Fethi HELAL

Fethi Helal holds a PhD & HDR in Applied Linguistics from the university of Manouba, Tunisia. His work has appeared in international journals such as Critical Discourse Studies, Discourse & Communication, international Multilingual Research Journal and the International Journal of Bilingualism. He is also the lead author of a book-length treatment of Language politics in Tunisia, published in collaboration with Professor Emiritus Joseph Lo Bianco (university of Melbourne, Australia) by Multilingual Matters in 2025.  Helal’s specialization is in discourse-oriented language policy & planning tied to solving practical language problems in multilingual and conflict-ridden language settings such as in the Maghreb. 

Currently, he is involved as lead researcher in LocalLing, a four-year research and staff exchange project funded by the European Union. This project is an international, interdisciplinary network dedicated to promoting the use, maintenance, teaching, and learning of local and heritage languages in countries spanning the five continents. 

From a LocalLing perspective, my research explores Heritage & minoritized  language revitalization efforts from a discourse planning perspective (often neglected in classical LPP theory) and the way it intersects with status/official LP and performative/grassroots’ community operations. 

Nadia BOUCHHIOUA

Professor Nadia Bouchhioua is a Tunisia Associate Professor and researcher at the Faculty of Letters, Arts and Humanities, University of Manouba, Tunisia. She holds a PhD degree and HDR in English language and linguistics.  She has been teaching various English courses at the university level for more than twenty years.  She supervises and evaluates MA and PhD research. Pr. Bouchhioua is previous chair of the MA program and member of the scientific council in her home institution.  She is currently a member of the doctoral and HDR committee and director of research at her institution and member of the accreditation and evaluation committee (ATEA) at the Ministry of Higher Education in her country. She is the author of two books and 15 research articles. Her research interests and publications revolve around multilingualism, cross linguistic transfer, second language phonological acquisition, as well as the documentation and acquisition of local and heritage languages.

Adel SLITI

Adel Sliti is Assistant Professor at Manouba University, Tunisia. His PhD dissertation examined Derek Walcott’s poetics of survival, while his MA focused on E. E. Cummings’s nonconformist poetry. His research interests include Anglophone, Caribbean, Arab, and American literature, as well as women’s poetry. He has participated in conferences in Tunisia and abroad, and his work has appeared in international journals and edited books. His research explores the intersections of literature, orature, language, storytelling, literary genre, identity, and cultural memory.

He is currently involved in the Revitalization of Linguistic Diversity & Cultural Heritage (LocalLing) project, a four-year research and staff exchange initiative funded by the European Union. Within this project, he studies how folk idioms, storytelling, songs, zajal, and other vernacular forms shape the sociocultural imaginary and circulate across print, radio, television, and digital media. He explores the figure of the storyteller and its intercultural resonances with the bard, griot, druid, rhapsode, ḥakawātī, qaṣṣāṣ, mughannāwātī, and fḍāwī.