On July 4, 2019, Associate Prof. Yuichi Ono and Associate Prof. Masaharu Shimada organized a one-day two-tier workshop: the OSU-Tsukuba Joint Linguistics Workshop and Data Science in Collaboration on Language (DaSiC) 2019. The CEGLOC FD Committee supported this event through advertising and participation.

 DaSiC 2019 kicked of the day with Assistant Prof. Yuko Hijikata as keynote speaker. She spoke on needs analysis in English language education and as an example she spoke about her experience developing an English for Occupational Purposes Course for Japanese native speakers employed in the automotive industry.

 The keynote was followed by a lightning talk session. A total of 18 undergraduate and graduate students, young researchers and educational staff introduced their research in short 3-minute presentations, live or on video. Topics included, among others, grammar and syntax, learner acquisition order etc. A subsequent poster session allowed the presenters to go into more detail and interact with the audience. This resulted in lively discussions.

 In the afternoon, Prof. Mineharu Nakayama of the Ohio State University was the keynote speaker for the OSU-Tsukuba Joint Linguistics Workshop. He introduced his research on raising constructions (e.g. seem + to + infinitive). He explained the problems Japanese learners encounter in acquiring this construction due to influence of their native language. His keynote led to an energetic Q&A session that concluded this workshop in which 35 persons were present for both the morning and afternoon.

 Poster session impressions

Ruth Vanbaelen for the CEGLOC FD Committee