Multilingualism from a lifespan perspective: case studies from a language workshop for Spanish seniors in Saint-Denis, France

Abstract

In socio- and applied linguistic research, age tends to be accounted for as fixed, biographical information, and individuals in later life have rarely been considered more than marginally. In this paper, I attempt to address this oversight by presenting data from multilingual subjects over the age of 65 as they take part in a language and literacy course for senior citizens. I account for their age not as a fixed category or an index of deterioration, but as a reflection of ongoing processes of personal, social and historical dimensions that can be measured in terms of the lifespan, a concept prevalent in the field of social gerontology. Keeping in mind the core elements of what I propose as a lifespan perspective – timescales, life events, language ideologies and linguistic repertoires – I conduct discourse analysis on their metalinguistic conversations to illuminate the subjective and phenomenological factors that have shaped – and that continue to shape – their linguistic repertoires and the ideologies that inform the ways in which they make use of them.