The Language, Society, and Culture Faculty Interest Group was created as a forum for sharing research interests within the domains of linguistics and sociolinguistics. The group emerged from a group based at BMCC, and now consists of members across CUNY. The FIG’s primary function is to plan a biennial one-day conference focusing on language/linguistic research in the context of society and culture. The first of these conferences was hosted by BMCC in spring 2011. The LSC cohort at BMCC organized the International Linguistics Association Conference in April 2012, so we skipped a year and the second LSC Conference (on “Storytelling”) was hosted by BCC in 2014. In 2016, the conference came back to BMCC; the theme was “Language and Politics” in concert with an interesting presidential election year. Our 4th biennial conference was held at LaGuardia Community College in 2018. The theme was “Language and Social Justice: Language for Change”.

The venue:

2020 marks the first time ever that the LSC is meeting by the beach (that is, at Kingsborough Community College).

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The crowd:

Other than the community colleges traditionally involved in this conference, we have also invited faculty and students from a number of senior colleges, including:

• Baruch College

• Brooklyn College

• Lehman College

• College of Staten Island

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Online Proceedings:

Depending on general interest, we may collect 4-page manuscripts of work presented at the conference for inclusion in online proceedings.

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Prizes!

In addition (though not for the first time in LSC history), there will be a student poster competition, sponsored by the joint efforts of the KCC Speech Club and Debate Club.

The organizing committee comprises faculty members from the Communications & Performing Arts Department at Kingsborough Community College as well as student volunteers from the Speech and Communication majors and KCC's Speech Club and Debate Club. Faculty across several CUNY campuses will be evaluating all entries received for LSC-5. Two subcommittees were formed as follows:

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SPEECH / LINGUISTICS

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Carlos DeCuba, KCC (chair)

Mary Sepp, BMCC

Cindy Greenberg, KCC

Christina Hagedorn, CSI

Francisco Antonio Montaño, Lehman College

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COMMUNICATION 

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Alyse Keller, KCC (chair)

Gordon Alley-Young, KCC

Lili Shi, KCC

Melisa JnPierre, KCC

Poppy Slocum, LGCC

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GENERAL CHAIR: Laura Spinu, KCC