Thinking, Doing, Learning 6

The 6th international conference Thinking, Doing, Learning: Usage-Based Perspectives on Second Language Learning (TDL6) will take place at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands, on 14–16 October 2026.

TDL6 brings together researchers exploring second language learning through usage-based, empirical, and theoretically grounded approaches. These perspectives view language as an embodied, semiotic, and interactional system, and understand language use as the primary condition for language learning.

The aim of TDL is to advance our understanding of what it means to take a usage-based approach to L2 learning and L2 research. We invite researchers to explore a wide variety of topics related to language usage, language learning, and cognition. These include questions such as what it means to interact in L2 in different social contexts, how speakers accomplish social actions in moment-to-moment sense-making activities, and what is the nature of language use environments as well as sediments of usage events left as “acquired linguistic constructions” in the individual language learner.

This variety of questions involves strong, empirical and theoretical considerations of language, learning, and cognition, such as:

• what is language – constructions or interactional competence?
• what is learning – social action or long-term portability
• what is cognition – an individual property or a socially distributed phenomenon?, and
• what are the implications for L2 teaching?
  

Keynote speakers and invited symposium

The Call for Papers is now closed. Notifications of acceptance will be sent out by May 11th, 2026.

We look forward to welcoming you to Groningen for a lively and inspiring academic event!