Preliminary results of the languages questionnaire published 5 June 2013 – 1 August 2013 WESLINE conference 2 September 2013 By Colin Homiski and Nick Hearn

What were the other HE Institutions? Bath 1 Birmingham 1 Brighton 2 Bristol 1 Cardiff 1 Chester 1 Coventry 1 Essex 1 Leeds 1 London 5 Manchester 2 Nottingham 3 Open 1 Portsmouth 1 Sheffield 1 Swansea 2 University of the Highlands and Islands 1 Warwick 1 Westminster 1

Language knowledge (Q.4) 14 people had some knowledge of all 5 languages ie French, German, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese 19 people had some knowledge of 4 languages 27 people had some knowledge of 3 languages 32 people had some knowledge of 2 languages 10 people had knowledge of only one language

What other languages do you know (Q5)? Russian 22 Latin 19 Greek 14 (Presumaby in most cases ancient Greek) Dutch/Afrikaans 7 Catalan 6 Welsh 6 Polish 3 Hungarian 2 Ukrainian 2 Arabic 2 Gaelic 1 Chinese 1 Basque 1 Hebrew 1 Urdu 1 Indonesian 1

Correlation between languages known and material acquired Knows language and acquires Knows language and doesnt acquire Doesn't know language and acquires

What subjects do you collect a) in the vernacular b)in English (Q13-25)

What other subject are you responsible for (Q28) Over half of respondents stated they were responsible for a number of other subjects Everything; All subjects principally humanities up to 1900, All undergraduate subjects. Most academic disciplines

Future of WESLINE: Cline of integration Q34 a) Groups to remain as they are LESS INTEGRATION MORE INTEGRATION b) Groups to remain as they are but cooperate more c) Individual language groups to be Replaced with a group like WESLINE d) More cooperation through umbrella group like WESLINE with other umbrella Groups like COSEELIS etc

Doing a languages questionnaire of this type takes a long time Difficult to ask the right questions There are technical difficulties with online forms Hard to get a large number of respondents Subject specialists cover a wide range of subjects Most want greater cooperation between groups but not great enthusiasm for full integration