The Linguistics department at the School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics is honoured to host the first Multilingualism in Ireland conference, September 7th–8th 2023. The conference will be held in person with the opening roundtable and closing multilingual poetry reading broadcast live on YouTube. Between these two key events, there will be a series of presentations on aspects of multilingualism in Ireland, including acquisition, policy and communities.

This conference will focus on the many languages of Ireland, be they national languages Irish, English and Irish Sign Language or the many migrant languages used every day. Linguistic diversity in Ireland has been documented over the years, but a dedicated event and subsequent publication has been lacking in the recent past. As Ireland has once again become a net-immigration state (CSO 2022), we must think of how we support language users in multilingual communities. This conference will bring together leading names in academia, youth organisations, the arts and advocacy to consider Ireland through a multilingual lens. The conference will thus further our understanding of how and when different languages are used in Ireland, but also highlight the immediate application of our knowledge to the concrete usage contexts in various multilingual communities.