Call for Papers

Communicating in and about Sports

May 16-17 2024, Paris 8 University

We are delighted to announce "Communicating in and about Sports," a two-day symposium to be held on May 16-17 2024 in Paris 8 University, in anticipation of the upcoming 2024 Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games. Defining sports is a challenging task as the range of activities that qualify is vast, including traditional Olympic and Paralympic events like swimming, athletics, and gymnastics, as well as extreme sports such as big wave surfing, and even non-physical competitions like chess and e-sports. The literary world offers an even broader spectrum, as evidenced by Lewis Carroll’s description of a curious croquet game in which "the croquet balls were live hedgehogs and the mallets live flamingoes" (Carroll 104). Though the chief difficulty for the player (Alice) was in “managing her flamingo”, the chief difficulty for the reader is to fall through the language rabbit hole. 

We are seeking proposals for papers that examine sports, parasports and e-sports from multidisciplinary perspectives, including but not limited to, English for Specific Purposes, History, Literature, Linguistics, Didactics, Culture and Media Studies, Sociolinguistics and Philosophy. We invite submissions that address the following topics :

•   Sports communication : This could encompass communication about sports, including coverage of the Olympic games and city, as well as sports journalism, social media, and other relevant topics. Communication within sports (i.e : sports, parasports, and e-sports) including spoken communication between athletes and coaches during training, games/events, and interviews with journalists, is also a key area of interest. We also welcome papers that explore cross-cultural communication in sports and parasports.
• Discourse analysis and genres : We welcome submissions that examine the style and terminology of sports discourse from multiple perspectives including, but not limited to, corpus approaches. We are also interested in papers that study sports genres, glossaries, rules and manuals.
• Sport metaphors : We are looking for papers that address metaphors in and about sports. This can range from the metaphors used by coaches, to the sport metaphors used in business.
• Sports in literature and popular culture : We invite submissions that explore the way sports is depicted in literature, films, TV shows, and other forms of popular culture.
• Didactics aspects in teaching English for sports : We encourage papers that explore language needs in the teaching of English for sports or CLIL (Content and language integrated learning )
• Sports history and collective memories : We encourage submissions that explore the historical significance of different sports and their evolution over time, as well as submissions pertaining to the cultural and linguistic legacy of professional communities. National sport events bring nations together, as can be witnessed during the FIFA World Cup, the Rugby World Cup or the Olympic and Paralympic Games for instance. Sports thus participates in the making and sustaining of national identities. These events are also a source of empowerment. Gymnast Simone Biles and tennis player Serena Williams have become vocal about their positions as women and Black individuals in sports. Submissions could therefore tackle identity and empowerment related issues. 
• Sport management : We are interested in papers that examine the economics of sports and sport management, including those that draw on a historical perspective.

Submissions :

Please send your abstracts in English or in French (200 to 250 words), along with a title and brief author biography by January 15th 2024 to Gwen Le Cor glecor@univ-paris8.fr and Margaux Coutherut margaux.coutherut@univ-paris8.fr

Contributors will be encouraged to submit an extended version of their conference paper to be considered for publication. 

References : see pdf