International Symposium on Social Justice in English Language Education Held at Bahçeşehir University

The 3rd International Symposium on Social Justice in English Language Education was held on 30-31 May at Bahçeşehir University's South (Beşiktaş) Campus, hosted by Assist. Prof. Dr. Ufuk Keleş, faculty member of the Department of English Language Teaching. The symposium, organized by an international committee of academics led by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Deniz Ortaçtepe-Hart of the University of Glasgow, was opened by Prof. Dr. Yavuz Samur, Dean of our Faculty of Educational Sciences. The keynote speech was delivered by Prof. Dr. Peter de Costa, director of the MA TESOL program at the University of Michigan. Over two days, the symposium hosted two invited talks, two panels, a workshop, 43 face-to-face synchronous presentations and 25 asynchronous online presentations. Participants from various countries presented their research and shared their ideas on native-speakerism, language policies and ideological approaches, minority and heritage language acquisition, othering, gender equality, freedom of belief, refugee rights, language acquisition in war zones and many other topics, and had the opportunity to meet many other academics working on social justice issues. Organized with the support of ELT Department students, the symposium was well received by the participants.