In October 2011, we published a post on the geographic location of academic events announced on Calenda, pointing to the increasing number of events held outside of France, the country where the platform was launched.

Since that post was published, Calenda has evolved into a multi-language platform, and, since 2012, it has been possible to submit – and therefore view – announcements on the calendar in a wide range of languages. Indeed, sometimes the very same announcement is available in several languages. It is also possible to browse the site in French, English and Portuguese.

Three years after introducing these features, with the aim of facilitating and showcasing multilinguism on Calenda, and given OpenEdition’s ongoing efforts to internationalize content on all of its platforms, we take a look back on the internationalization of Calenda, starting with the places where the events published on your favourite calendar are held.

To do so, we have analyzed and mapped the database of 30,000 academic events now published on the platform. Here are the main results.

Calenda across the world

Since 2000, Calenda has announced events held in over 110 countries. Each year, the calendar publishes events taking place in around 50 different countries.

— Almost 25% of academic events on Calenda take place outside of France

Most of the academic events announced on Calenda are held in France. However, an increasing number of the events take place outside of France, representing 22.5% of events published on Calenda over the course of 2015. Here is the distribution by continent:

• Europe: 13%
• North America: 4.6%
• Africa: 3.8%
• Asia: 0.7%
• South America: 0.3%
• Oceania: 1%

A growing European standing

Even excluding events held in France, most of the events on Calenda take place in Europe. The internationalization of Calenda is thus above all a sign of Europeanization.

— In French-speaking countries

The Europeanization of the platform is above all due to other French-speaking countries on the continent, in particular Belgium, but also Switzerland and Luxembourg.

— In the rest of Europe

Yet this process is also clearly becoming established in the continent’s other language communities. Southern Europe (Portugal, Italy, Spain) and northern Europe (The Netherlands, Germany and the UK) are announcing more and more academic events using the platform. This trend is the fruit of efforts undertaken since 2012 to internationalize Calenda.

The trend is probably also the result of a ripple effect from OpenEdition’s other platforms, particularly Hypotheses, a research blogging platform which for several years now has pursued an active policy towards the German- and Spanish-speaking academic communities.

Lastly, the Europeanization of the platform reflects OpenEdition’s development of projects focused on specific linguistic or geographical areas, such as OpenEdition Italia and LusOpenEdition.

Outside Europe

The same trends can be observed beyond Europe, with a process of internationalization underway in French-speaking countries in particular, but also increasingly in Spanish-, Italian-, German- and English-speaking countries, and, to a lesser extent, in Arab- and Dutch-speaking regions.

— French-speaking countries

The Mediterranean region has long been a dynamic presence on Calenda, particularly in terms of research from the Maghreb and Mashriq. Here the network of French Overseas Research Institutes – one of Calenda’s partners – plays an important role.

Further south, West African countries have published numerous events on Calenda, in particular Senegal and Cameroon.

Finally, academic communities in Quebec are making increasing use of Calenda, with around a hundred announcements now being published each year.

— Other language communities

In addition to francophone countries, non-francophone countries in sub-Saharan Africa are publishing more and more event announcements on Calenda. Latin America is also present on Calenda, with Brazil playing a particularly prominent role thanks to the LusOpenEdition project. The United States, too, is represented on the platform.

On the other hand, Asia, whose academic communities are nonetheless increasingly dynamic, is notably absent from our calendar.

In the future

Calenda’s archiving features and statistics offer a comprehensive overview of the locations of events announced on the platform. However, at this stage we can only speculate as to why some academic communities are making greater use of Calenda than others. There is need for further documentary work and analysis in this area.

The years to come will no doubt see Calenda becoming increasingly established at the European level, thanks to the platform’s multilingual features and the development of partnerships with European research networks like Dariah.

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