Abstract
In a context of the internationalisation of Higher Education (HE) driven by the high mobility of international Higher Degree Research candidates (HDRs), it is important to consider the value of HDRs’ multilingual capabilities for their learning and making of original contributions to knowledge. This article reports on a literature study regarding conceptualisations of multilingualism and multilingual capabilities, together with multilingualism in university research education practices and policies. Key themes to emerge from the literature include divergent understandings of languages, multilingualism, and multilingual capabilities. For example, a ‘static’ language construct provides a structuralist lens through which multilingual HDRs are viewed as an accumulation of monolinguals, whereas a ‘dynamic’ language construct informs a socially and culturally constructed linguistic space where the multilingual resources of HDRs are valued. These divergences are manifested in the language-as-problem orientation and language-as-resource orientation in anglophone universities’ HDR education policies. Informed by empirical evidence of leveraging multilingual capabilities in original contributions to knowledge, this article argues that it is urgent for pertinent stakeholders in HDR education to reconfigure language practices and policies in the HDR educational context. In doing so, the voices of HDRs would be able to leverage multilingual capabilities in their research instead of being treated as deficient English learners.
Highlights
A “high standard of English and a professional standard of presentation” are stipulated criteria in the Higher Degree Research Examination Handbook 2016 issued by the Graduate Research School, WesternSydney University [1]
Higher Degree Research candidates (HDRs)’ multilingual practices, a phenomenon dubbed ‘the postmonolingual condition’ by Yildiz [14], this paper explores the challenges and possibilities for creating an intellectual space for multilingual
There is evidence that the multilingual capabilities of HDRs can be leveraged in anglophone universities to make an original contribution to knowledge [12,67,68,69,70], despite multilingual HDRs being trained and assessed under English-only monolingual university policies [4]
Summary
A “high standard of English and a professional standard of presentation” are stipulated criteria in the Higher Degree Research Examination Handbook 2016 issued by the Graduate Research School, Western. These criteria apply uniformly to all Higher Degree Research candidates (HDRs), whether monolingual anglophones or multilingual. Degree Research (HDR) education in anglophone universities. English-only agenda is preferable for educating multilingual HDRs, given that their multilingual capabilities and associated knowledge have been marginalised. Sci. 2016, 6, 39 students in 2014, the majority of whom had multilingual capabilities Educating these multilingual HDRs presents challenges to HEIs in Australia. Research indicates that English-only monolingualism raises educational and ethical issues concerning students’ struggles to maintain their multilingual capabilities at acceptable levels of proficiency in academic domains [6,10].
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