learning Catalan and discovering a new culture. Some of our students from QMUL were there, practising the language while enjoying the island and making new friends.

They have been cooking (and eating!) traditional dishes, such as “coca de trempó”; visiting emblematic buildings, like the Parliament; walking around the city centre in Palma, where amazing views of the Cathedral were to be found anywhere; meeting Majorcan writers like Sebastià Portell; singing Majorcan “gloses”; swimming at the beach, in the amazing blue water… and, more importantly, making new friends and speaking Catalan all the time!! 

And this is all free, funded by the Institut Ramon Llull.

If you don’t want to miss this experience, study Catalan with us at Queen Mary University of London! 

 

Margarida Castellano makes a stay at QMUL

Margarida Castellano, a teacher and researcher from the Universitat de València, is currently at the School of Languages, Linguistics and Film QMUL to spend two months on a research programme.

Previously, in 2013 she also completed an investigation stage at the Center for Catalan Studies, whose result was the awarded essay “Les altres catalanes” (Joan Fuster Award 2017).

She will now carry out a research focused on identities, postcolonial literature and its didactic uses, multilingualism, multicultural contexts and visual literacies.

What an honour to have you with us these months! Welcome aboard! 😍

Professor Robert Davidson is awarded the Josep Maria Batista i Roca Prize

An associate member of the Centre for Catalan Studies (CCS), Professor Robert Davidson of the University of Toronto, is one of those who have been awarded the 2022 Josep Maria Batista i Roca Prize – Memorial Enric Garriga Trullols.

Professor Davidson gave the Joanot Martorell Lecture at the CCS last year and we wish him congratulations on this official recognition of his contribution to the awareness of Catalan culture outside Catalonia.

Charlotte Byrne gives a talk at the “Anarchism in the Iberian Peninsula Symposium”

Last Monday, June 20, our PhD student Charlotte Byrne participated in the “Anarchism in the Iberian Peninsula Symposium”, at the University of Leeds.

She gave a talk entitled “A Queer Problem: Writing Sapphic Anarchism in a Novel of the Spanish Civil War”.

Attendees were fascinated by her research and the historical novel she is writting, where she explores sapphic anarchism during the Spanish Civil War.

Congratulations, Charlotte! We are very proud of you!

Catalan is present at the Festival of Communities QMUL

This weekend, 11th and 12th of June, Queen Mary University of London has been hosting the Festival of Communities, a festival devoted to provide a space where everyone can come together, share experiences, and get involved in our borough in ways that we may not have had the opportunity to before.

Members of the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures organised a Language Bingo to let people discover new languages, such as Catalan, Spanish or French. Catalan was present in the game with our teacher Dr Isabel Crespí, who was super enthusiastic.

Thank you all for coming! 🤩

Dr Isabel Crespí presents her research at the LSRL

Last Saturday, 23rd of April, Dr. Isabel Crespí presented her research on theoretical syntax at the 52nd meeting of the Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages (LSRL).

The LSRL is one of the most important annual venues for sharing research on theoretical linguistics and its application to the Romance language family. This year it was virtually held by the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Isabel did a nice presentation and the feedback and questions were great!

Stay Homas meet us!

The Catalan group Stay Homas came to London last weekend to perform a concert at the Scala club on Sunday, April 24.

They met Dr. Isabel Crespí, our Catalan teaching assistant, who gave them the bag from the Centre for Catalan Studies QMUL, and convinced them to come and visit us next year! How amazing would that be?

The concert was a great success, with more than 200 attendees. Scala was full and the atmosphere was great.

We hope to see them soon at Queen Mary!