On May 26, the 24th Symposium on FunctionalLinguistics and Discourse Analysis was held in SCAU. The symposium wasorganized by the School of Foreign Studies of SCAU and co-organized by Englishand Chinese Discourse Analysis Committee of China Association for ComparativeStudies of English and Chinese, "Journal of Poyang Lake", GuangdongSociety of Foreign Languages and Centre for Ecolinguistics of SCAU with thetheme of “Migrants Language Problems”. The keynote speakers included Prof.Huang Guowen (South China Agricultural University), Prof. Wang Lei (GuangdongUniversity of Foreign Studies), Prof. Hu Yingfeng (Jiangxi Academy of SocialSciences) and Dr. Liu Junhong (China Three Gorges University). More than 140teachers and students attended from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Sun Yat-sen University,Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Hong Kong Polytechnic University and South China AgriculturalUniversity, etc.

  The opening ceremony was chaired by CPC branch secretary of SFS Prof.Chen Wenyi.In the opening ceremony, Vice President of SCAU Prof. Yang Zhoudelivered a welcoming address, in which he welcomed the teachers and studentspresent and introduced SCAU. SCAU is determined to devote to the cause of countrysiderejuvenation, in which ecological migration is an important part. Prof. YangZhou pointed out that to study the language issues of migrants is of great valueto ecological and cultural protection. He hoped that scholars of this symposiumcan exchange ideas of migrant language research and make contributions tocountryside rejuvenation.

  Keynote speakers Prof. Huang Guowen, Prof. Wang Lei, Prof. Hu Yingfengand Dr. Liu Junhong respectively delivered speeches with the title of"Migrant Language Study from the Perspective of Harmonious Co-existence ofHumans and Nature", "A Initial Survey of Language Use by Immigrantsfrom Three Gorges to Guangdong", "A Survey of Language Use byEnvironmental Immigrants" and "From Language Islet to Islands:  A Review of Research on Language Contact byThree Gorges Immigrants".

  The speeches were highly inspirational and the audience raised questionslike "what is the impact of immigrants on local ecology", "questionnairedesign on immigrants' language attitude", "language fusion andharmony", "dialect protection", etc., which the keynote speakersanswer in great length. The keynote speakers also answered questions like howto conduct research and publish papers and encouraged the teachers and studentsof the symposium to do research in a devoted and down-to-earth way.

   Inthe closing ceremony, Deputy Dean Prof. Chen Yang expressed gratitude to thekeynote speakers' thought-provoking speeches and observed that these speechesshowed that functional linguistics bore a strong sense of social responsibilityand a strong affection for the country. Prof. Huang Guowen concluded that theorganizer and co-organizers all had made painstaking efforts for the success ofthe symposium.

  The symposium served as a platform on which researchers of functional linguisticsand ecolinguistics could exchange and share thoughts, which in turn helpedbroaden our horizons and kept us updated for the cutting-edge development inrelevant fields.