Tobie van Dyk

• Doctoral defence: 1 June 2026 at 10 a.m.
• Stadscampus, Building R, R.219
• Supervisor: Kris Van De Poel
• ​Register by 25 May through this form​

Abstract

Despite substantial scholarship in language planning and management, the field continues to show limited theoretical progression in addressing systemic institutional transformation in multilingual and socially unequal contexts. While earlier work has offered valuable insights into the ideological, economic, and ecological dimensions of language policy, it remains largely descriptive and provides insufficient guidance for navigating the complexities of contemporary higher education, characterised by linguistic diversity, structural inequality, and political contestation. This study responds to this gap by proposing a meta-framework that reconceptualises language planning as a transformative, rather than purely regulatory, process. By foregrounding institutional preparedness and maturity, the framework enables a critical assessment not only of the existence of policies and strategies, but of institutions’ capacity to implement them in meaningful, ethical, and sustainable ways.

Grounded in applied linguistics and sociolinguistics, the framework situates language planning within broader concerns of power, epistemic justice, and lived experience. It reframes language as epistemic infrastructure, multilingualism as transformative practice, and policy as a mechanism for advancing social justice rather than symbolic compliance. Structured across three interdependent tiers (macro, meso, and micro) the framework provides an integrated architecture for understanding how national policy environments, institutional systems, and everyday academic practices intersect to shape multilingual transformation. The macro tier establishes normative and regulatory orientations, the meso tier mediates these through governance, coordination, and resource alignment, and the micro tier captures the enactment of multilingualism in teaching, learning, and scholarly interaction. These tiers operate dynamically and recursively, positioning multilingualism as an evolving, contextually grounded practice.

Central to the framework is an axis of innovation and ethics. Innovation enables institutional responsiveness and adaptability, while ethics anchors transformation in principles of equity, inclusion, and human dignity. Their interaction ensures that change remains both forward-looking and socially accountable, fostering institutional learning, informed decision-making, and agency across all levels.

The application of the framework demonstrates how ethical innovation can translate constitutional ideals into meaningful educational practice. Its extension to generative artificial intelligence further illustrates its relevance for navigating the pedagogical and moral complexities of an increasingly digital academic landscape. The study thus offers a scalable and transferable model for sustainable transformation in higher education, reaffirming the university as a space of ethical imagination where diversity constitutes a collective resource and innovation is directed towards inclusive and socially responsive futures.

Max-Quentin Bischoff

• Doctoral defence: 10 June 2026 at 1.30 p.m.
• Location: FelixArchief and online
• Supervisor: Jeroen Puttevils
• ​Please register before 4 June by email​

Abstract

The dissertation investigates the future horizon of the Tucher trading company from sixteenth-century Nuremberg based on their internal correspondence. It consists of three parts. Part I discusses the theoretical foundations of the future horizon and analyses the main categories of the Tuchers’ future horizon through the annotation of 178 letters. This discoursive future horizon can be summarised in four points. 1) Almost one half of an average letter was concerned with future events or actions. 2) The Tuchers’ future horizon was largely short-term oriented, desirable, and within their control, but with no clear tendency in terms of certainty or uncertainty. 3) The future horizon partially differed between individual letter writers and domains of life. 4) The discoursive future horizon is strongly influenced by writing conventions and rhetorical strategies. A fuller understanding therefore requires a deeper exploration of the future horizon in concrete contexts.

Part II focuses on internal planning. The correspondence was primarily focused on short-term information management, servant coordination, and travelling preparations. But it also includes mid- and long-term perspectives. Mid-term planning was concerned with a horizon of one to ten years and included the conditions and positions of servants as well as structural adaptions of the company. The Tuchers had to manage personal ambitions of servants, organisational problems as well as cooperations with other merchants. Long-term planning dealt with the education of sons in order to ensure the continued existence of the family company. While the education was essentially standardised, the Tuchers continuously adapted plans to suit individual circumstances and took long-term personal development into account.

Part III analyses market expectations and how expectations were formed. Monetary expectations were mostly implied in concepts like trust, investment and interest. Nevertheless, a closer look reveals conflicting attitudes and priorities within the company: optimism and profit orientation on the side of some servants, and pessimism and security orientation on the side of the leaders. Future developments of interest and exchange rates were mostly unpredictable and were rarely discussed explicitly. Saffron prices, by contrast, were analysed in detail. The Tuchers took a range of factors into account in order to determine future prices and make investment decisions accordingly. One servant of the Tucher company, Christof Kurz, proposed a prognostic system based on astrology and market mechanisms that promised certain profits. While this idea raised interest and was even tested, it was also highly controversial within the company and quickly abandoned.