Vol. 29 (2025): Culture Crossroads
The Latvian Academy of Culture is among the institutions that have contributed most significantly to the development and consolidation of Spanish as a foreign language in Latvia. First, since 1995, the Academy has offered the degree in Intercultural Relations between Latvia and Spain, which allows for specialization in Spanish with a curriculum similar to that of Hispanic Studies. Additionally, in 2004, it began collaborating with the Instituto Cervantes as the examination centre for the Diplomas in Spanish as a Foreign Language (DELE) in Latvia. Finally, since 2015, its Department of Intercultural Relations and Foreign Languages has been organizing the International Scientific Conference on Teaching Spanish as a Foreign Language (ELE/SFL), a space dedicated to applied linguistics research and the exchange of innovative teaching practices.
In 2024, on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the International Scientific Conference on Teaching Spanish as a Foreign Language, Dr. Anda Laķe – Head of the Institute of Arts and Cultural Studies, the research centre of the Latvian Academy of Culture – promoted the publication of this special issue of Culture Crossroads journal. The aim was to bring together a representative sample of the main lines of research addressed at the conference during its recent years of development. The result is a volume about Spanish and in Spanish, a language that, according to the latest yearbook of the Instituto Cervantes, has surpassed the figure of 600 million speakers worldwide, making it a valuable tool for intercultural communication.
