Abstract
The paper describes results of a study whose main aim was to analyze the role of English in the internationalization process of the University of Geneva in particular and in Switzerland in general, drawing some considerations regarding possible lessons for the Brazilian scenario in regards to the development of multilingualism.The theoretical background includes the review of the role of languages in general and of English in particular in the globalized scenario and the review of a language teaching approach, the intercomprehension approach, with some implications for the teaching of foreign languages in Brazil. The study concludes with some considerations regarding the role of English in Brazil and some suggestions to boost multilingualism there through the review of language policies and the use of the intercomprehension approach.
Highlights
This study draws on results of previous studies carried out to analyze the role of English in the internationalization process of Brazilian universities, and which was extended to include the role of English in the internationalization process of Swiss universities (Finardi & Csillagh, 2016), to propose a review of language policies for the teaching of foreign languages and the use of a language teaching approach to boost multilingualism in Brazil
Because of the challenges of adopting English as an academic language in Brazilian universities, this study aimed at investigating the role of English in the internationalization process of Swiss universities in general and of University of Geneva (Unige) in particular to see whether it was possible to discuss some lessons for Brazilian universities
This proposal could be put into practice in the following way: English would be taught as a mandatory foreign language in school following Finardi’s (2014) suggestion, and Spanish, French and Italian would be taught as foreign languages with the IC, guaranteeing the development of multilingualism and the use of English as a multilingua franca in Brazil following the Swiss example
Summary
This study draws on results of previous studies carried out to analyze the role of English in the internationalization process of Brazilian universities (for example Finardi & Archanjo, 2015; Finardi & França, 2016; Finardi & Ortiz, 2015; Finardi & Tyler, 2015), and which was extended to include the role of English in the internationalization process of Swiss universities (Finardi & Csillagh, 2016), to propose a review of language policies for the teaching of foreign languages and the use of a language teaching approach to boost multilingualism in Brazil. Because of the challenges of adopting English as an academic language in Brazilian universities, this study aimed at investigating the role of English in the internationalization process of Swiss universities in general and of Unige in particular to see whether it was possible to discuss some lessons for Brazilian universities. The rationale for the study was that if Unige could be well ranked and internationalized without adopting English as the academic language, perhaps there was something that Brazilian universities could learn from Unige. Still according to Finardi, Santos, and Guimarães (2016) and drawing on Hamel (2013), this bias remains even when the language is not English, as in the case of the international academic production in Spanish of the same journal and in the same period, as shown, where it can be seen that Anglo speaking countries, such as the United States are still ahead of Spanish speaking countries such as Spain, Chile and Mexico Still according to Finardi, Santos, and Guimarães (2016) and drawing on Hamel (2013), this bias remains even when the language is not English, as in the case of the international academic production in Spanish of the same journal and in the same period, as shown in Table 2, where it can be seen that Anglo speaking countries, such as the United States are still ahead of Spanish speaking countries such as Spain, Chile and Mexico
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