Akshay Kale

Akshay Balwant Kale is a prominent Indian Hispanist specializing in Hispanic literatures with an emphasis on poetry. He has received his M.Phil degree from Jawaharlal Nehru University and has the distinction of having cleared DELE C2, the highest level international proficiency exam in Spanish accrediting native level command of the language. He has conducted conferences on Latin American poetry at the University of El Salvador and San Carlos University, Guatemala as well as at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He was invited as a Hispanist of eminence to conduct a key note address on the poetry of the Peruvian poet César Vallejo by Instituto Cervantes, New Delhi as part of the lecture series Semblanzas.

He has worked as a Collaborating Professor at Instituto Cervantes where he specialized in teaching Spanish as a foreign language (ELE) and taught courses spanning the entire gamut of levels from A1- C1 in accordance with the Common European Framework of Reference. (CEFR). Beyond imparting a solid grasp of grammar and linguistic nuances, his espousal of an integrated communicative approach towards language teaching premised on the principles of cognitive grammar is aimed at making the students understand the importance of grammar to communicate effectively in real-life situations and articulate complex ideas and arguments. He has similarly striven to deploy literary texts in the Spanish language classroom with a view to foster a grounded understanding of Hispanic cultures and literatures. During his tenure at Instituto Cervantes, he was bestowed with a number of advanced teacher training scholarships awarded by Spanish universities such as Universidad Castilla de la Mancha, Toledo and Universidad Nebrija, Madrid. Apart from his research and teaching credentials, he is credited with the first book length direct translation of the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda from Spanish into Marathi titled Uddeshika Goshtinsathi (Ode to things) as well as that of the novel Los siete locos (The seven mad men) by the Argentine novelist Roberto Arlt. In addition to his background and training as a Hispanist and Spanish language professional, he is also well-versed with the field of Germanic studies as he received his B.A. in German from Savitribai Phule Pune University and was also awarded a scholarship by DAAD to pursue a summer course at Otto-Friedrich-University Bamberg. He is a doctoral candidate at Jawaharlal Nehru University and his current research interests include the examination of the concept of compromiso (commitment) in Latin American as well as Spanish poetry, comparative poetics, literary theory and cognitive linguistics.