Dr Alicia Moreno Gimenez
Lecturer in Hispanic StudiesResearch Overview
My research develops along two interconnected strands. I investigate how AI‑enhanced virtual reality can transform language learning through immersive, experiential and inclusive pedagogies. My work examines learner agency, confidence, interactional responsiveness, participation and technology acceptance, designing and evaluating VR‑AI conversational scenarios across university and school contexts. I explore how immersive environments support equitable, engaging and responsive language‑learning experiences.
I also research Translation Studies and Hispanic and Catalan literary and cultural studies, focusing on verbal irony, exile, displacement, identity, trauma narratives and material culture. I analyse how narratives of migration and peripheral identities articulate trauma, belonging and cultural memory, and how translational processes shape these representations.
PhD Supervision Interests
Alícia is currently leading a curriculum-embedded VR-AI initiative at Lancaster University, where "smart scenarios technologies" have been conceived and developed. She welcomes enquiries from prospective PhD students looking to explore, from various angles, the connections between language learning, language teaching, and innovative pedagogies involving AI and VR. Central issues could include: immersive contexts; AI-mediated spoken interaction; automated feedback; pedagogical scaffolding; language development; learner agency; confidence; and willingness to communicate.
Innovations in Inclusive Language Pedagogies
Participation in conference - Academic
AHGBI 71st Annual conference Lancaster University
Participation in conference - Academic
AHGBI 71st Annual conference Lancaster University
Participation in conference - Academic
A Pedagogical Framework for Collaborative and Inclusive Language Learning in Virtual Reality
Invited talk
Lancaster University Education Conference
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Winstanley College
School Engagement
Catalan and Catalanism
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Book Lauch: A Transdiciplinary Approach to Global Displacement: Identities on the Move.
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
70th AHGBI Annual Conference 2025 - Association of Hispanists of Great Britain & Ireland
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
Charting a New Arc: Translation, Politics, and the Role of Catalan in a Globalized World
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
FRENCH AND SPANISH FILM DAY. "UN P’TIT TRUC EN PLUS" AND "CAMPEONES", LESSONS LEARNED ON INCLUSIVITY IN FRANCE AND SPAIN
Participation in workshop, seminar, course
Peter Symonds College
School Engagement
SPANISH FILM DAY
Participation in workshop, seminar, course
Material culture voicing peripheral identities in exile
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Merce Rodoreda in exile: Female Catalan identity through the ironic lens of horror and fantasy
Public Lecture/ Debate/Seminar
Representations of Border Crossings in Literature, Media, and the Arts
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
UCLan Research Centre for Migration, Diaspora and Exile. MIDEX Book Launch series. 2021-2022.
Participation in conference -Mixed Audience
“Catalonia: A region or a nation in the periphery?”
Invited talk
Identities on the Move”
Participation in conference - Academic
The 80th Anniversary of the Republican Exile of 1939: Lessons from and for a Modern World Symposium
Symposium