The contribution presents the course concept of an intercomprehension course for Romance languages offered at the Language Centre of the University of Salzburg. The primary aim of the course is the construction of (receptive) plurilingual and pluricultural competencies.
Romance languages hold a comparatively privileged place in intercomprehension didactics. In spite of the diversity of the resulting research literature and methods (cf. for example Klein & Stegmann 1999, Meissner 2011, Teyssier 2012, Ollivier & Strasser 2013), intercomprehensive approaches have not yet been systematically integrated into foreign language teaching. The contribution is intended to present the course concept and concrete examples of the intercomprehension course „Romanische Sprachen vernetzend erlernen" offered at the Language Centre of the University of Salzburg since 2018. The primary aim of the course, which targets a heterogeneous audience (students from different subject areas, university employees and external persons) with basic competences in at least one Romance language, is the construction of pluricultural and plurilingual competences, i.e. a relatively rapid acquisition of reading and listening skills in several (mostly not yet formally studied) Romance languages. In addition to French, Italian and Spanish, which are common foreign languages in the school systems of German-speaking countries, Portuguese and Romanian (as well as selected examples in Catalan) are also covered. The didactic principles include the exclusive use of authentic and non-pre-didacticized material covering a wide range of text types. The texts form the basis for the participants' assumptions about the target languages, the central decoding process consisting in the transfer of forms, functions and meanings on the basis of linguistic but also non-linguistic factors such as (the general or specific/textual) knowledge or context. The systematic comparison of languages – also in the form of a portfolio – promotes the development of metacognitive competences and raises the participants' awareness of their plurilingual repertoire. The training of decoding strategies and reflection on their own learning process develops language learning competences and fosters learner autonomy. Furthermore, the rapid progress in receptive skills is also an important motivating factor for the (later) acquisition of productive competences.
