The University of Granada (UGR) hosted the first Conference on Spanish as an International Academic and Scientific Language: Synergies for Transnational Promotion, an event jointly organised by the Conference of Rectors of Spanish Universities (CRUE) and the Iberoamerican University Association for Postgraduate Studies (AUIP). The conference, which took place at the UGR's "Triunfo" Administrative Complex, was attended both in person and online by over 160 people from more than 50 institutions in Latin America and around the world.
Opening ceremony and objectives
The conference was officially opened by Pedro Mercado Pacheco, Rector of the University of Granada, and Chantal Pérez Hernández, Director General of the AUIP and member of the UGR's Committee for the Promotion of Academic Spanish. Silvia Montero Martínez, Director for Language Services and Resources at the UGR's Vice-Rectorate for Internationalization, then presented the agenda for the day.
The main objective of the event was to discuss and establish joint actions to promote Spanish as a language of science and culture, as well as its role as an essential tool for generating, transmitting and disseminating specialised knowledge. These goals are aligned with the core mandate of higher education institutions to guarantee universal access to knowledge and protect cultural diversity.
Presentation of the Granada Declaration
Part of the conference was dedicated to presenting and promoting the Granada Declaration on the Development, Communication and Dissemination of Science in Spanish. In line with the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science, the Declaration seeks to promote the right of all people to benefit from scientific progress, as established in Article 27.1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The document emphasises that the predominance of English in the global communication of scientific knowledge has resulted in a loss and lack of terminology for communicating this knowledge in vernacular languages. It also highlights the fact that scientific developments are deeply rooted in the culture and language in which they are produced. Therefore, the preservation of linguistic and cultural diversity is a fundamental epistemological condition for pluralistic and rigorous knowledge production.
The UGR therefore urges universities and other organisations to sign and promote the Declaration, which lays the groundwork for developing action plans that seek to:
- Promote academic projects in digitalisation, the knowledge economy, language technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) in Spanish, in order to contribute to the creation of standardised scientific terminology and corpora.
- Strengthen the role of publishing companies, repositories and university communication channels in promoting open, multilingual and accessible science, as well as advancing institutional policies for dissemination in Spanish.
- Develop and adapt models for teaching and learning Spanish as a foreign language to enhance professional performance in scientific-technical, social and cultural fields.
- Promote dialogue with academic and scientific evaluation agencies to develop policies and models aligned with open and multilingual science that foster the use of scientific Spanish.
Conference structure and panels
The conference was divided into four thematic panels designed to address challenges and opportunities related to researcher training, scientific production, and the dissemination of knowledge in Spanish:
- PANEL 1: Standardisation of scientific Spanish and development of technologies in the Spanish language.
- PANEL 2: Publication and dissemination of science and culture in Spanish.
- PANEL 3: Challenges in the evaluation and funding of science generated in Spanish.
- PANEL 4: The role of academic institutions and organisations in promoting international scientific Spanish.
In addition, the conference included a keynote speech titled ‘Hablemos de ciencia’ (Let's Talk About Science), delivered by the Director of the Cervantes Institute, Luis García Montero.
Conclusion and closing ceremony
To bring the conference to a close, Ana Gallego Cuiñas, Dean of the UGR's Faculty of Arts, presented the Granada Declaration on the Development, Communication and Dissemination of Science in Spanish. The full version of the document can be found at: https://internacional.ugr.es/informacion/estrategia-internacionalizacion/espanol-academico-cientifico-internacional
The closing ceremony was led by Pedro Mercado Pacheco, Rector of the University of Granada, who highlighted the importance of collaborating at the institutional level to develop coherent and consistent lines of action; Guillermo López Gallego, Deputy Director General for the Promotion of Spanish in the World, who stressed the need for academic evaluation and funding systems to avoid penalising the use of the Spanish language; and Inmaculada Marrero Rocha, Vice-Rector for Internationalization at the UGR, who reiterated the importance of languages in enabling us to understand and express the nature of the world around us.
A recording of the conference is available to watch on the UGRMedia YouTube channel.
Contact details:
Silvia Montero
Email: @email
Further information (in Spanish): https://canal.ugr.es/noticia/la-universidad-de-granada-impulsa-la-diversidad-linguistica-en-la-ciencia/