ESSE Book Award (Category A):  A book prize of €1,500 will be awarded by ESSE in 2020, coinciding with the 15th Conference to be held in Lyon, France, for books first published in 2018 or 2019 in each of the following fields:

1. English language and linguistics
2. Literatures in the English language
3. Cultural and area studies in English

ESSE Book Award for Junior Scholars (Category B): A further book prize of €1,500 will be awarded by ESSE in 2020 to a junior scholar for a first research book published in English in each of the three fields mentioned above, provided that publication was in 2018 or 2019.

The deadline for submission of books is 1 February 2020. The winners will be announced on the occasion of ESSE-15 in Lyon, France.

The requirements are as follows:

• Books eligible for prizes will be those published in English; they must have an ISBN. PhD dissertations published in book format, with an ISBN, are accepted. Editions of collected essays will NOT qualify for these prizes. The books must be works of scholarly research in the field of English studies. Undergraduate textbooks will not be considered.
• Any number of books may be submitted by the same author (provided that they are published within the admitted period of time), except for category B, since junior scholars are expected to submit their first research book published in English.
• All books will be evaluated strictly on the basis of their academic value, without regard to publisher, country of publication or nationality of the author.
• Authors must be members of national associations affiliated to ESSE (according to the official membership list submitted in 2019).
• Three copies (printed or electronic format) must be provided of each book submitted for consideration. No book will be considered for an award unless three copies have been received. The copies will not be returned.
• Candidates must write an email to the President of ESSE, Prof. Andreas H Jucker esse.president@outlook.com, informing him of their intention to participate, declaring their affiliation to a national association which is a member of ESSE, giving their university address, mentioning the field to which their book belongs, and indicating whether the copies of the book will be sent by the author or by the publisher. Candidates for the Category B award must also include a brief CV which must contain at least their date of birth, university affiliation, main field(s) of research and previous publications.

The three review copies must be sent to the address below by 1 FEBRUARY 2020. The deadline must be observed.

Books must be sent to the following address:

President of ESSE          
Prof. Dr. Andreas H. Jucker
Department of English
University of Zurich
Plattenstrasse 47
CH-8032 Zurich

The selection committees (three members each) will be appointed by the Board of ESSE in each of the three fields and for the two categories named above. Their composition will not be made public. Board members shall not pass on any information concerning this matter to the members of their associations. The Executive of ESSE will replace any members who are unable to carry out their duties. The Chairs of the selection committees will report progress regularly to the President of ESSE. The members of the committees can be Board members or ESSE members invited by the Board to do the selection job. The members of the committees and the ESSE Board are excluded from submitting their own books.

Two months before the opening of the conference a shortlist of a maximum of five books in each field and category will be announced on the ESSE Website. Board members are asked to report to the President any misgivings that they may have about the propriety of awarding a prize to any book on the shortlist, with the President passing on such comments to the committees if he deems it appropriate. The committees will recommend the awards to the Board, or they may recommend that no award be made in a particular field. Each committee can also recommend the conferment of one honourable mention. The President will report to the Board whether the work of the committees has been satisfactorily conducted. The Board may then approve the recommendations of the committees or they may reject a recommendation, in which case no award will be given in that field or category. Winners will be informed immediately in confidence, and the awards will be publicly announced during the opening ceremony of ESSE-15 conference, in Lyon, France

The Nominations Committee of the ESSE Board seeks applications for the positions of Secretary and Treasurer, which fall vacant in January 2020. The usual term of office is three years. Candidates, who should preferably have been involved in ESSE affairs or have had similar positions in their national associations, should submit, as e–mail attachments:

• a letter of application
• a short (2–3 page) CV
• letters of support from two national associations.

Each national association can also nominate candidates for any of these two positions (only one candidate for each position). In this case, national associations will submit, as e–mail attachments:

• a letter, signed by the association’s President, describing the candidate’s competence for the specific office
• a short (2–3 page) CV of candidate(s) proposed
• a letter, signed by another association’s President, seconding this proposal
• a letter in which the candidate will express his/her agreement with the candidacy.

Applications and nominations must be submitted electronically, by 30 April 2019 at the latest, to the members of the Nominations Committee:

• Terry Walker (Chair): Terry.Walker@miun.se
• Željka Babić: zeljka.babic@flf.unibl.org
• Rainer Emig: emigr@uni-mainz.de

From the applications and nominations received, the Committee will select the best candidates (maximum of three for each office). The two officers will be chosen by vote at the ESSE Board meeting in Wroclaw, 29–30 August 2019.

 ESSE Secretary and ESSE Treasurer 2019

Developing Mediation Skills for Teaching Legal English

By Patrizia Anesa & Barbora Chovancova

 4-5 October, 2018
Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería de Sistemas Informáticos, MADRID

The project proposal was presented by Patrizia Anesa (University of Bergamo, Italy) and Barbora Chovancová (Masaryk University Language Centre, Brno, Czech Republic). Members of the project are: Ismael Arinas Pellon (Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Spain), Shona Whyte (Université Nice Sophia Antipolis, France) and Halina Sierocka (University of Białystok, Poland).

 The workshop gave the participants the chance to discuss the project proposal and offer a definition of the first operational steps. Some of the sessions were also open to members of the Comm&Learn Research Team based at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (in particular Carola Álvarez-Bolado Sánchez, José Luis Llavona Arregui, Luis Dochao Moreno, and Éva Jakusné Harnos). The workshop also allowed us to discuss future strategies and potential forms of cooperation, as well as to share ideas about how project findings can be presented and circulated to colleagues internationally.

The term mediation can denote both a tool to reach a consensus in ADR (Alternative Dispute Resolution) and a language skill which enables communication over a linguistic barrier. The project intends to address both aspects. It also aims at defining good practices in the field of mediation to be developed for the legal profession, identifying educational needs and gaps in the area (emerging across different countries), and producing flexible programmes for legal English in a globalized, fast evolving legal world. The approach is not limited to linguistic features but will be contextualised by information offered by practitioners and teacher educators.

The complexity of mediation dynamics encompasses phenomena such as the popularization of information and its recontexualization, especially in teaching and training contexts. Thus, mediation will also be observed from a communicative perspective as a skill which has been relatively overlooked in ESP teaching (Chovancova 2016). The project will investigate practices which can be implemented in the teaching of Legal English in light of the importance of such discursive practices in making informed decisions. Thus, the analysis also aims to evaluate to what extent mediation may be defined as a crucial skill in legal language instruction and teacher education, and will provide practical applications of the integration of mediation into the legal English syllabus. In particular, legal language learning is inherently linked to content construction in Content-Based Instruction (CBI) and English Medium Instruction (EMI). Thus, a syllabus focusing on technical mediation material, interactive teamwork, and communication skills is crucial for efficient teaching and learning. Practical examples of qualitative and quantitative results from courses involving different types of technology-mediated teaching and learning in different universities will also be considered.

The overall objective is thus to offer insights into ways of enhancing and modernizing legal English teaching and learning by taking into account skills which are often ignored in traditional materials, but which in turn represent essential abilities in specific professional contexts.

This workshop represented a great opportunity to discuss the strengths and weakness of the project and exchange ideas with other experts in the field. We would like to express our gratitude to ESSE, which supported it and made it possible.

The ESSE Collaborative Project Workshop Scheme offers seed funding of up to 8,000 Euro to support a preliminary meeting of European researchers working towards a collaborative research project in the field of English Studies. The main purpose of this grant is to encourage prospective co-researchers from different national associations to plan a bid for a larger award from alternative funding sources; it also aims to resource the time and space to work out practical and intellectual details of the proposed project. Applications will be assessed on the quality and originality of research, evidence of sustainable international collaboration, and the feasibility of the project and its development.

• The proposed workshop should be designed to explore a collaborative research project that falls within the subject area of ESSE. The main purpose of the workshop should be to plan or facilitate grant writing for a larger award, although other activities connected to the development of the project may be involved.
• Applications should be submitted jointly by two full ESSE members from two different national associations.
• Other participants in the proposed workshop may be drawn from the same institutions or associations, but international diversity and collaboration across associations will be one of the criteria for assessing applications. Proposals can include postdoctoral and postgraduate researchers. Any participants who are not members of their national associations will be expected to join where possible following a successful application.
• The ESSE Board members are excluded from proposing or taking part in the workshop.
• The grant will only fund workshops of the type described above; it does not support other types of events, such as conferences, symposia, colloquia, seminar series or guest lectures.
• The grant may be used for reasonable expenses only: these include travel, accommodation and subsistence. Costs of meeting room bookings should be met by the hosting institution.
• The grant is designed to support a two-day meeting, and budgets should be designed to reflect this structure unless there is good reason for an alternative.
• The grant will be of a maximum of 4,000 euro per application.
• Successful applicants are expected to submit a full financial report with a detailed overview of expenses, including receipts and invoices. They will also be required to report back to ESSE on how the workshop objectives have been achieved and what plans are in place for the follow-up bid. Workshop participants may also like to write up their meeting for the ESSE Messenger.
• Successful applicants should acknowledge support received from ESSE in subsequent publications or publicity for the project. The ESSE logo should be included where appropriate in printed or electronic materials related to the project.

Applications should include the following:

1. Workshop participant details: name, affiliation, position and email address for all participants, and indication of their contribution to the project (maximum 150 words for each participant)
2. Project topic: outline of the proposed project with research questions and brief bibliography (maximum 1,000 words)
3. Funding plans: details of funding body, scheme and amount of award to be applied for, where possible.
4. Workshop details: breakdown of date, venue and costs for workshop (download the budget guideline)
5. Rationale: a statement explaining the urgency/value/originality of the project and the key objectives of the workshop (maximum 500 words)
6. Applications should be sent to Rainer Emig emigr@uni-mainz.de

 Dates

• Deadline for applications: 31 March 2019
• Notification of results will be sent to applicants by 8 May 2019
• Deadline for completing the workshop and submission of workshop reports: 30 November 2019

Recognising that it is difficult in some situations to obtain access to books necessary for research without purchasing them, and recognising also that some ESSE members have financial difficulties, ESSE awards some small grants to its members for the purchase of books in connection with specific research projects.

Grants will be of a maximum of 300 euro per applicant. However, applications will be kept to the minimum necessary and restricted only to books that fulfil the following criteria:

• Books that are not held by the applicant’s university libraries and cannot easily and quickly be obtained by interlibrary loan.
• Books that need to be available to the applicants over an extended period, longer than would be possible through a library loan.
• Books whose price would place a strain on the applicant’s available financial resources, for example, because of the high cost of the books concerned.

ESSE requests that successful applicants donate the books to their university libraries when their research projects have been completed, so that other scholars can benefit from the books.

Eligibility

• Applicants for book grants must themselves be members of their national associations affiliated to ESSE, with the exception of PhD students from the Serbian Association for the Study of English, which does not consider doctoral students eligible as members; in this case, their supervisor must be a member of an association affiliated to ESSE.
• Grants are available for any research project, whether it is formally registered and recognised or simply normal individual academic research. However, it is not the intention to provide books for general academic purposes, e.g. as reference works to have on one’s bookshelf.

Dates

The application deadline is 1 May 2019. Applications will be dealt with as quickly as possible.

Books included in the application must be bought at the personal expense of the applicant between the application deadline and 30 June 2019.

After purchasing the books, the winners will send the itemised receipts to the Treasurer of ESSE, Alberto Lázaro (alberto.lazaro@uah.es). The receipt(s) will include the name of the purchaser, the titles and the cost of the books (even if the purchases are electronic).

Grant money will be transferred to recipients’ accounts before 15 July 2019.

Selection Committee

• Prof. Titela Vilceanu (Chair): elavilceanu@yahoo.com
• Željka Babić
• Armela Panajoti

 ESSE Book Grants Announcement Application Form

In 2019, ESSE will offer funding of up to €19,000 to help cover costs associated with a research trip.

ESSE will again offer TWO types of travel bursaries:

1. Type A: a number of bursaries of up to €1,500 each will be available for scholars in need of support to pursue a project or programme of research leading to the writing of their PhD dissertation.
2. Type B: a number of bursaries of up to €1,500 each will be available for scholars already holding a doctorate or its equivalent.

Applications are invited from all member countries. Awards are made on the basis of academic merit.

Only one application per person is allowed.

Bursaries may not be used to support research trips begun before the Bursary Committee has announced the outcome of the competition.

Applications for Type A and Type B Bursaries will not normally be entertained from candidates who have previously been successful in that competition.

In the case of both competitions A and B, winners are expected to make a short-term visit to a country where they, for example, identify an outstanding holding, collection or other type of material relevant to their research, or where they gather corpus materials or conduct an experiment. Conference participation is not supported by these bursaries; award winners may extend their visit at their own expense to attend a conference in the country concerned, but no part of the conference expenses will be covered by the bursary. Bursaries must be utilized and the study trips completed by the application deadline for next year’s bursaries, i.e. 1 March 2020.

After completing the research trip, winners will be asked to send a financial report to the Treasurer of ESSE and a report about their results to both the Treasurer and the Chair of the Selection Committee. This latter report may be published in ESSE Messenger.

Applicants for the first type of bursary are required to be members of their national associations affiliated to ESSE with the exception of the Serbian Association for the Study of English which does not consider PhD students eligible as members; in this case, their supervisors must be ESSE members.

Applicants for the second type of bursaries must be registered members of their national associations affiliated to ESSE for at least one year (membership starting on 1 January of the previous year – this is to say, January 2018).

The deadline for applications for both types of Bursaries is 1 March 2019.

Notification to the applicants should be sent (electronically) by 15 April 2019. Applicants should send electronically to the chair of the Selection Committee:

• the completed application form (see below) with sections on personal information, a list of the applicant’s most important publications, a research plan, and a provisional budget proposal;
• a scanned or electronically generated letter issued by the president or the secretary of the appropriate national organization to certify the membership of the applicant (or his/her supervisor in Serbia);
• for Type A bursaries, a letter of recommendation, sent directly via email to the Chair of the Selection Committee by the supervisor of the PhD candidate.

Note: the names of the bursary winners and their projects will be published on the ESSE website.

Selection Committee:

• Prof. Titela Vilceanu (Chair): elavilceanu@yahoo.com
• Željka Babić
• Armela Panajoti

 Bursaries 2019 Announcement Application Form

Here are a few details about the forthcoming 15th ESSE Conference and its host city, Lyon (France).

 Diaporama – ESSE 15 Conference, Lyon, France 2020

The main decisions taken at the Board Meeting in Brno (Czech Republic), August 2018 are now available on the website at https://essenglish.org/decisions-by-the-board-2018

 ESSE Letter of Support