MRL 2026 Shared Task on ECLeKTic-style Multimodal and Multilingual Benchmark


Overview


As part of the Multilingual Representation Learning Workshop at EMNLP 2026, we are organizing another collaborative shared task. We are asking contributors to write culturally specific question-answer pairs in their language. All contributors to the dataset will be invited to be authors on the dataset paper, which we will submit for publication next year.

This is a great project if you’re looking to get involved in NLP research for the first time! We are accepting submissions in any language, but we especially welcome submissions in languages with few speakers and non-standard varieties!

Last year, we collectively created a benchmark for over 140 language varieties with over 350 collaborators around the world, called Global PIQA. We are hoping to create another huge dataset with at least as much impact. Help us make sure your language is represented!

If you are interested in contributing or getting updates, please fill out the Interest Form.

See our task website for up-to-date information, and join our Discord to meet potential collaborators. Follow the workshop account on Twitter/X and Bluesky for updates and announcements!


Organizing Committee



Important Dates


  • June 8, 2026: Call for participation released, task specifications and submission guidelines published.
  • July 10, 2026: Information Session, online event to find out how to participate and ask questions.
  • August 1, 2026: Dataset submission deadline, submit your dataset and dataset description.
  • September 2026: Decision notification, acceptance decisions sent to participants.
  • Early October 2026: Benchmark paper publication, organizers work with authors to compile and publish the final dataset and paper.
  • October 24–29, 2026: MRL Workshop @ EMNLP 2026, shared task results presented at the workshop.

Contact Us


Email: mrlbencharks@gmail.com

Workshops



Shared Tasks