Abstract
During Academic Book Week (9–13 November 2015) academics within the University of Liverpool, in conjunction with Liverpool University Press, held a writing sprint focused around modern languages (ML), one of the major research areas within the University and one of the key areas of publishing within the Press. The writing sprint brought together experts around some fundamental questions in ML research, and resulted in a collaborative-authored piece at the end of the week. This article explores the inspirations behind the sprint, describes the methodology and research questions, and finally discusses the advantages and challenges of undertaking such an activity.