Dr. Javier Moreno-Rivero, Assistant Professor of Translation and Intercultural Studies,  was elected as an expert consultant to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)’s International Decade of Indigenous Languages (2022-32). He will join a 20-person working group on recognition, status and policy implementation. The group will map the recognition and status of Indigenous languages in language policies and analyze the implementation of those policies.

The UN General Assembly proclaimed the period between 2022 and 2032 as the International Decade of Indigenous Languages to draw global attention to the critical situation of many Indigenous languages and to mobilize stakeholders and resources for their preservation, revitalization and promotion. The International Decade is a key outcome of the 2019 International Year of Indigenous Languages, which UNESCO led. A Global Task Force, which includes international experts from UN Member States, Indigenous people’s institutions and other organizations, was created to provide scientific evidence to the assessment and design of inclusive language policies for Indigenous communities.

Moreno-Rivero holds a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge, and his expertise spans applied and sociolinguistics, translation studies, law and language, sociology and political science, with a particular focus on language barriers. He is a leading scholar in these fields: he has published extensively, belongs to the editorial board of top-ranked journals, such as The International Journal for the Semiotics of Law, and is an elected member of the Romance Linguistics Special Group of the Modern Language Association. 

Prior to his appointment at John Jay, Moreno-Rivero worked in universities across the UK and the US, and he has been invited to speak at international conferences and symposia at London, Cambridge, Mexico, McGill, MIT, Princeton, Sevilla and Geneva, among others.