In/Un-Natural: Literary, Language-Education and Linguistic. Perspectives between the Natural and the Artificial - 10th Doctoral Conference

Conference website: https://www.unive.it/dslcc-phd-conference

The 10th Doctoral Conference In/Un-Natural at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice explores the shifting boundaries between the natural and the artificial across a rich interdisciplinary spectrum. Bringing together Literature, Educational Linguistics, Linguistics and Psycholinguistics, and Computational Linguistics, the conference highlights how each field reinterprets this central dichotomy—from narratives of the Anthropocene to language acquisition processes, from cognitive and biological foundations of language to the challenges posed by artificial intelligence and language models.

Topics and areas:
Literature:
- Literary representations of natural and artificial environments;
- Literary representations of the Anthropocene/Capitalocene, Dark Ecology and
the climate crisis;
- Nature and exploitation in colonial and post-colonial contexts;
- Perspectives from Material Ecocriticism and non-human agency;
- Urban spaces, suburbs and the “Third Landscape” in literary texts.

Educational linguistics:
- The Natural Approach and acquisition perspectives in L2/LS teaching;
- Emotional dimension, motivation and affective filter in L2/LS acquisition
processes;
- Natural environments and ecological approaches to the development of
communicative competence in L2/LS;
- Multilingualism and educational mediation, intended as a practice based on the
idea of the learner as a social actor and oriented towards reproducing the
communicative nature of real contexts of L2/LS in the classroom (Council of
Europe, 2020);
- Natural language acquisition between digital technologies and Artificial
Intelligence.

Linguistics and Psycholinguistics:
- Natural language acquisition;
- Formal analysis of the natural features and components of language (from both
generative and usage-based perspectives);
- Biolinguistics: the phylogenetic development of language;
- Clinical linguistics: language in populations with atypical development;
- Ecological contexts for data collection.

Computational linguistics:
Human and machine language learning;
- Competence and generalization in language models;
- Cognitive plausibility of models versus natural acquisition;
- Model training strategies and architecture;
- Language performance analysis: syntax, morphology, semantics;
- Model interpretability and comparison with human cognitive processes;
- Sustainability and accessibility implications in modeling research.

Keynote Speakers:
Lucio De Capitani, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice
Paolo Balboni, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice
Gloria Gagliardi, University of Bologna

Key Dates: Abstract submission: 16 March – 4 May 2026 (by 11:59 PM CEST)
Notification of acceptance: by 30 June 2026
Registration: 1–15 September 2026

Submission Guidelines:
The Call for Papers is addressed to master students, PhD candidates and researchers interested in contributing to the conference debate.
The abstract, of a maximum of 350 words and no more than 5 bibliographical references (excluded from word count), must be sent to the scientific-organizing committee by May 4, 2026 by filling out the form available on the conference website.
Contributions are to be delivered as an oral presentation up to a maximum of 20 minutes (+ 5 minutes for questions).
The abstract must be uploaded in PDF format and renamed Surname_CD_Unive26.
The file must also contain a short biography of about 150 words.
The conference will be held exclusively as an in-person event. Registration is free of charge.

Conference languages: Italian and English
Conference website: https://www.unive.it/dslcc-phd-conference
For further information, feel free to contact us at convegnophd.lcsmsl@unive.it.