by: Hannah Jane Matol & Ma. Juliet Vasay

The Society of United Language Students (SoULS) of the College of Arts and Humanities (CAH) attended the 3rd Linguistic Society of the Philippines (LSP) International Conference last March 11-13, 2021 with the theme, “Linguistics, Languages, and Languaging: Braving the Challenges of the New Normal.”

Spearheaded by LSP together with the University of Santo Tomas (UST), the third International Conference was held via Zoom. It commenced on the morning of March 11, 2021 with the opening remarks from Dr. Marilu R. Madrunio, the Dean of UST Arts and Letters.

The three-day conference featured plenary speakers from Japan, Australia, the United States of America, China, and the Philippines, workshop resource speakers from Japan, Malaysia, United Kingdom, Germany, and the Philippines, and themed panel presentations by the different Philippine institutions namely UST, Ateneo de Manila University, University of the Philippines, Far Eastern University, and De La Salle University. One of the plenary speakers, Prof. Rod Ellis, is a known linguist wherein his works led him to be recognized as the “Father of Language Acquisition.”

True to its theme, the conference showcased papers focusing on different areas of linguistics during the parallel discussion: Philippine languages, discourse analysis on language acquisition and language teaching, critical discourse analysis, English language teaching and assessment, digital linguistics, data-driven learning, corpus linguistics, language education, forensic linguistics, world Englishes, and language policy.

In detail, the event was particularly attended by the third year Bachelor of Arts in English Language Studies as part of their club activity and thesis writing orientation, along with Prof. Ma. Juliet Vasay, a language Professor from CAH. She also presented her study titled, Unveiling #MartialLaw: A Critical Discourse Analysis.

The LSPIC 2021 was attended by 502 national and international participants.