CIP hosts international conference on sociolinguistics and AI

From 19-21 August 2026, researchers from around the world gathered at the University of Copenhagen's South Campus for the conference Sociolinguistics and AI 2026, hosted by the AI-UNI research group and the Centre for Internationalisation and Parallel Language Use (CIP). The conference explored the growing impact of artificial intelligence on language, communication, identity, and society. 

The three-day event brought together scholars from a wide range of sociolinguistic traditions to discuss how AI technologies, particularly large language models, are potentially reshaping the ways we use, understand, and think about language. Topics included language diversity, multilingualism, language policy, social inequality, digital communication, AI and education, and the ethical implications of AI-driven language technologies. 

The conference featured keynote presentations by leading international researchers Maartje De Meulder (HU University of Applied Sciences Utrecht), Nicole Holliday (University of California, Berkeley), Rodney H. Jones (University of Reading), and Britta Schneider (University of Vienna). They presented on sign language AI, speech evaluation technologies, prompting practices, and democratic discourse in the age of AI. 

By creating a forum for critical dialogue, Sociolinguistics and AI 2026 highlighted the important role of sociolinguistic research in understanding and responding to the rapid development of AI technologies and their consequences for language and society.

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