Last September, the University of Granada hosted the FOM@PLAY (Freedom of Movement) international conference, a European Erasmus+ project coordinated by the University of Murcia, in which U^CHASS collaborated locally through its guarantor Encarnación Hidalgo Tenorio. Together with other team members — Aritz Gorostiza, Juan Luís Castro Peña, Francisco José Sánchez García, and Sergio Castro Cortacero — she oversaw the event’s logistics and communication.
The project’s principal investigator, Pascual Pérez-Paredes, who is also an associate member of U^CHASS, conceived this initiative to explore how narratives about freedom of movement are constructed and disseminated in social, political, and cultural contexts — particularly at a time marked by Brexit, populist movements, and migration flows. The conference marked the culmination of three years of research, resulting in a substantial corpus of more than one hundred stories from European citizens living in countries other than their own. This resource aims to serve both academic and pedagogical purposes by fostering awareness of issues such as racism, xenophobia, and digital misinformation.
Over the course of three days, the event showcased a wide range of studies from various disciplines, including pedagogy and linguistics, with a particular focus on discourse analysis, underscoring the conference’s interdisciplinary character. Among the contributions, special mention should be made of the study conducted by Encarnación Hidalgo, Borja Manzano, and Sergio Castro, as it represented Sergio’s first presentation at an international conference. Their paper, “Migration, media literacy and fake news awareness among Spanish secondary school students on social media,” highlighted adolescents’ ability to identify fake news and engage critically with socially relevant topics such as migration and homophobia.
The conference also featured participants from civil society, including artists and political figures who shared their concerns about migration. During the closing session, attendees enjoyed the participation of actor and comedian Álex O’Dogherty, who presented his documentary “De todos lados un poco” (“A Little Bit from Everywhere”), an exploration of the origins of his surname that brings together artists from the performing arts to reflect on the role of migrants in cinema.
On the institutional side, the closing ceremony was led by Elma Saiz, Minister of Inclusion, Social Security, and Migration, who delivered a speech advocating for legal and regulated migration:
“For both the host country and the country of origin, the benefits are enormous — economically, socially, and culturally. We must ensure that these benefits, which have already been scientifically proven and supported by data, become evident to everyone.”
The project’s dissemination phase concluded with a final event held at the European Parliament in Brussels. Accompanied by MEP Marcos Ros Sempere, representatives from the universities involved — Murcia, Granada, Zaragoza, Perpignan, Naples L’Orientale, and Parthenope — along with institutions such as the International Center of Photojournalism of Perpignan, the NGO In Limbo, and Digio Soluciones Digitales, presented the project’s main achievements. The session emphasized the importance of promoting a shared European narrative on mobility, rooted in inclusion, diversity, and respect for fundamental rights.
