Actual Language Practices Research Articles

INTERTEXTUALITY AND INTERDISCURSIVITY IN POST-COLONIAL LANGUAGE POLICIES IN KENYA

Addressing the intricate challenges within the realm of language planning and policy involves establishing meaningful connections between language policy texts, discourse, and actual language practices. Moreover, navigating connections across diverse domains, contexts, levels, layers, and scales presents a formidable challenge. Therefore, this study endeavours to unravel intertextual connections as a means of comprehending language-policy texts in the Kenyan context. Focusing on post-colonial language policies in Kenya, this paper explores intertextuality and interdiscursivity. Employing Fairclough's (1992) Critical Discourse approach, this analysis explores how language policy documents undergo decontextualization from prior discourses (intertextuality) and examine their correlation with different generic chains (interdiscursivity). The study employs a qualitative research design, specifically historical and documentary analysis. The study's findings reveal that post-colonial language policies exhibit links to both pre-colonial and current policy documents, showcasing vertical and horizontal intertextuality. Additionally, these policies are linked to a myriad of past and present discourses, such as those related to culture and diversity (interdiscursivity). Notably, the analysis of intertextuality and interdiscursive discourse reveals revisions to language policy and tracks the shifts in discourses surrounding this policy over time. In conclusion, this study emphasises that the meaningful interpretation of intertextuality and interdiscursivity renders language policy texts significant. It is anticipated that this research will shed light on understanding language policy through the lens of intertextuality and interdiscursivity, contributing to a more comprehensive perspective on language policy dynamics.<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/soc/0089/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

World Englishes, Monolingual Bias, and Standardized Tests in a Multilingual World: Ideologies, Practices, and the Missing Link

As English continues to spread as an international lingua franca, there is a growing diversity in its use around the world. As a result, there are calls for embracing the diversity in the teaching, learning and assessment of the language. At the same time, there is a growing criticism against the widely taken language tests such as the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and The International English Language Testing System (IELTS) for being guided by the pervasive ideology of monolingual native speakerism and devaluing the multilingual speakers and the multiple varieties of Englishers. Against this backdrop, this conceptual paper focuses on the influence of the World Englishes movement on these so-called standardized tests and critically examines how the existing assessment practices fail to represent the multilingual repertoires and actual language practices of the diverse range of test-takers around the world. Based on the critical analysis of relevant literature on World Englishes, the paper highlights the progress, challenges and possibilities for incorporation of more diverse models of language tests in a translingual world that we live in today.

Language of Instruction under the Competency-based Curriculum of Kenya: Policy, Practice and Performance

In Kenya, the educational language policy stipulates that the language of instruction in lower primary Grade 1 to 3 in rural settings should be the learners’ First Language or Mother Tongue. In urban settings, the language of the school’s catchment area (usually English or Kiswahili) should be used as the language of instruction in Grade 1 to 3. Kiswahili and English are to be taught as subjects. English becomes the medium of instruction in all settings from Grade 4 onwards. This policy creates problems for teachers and learners considering that Kenya is linguistically heterogeneous. The purpose of this study was to establish the actual language practice in lower primary school Grade 1 to 3 in relation to declared policy and to evaluate its relationship with learners’ academic achievement. The objectives of the study were to establish the actual status of educational language policy and language practice in lower primary schools; to assess the relationship between the language of instruction and English subject scores of learners at Grade 4; to assess the relationship between the language of instruction and Mathematics subject scores of learners at Grade 4. The study area was Kakamega County, which was selected based on being a county with a fair mix of urban, rural and semi-urban schools. The study adopted a correlational design. The study population comprised 1,120 primary schools and 10,767 Grade 4 learners. Multistage sampling was used to select a sample of 175 schools from the population. Questionnaires were administered to 75 teachers and mean scores of Grade 4 assessment results were obtained from 1,076 learners from the sampled schools as part of a different, larger study. The data were analysed using descriptive statistics. Inferential statistics were used to test the hypotheses. The findings of the study indicate that there is a gap between policy and practice in lower primary school. The study revealed that there is a strong correlation between the language of instruction at lower primary school and learners’ academic achievement at Grade 4 in English and in Mathematics subjects. A policy shift is recommended to unify the language of instructions in the new CBC framework. This is imperative for equality of outcome in the learners’ Grade 4 school-based assessment under the CBC.

Language use in English-medium instruction programs in Vietnamese higher education: From policy to practice

ABSTRACT Premised on the theoretical approaches of language planning and policy (Spolsky, 2004, 2009; Ricento & Hornberger, 1996), this study provides a holistic examination of language use from policy to practice in Vietnamese higher education English-medium instruction (EMI) programs from multiple stakeholders’ perspectives. Specifically, this study examines how the use of languages is enacted (language management), perceived (language beliefs), and implemented (language practices) at three layers/levels involving 30 university administrators, 96 content lecturers, and 286 students (N=412). Research data were drawn from multiple sources, including policy documents, questionnaires, interviews, and classroom observations. An overarching ideology of English only as the medium of instruction was manifest in the data at all levels. However, the findings revealed a stark misalignment between the language management policies explicitly articulated at the national and institutional levels and actual language practices taking place at the interpersonal/classroom level. These findings suggest that ideology/beliefs are not the sole determinant of language practices and that the latter can sometimes be driven by contextual factors. The paper discusses the findings’ implications for EMI policies and practices and offers suggestions for future EMI-related research.

Mismatches between teacher beliefs, practices and reasons for English use in preschool Malay language classrooms

Existing studies are inconclusive about if and how children’s stronger language can support target language instruction. This study analyzed 29 Malay language teachers’ switching practices, reasons for switching, and perceptions of their Malay-English bilingual children’s language preferences and needs, in Singaporean preschool classrooms. 5 teachers’ and 68 children’s actual language practices were video-recorded, transcribed and coded for frequency and reasons for codeswitching. The Computerized Language Analysis (CLAN) software calculated these occurrences, and the combos function was used to examine the impact of teachers’ language on children’s classroom language output. The results revealed mismatches between teachers’ reported and observed language perceptions and practices. Language separation ideology is prevalent in Singapore, yet only one teacher claimed to never use English. All teachers were observed to switch to English at varied frequencies. While most Malay language teachers reported that their English use was because of instructional purposes, they were observed codeswitching mainly due to habitual reasons. These findings reflect the need to address gaps between perceptions and practices in preschool language instruction, and to consider further steps in preparing teachers to address the reality of language needs and practices in their classrooms.

English Medium Instruction Ideology, Management and Practices: a Case Study of Bangladeshi Private University

In an increasingly globalized world, English medium instruction (EMI) in higher education has now become a common phenomenon. Recent research, however, has shown that EMI is not without its problems. This article reports a case study of a private university from Bangladesh. Employing Spolsky’s language policy framework, the study made a critical analysis of the institutional policy statements and website content of the university, and also carried out interviews with policymakers, faculty members and students to uncover the ideology, management and practices of languages in the university. The findings reveal a mismatch between intentions of EMI policy based on the language ideologies of the stakeholders, and the actual language practices in the university. The findings raise serious concerns regarding the adaptation of EMI policy in private universities in Bangladesh. More importantly, the quality and consequences of implementing such EMI policies need further investigation.

The complexity of family language policy decisions: The case of Cantonese and other regional Chinese varieties

This paper explores the beliefs, attitudes, and efforts of parents with regard to the use and preservation of regional Chinese varieties including Cantonese in the region of Guangzhou, China. The study relied on a sequential mixed method approach, involving 771 parents who completed a parental questionnaire in an online survey on Chinese parents’ language ideology, practice, and management in the home domain, followed by semi-structured interviews of 10 of the surveyed participants to gather detailed data related to the questionnaire results. The study identified inconsistencies in the participants’ beliefs and actual language practice in the survey, revealing mediation by sociolinguistic complexities, national language policies, and socioeconomic conditions on family language decisions and practices. These remind us that the survival of regional Chinese varieties or linguistic varieties without official recognition requires conducive socio-political conditions, including relevant national language policies. The results also suggest that researchers should be particularly concerned by the decline of regional Chinese varieties other than Cantonese, which are not backed up by the national language policy but enjoy a similarly prestigious status to Cantonese in the region.

Heritage language policies of the Iranian diaspora in New Zealand

ABSTRACT The present study investigates immigrant parents’ family language policies in regards to their children’s heritage language development and maintenance by utilizing Spolsky’s theoretical model on which research on family language policy (FLP) considerably draw. Following the three core components of the FLP model, Iranian parents’ beliefs, practices and efforts in relation to their children’s home language (i.e. Persian/Farsi) acquisition and maintenance are investigated. The data were collected through semi-structured interviews with twenty-five parents of Persian-English bilinguals (6–18 year old) in New Zealand. The findings reveal that although the parents hold positive beliefs towards the family language acquisition and maintenance, there are discrepancies between their language ideologies and family language practices. In light of these inconsistencies between parents’ beliefs and their actual family language practices and efforts to preserve the heritage language, we argue that to raise their children bilingually, immigrant parents should not only have strong beliefs towards family language acquisition and maintenance, but also their everyday practices and efforts should be in line with their beliefs.

Legitimate bilingual competence in the making: Bilingual performance and investment of Korean-English bilinguals

Because global migration and mobility have increasingly blurred boundaries, questions of authenticity have become more complex than ever, and the issue of what constitutes “real” versus “fake” language practices and language users has become increasingly important. The newly emerging images of imposters associated with bilingualism and transnationalism have put bilingual and multilingual language users in a fragile position, where bilingual displays can summon the damaging image of inauthentic bilingualism and frame them as imposters who try to articulate their alleged modernity by mimicking other “reals.” Focusing on the issue of authenticity, this ethnographic study explores how Korean-English bilinguals navigate and respond to the newly emerging images of imposters associated with bilingualism and transnationalism. In particular, I examine the case of 20 South Korean graduate students in the USA who have both advanced English language proficiency and native Korean language proficiency. Because they are in a relatively advantageous position in being able to flexibly use both the Korean and English languages and to employ a variety of linguistic resources, their bilingual practices and performance provide an excellent example of the ways in which bilingual language users locate their social positioning through the selective production of ideological representations or language registers associated with images of inauthentic bilingualism. The findings highlight the agentive role of bilingual and multilingual language users in participating in the reconfiguration of what counts as legitimate bilingual competence and performance, and in making a very calculative investment in distancing themselves from particular types of language registers, language competences, and models of personhoods associated with inauthentic Korean-English bilinguals. These findings present a challenge to traditional research in the fields of second language studies, and applied linguistics, and urges researchers to look at the actual language practice of bilingual users who actively participate in the process of developing sense-making discourses.

Language and identity construction: Evidence from the ethnic minorities of Armenia

AbstractThe Republic of Armenia is for the most part an ethnically homogenous country. According to the 2011 census, the share of ethnic minorities is about 1.9 percent of the population, comprising eleven registered minorities and at least two additional groups, namely the Udi and Tat refugee minorities. This article examines the different values that ethnic minorities of Armenia assign to language in the process of identity construction. Despite their cultural and religious diversity, the ethnic minorities of Armenia have a feature in common: none of the groups originates from the territory of the present-day Republic of Armenia, and in each instance immigration occurred under Tsarist or Soviet rule. Various social and historical factors related to migration condition the relevance of language for individual ethnic minorities. In some cases, these factors also influence collective self-perception in a way that is inconsistent with actual language practices and actual linguistic competence. The present article is descriptive in nature and aims at characterizing the role that language plays in identity construction by minority groups within a predominantly mono-ethnic country.

Ideologies, practices, and their effect on dialect vitality: a case study from Vanuatu

ABSTRACTUnderstanding dialect loss is informative for language loss, yet dialect attrition remains relatively understudied. Suru Kavian is an endangered dialect of Pentecost Island, Vanuatu. Drawing from language recordings, interviews, and observations, this paper explores the relationship between linguistic ideologies about Suru Kavian (what members of the community say about the dialect), people’s actual language practices (what they ‘do’ – how the dialect is used), and the potential effect that the interplay of these factors has on the vitality of this endangered variety. The methodology and analysis used here add to the sparse literature on the intersection between endangered languages and dialect studies, and contribute to the wider discussion on not only dialect loss, but also language loss.

Płynna gramatyka. Wybrane problemy metodologii i dydaktyki gramatyki języka włoskiego

LIQUID GRAMMAR: SOME PROBLEMS REGARDING THE METHODOLOGY AND DIDACTICS OF ITALIAN GRAMMAR Italian grammar today is still subject to change and reinterpretation. In this article, I attempt to introduce some problems regarding Italian grammar from the point of view of the methodology of grammar didactics. It is not, therefore, a study of the standard Italian language; rather, it is mainly a reflection on the creation of grammar rules and their explication in grammar textbooks that are dedicated primarily to foreigners. the problems that students of Italian grammar may encounter are the following, among others: the presentation of outdated grammar structures (the differences between standard grammar and actual language practice); a lack of explicitly expressed rules for various language problems; a lack of discussion about grammatical differences that result due to sociolinguistic variations; and a lack of appropriate comments for some grammar issues, which cause difficulties for foreigners. I seek to suggest some methodological solutions and to define the features of grammar (textbooks) on an academic level that could help to overcome—at least partially—similar problems. All questions that I discuss in the present text are illustrated with examples taken from popular academic grammar textbooks written by Polish and Italian linguists.

Can language classrooms take the multilingual turn?

For the past three decades, momentum has gathered in favour of a multilingual turn in second language acquisition research and teaching. Multicompetence has been proposed to replace nativeness and monolingualism to measure L2 learners’ success. This proposed shift has not made its way into L2 teaching settings. The language presented to L2 learners is a set of monolingual, standard norms often removed from actual target language practices, implying that these linguistic features are adequate for all situations. We propose that the multilingual shift has not taken place in practice because language features associated with monolingual nativeness are necessary in many of the communicative situations L2 users encounter. Adapting the concepts of communicative distance and immediacy in order to integrate multilingual communications, the purpose of this article is to demonstrate how these situations and their oral or written realisations are located on a pluridimensional conceptional continuum. We illustrate how monolingual standard norms and code-meshing practices represent the model’s most distant and immediate communicative ends, respectively. We argue that traditional mono/multilingual and native/non-native oppositions can be reframed in order to become legitimate models for L2 classrooms.

THE DYLAN Project: “Language Dynamics and Management of Diversity”

This paper presents the European research project Language Dynamics and Management of Diversity (DYLAN) and its main findings.1 This project, from the European Union’s Sixth Framework Program, completed in 2011 after five years’ work by nineteen partners from thirteen countries across Europe, offers a fresh look on multilingualism in European institutions, businesses and institutions of higher education. In this project, our focus was on the interrelationships between actual language practices, people’s representations about multilingualism, their language choices, and the contexts in which they are confronted with linguistic diversity. In order to deepen our understanding of these relationships, we have examined at close range (i) how the very diverse linguistic repertoires of speakers operating in increasingly multilingual environments develop, and (ii) how actors make the best use of their repertoires and adapt them skilfully to different objectives and conditions. Throughout the project, a special emphasis was placed on how organisations actually cope with this diversity. Careful observation of actors’ multilingual practices has revealed finely tuned communicational strategies drawing on a wide range of different languages, including national languages, minority languages and lingue franche. Understanding these practices, both at the level of their meaning and at the level of their implications, helps to show in what way and under what conditions they are not merely a response to a problem – multilingualism often being primarily construed as such – but an asset in business, political, educational, scientific and economic contexts. In addition, the project explored issues that could not be assigned to any of these terrains, because they straddle the boundaries between them. Three such transversal issues have emerged as particularly relevant in the management and practice of communication in multilingual settings. They have provided much of the integrative substance of the project.The approach designed and implemented in the DYLAN project amounts to a reversal of the commonly held view that linguistic diversity is per se problematic. This research therefore allowed us to address the fundamental issue of whether (and, if so how), a European knowledge-based society designed to ensure economic competitiveness and social cohesion could develop and blossom despite the fact that, following enlargement, the European Union found itself more linguistically diverse than ever before. The DYLAN project has adopted a “mixed-methods” approach, collecting and analysing different types of data such as official documents, interviews with agents working at different hierarchical levels, job ads, websites, various features of the linguistic landscape, and tape recordings of multilingual and monolingual interaction in the workplace, in various institutional settings and in teaching in educational institutions. Our analysis showed that the use of multilingual repertoires can constitute a resource for the construction, transmission and use of knowledge, providing various modes of access to information processing, and helping actors retain and classify new information. A multilingual mode, encouraged by a policy of multilingualism and linked to an appropriate participatory framework, seems to be one of the conditions for taking full advantage of the multilingual asset.

“See Translation”: explicit and implicit language policies on Facebook

The currently tested “See Translation” button can be considered an expression of Facebook’s explicit language policy. It offers the users fast and easy translations of others’ status updates and can therefore be seen as diminishing language barriers and reducing the need for a lingua franca in polylingual networks, thus enhancing linguistic diversity and freedom of language choice. As Spolsky (2004) stated, however, the effect of an explicit language policy on actual language practices, and the corresponding implicit language policies is not guaranteed. In this article, I investigate the effect of the “See Translation” button as an instance of explicit language policy on Facebook users’ practices and beliefs, thus their implicit language policies. The study addresses the effect from two perspectives: the active usage of the button in order to understand others’ status updates, as well as the way in which users rely on it in choosing a language for their own status updates. Based on a survey conducted among Facebook users it appears that their translation behavior is strongly dependent on their media ideologies (Gershon 2010). Furthermore, the study suggests that, despite the effort by Facebook to modify users’ language use, language choice for one’s own status updates is not determined by the “See Translation” button, but is based on a whole range of criteria and thus remains a socially meaningful choice made by the user, resulting in a discrepancy between explicit and implicit language policies on Facebook.

Language policies and English worldwide

This is a weighty volume, and one which provides a very useful addition to the Cambridge Handbook series, which previously has covered such topics as phonology, code-switching, child language, endangered languages, sociolinguistics and pragmatics. The volume comprises a total of 30 chapters, which in turn are grouped into five constituent parts. Part I sets out ‘Definition and principles’, Part II deals with ‘Language policy at the macrolevel’, Part III discusses language policies in ‘Non-governmental domains’, Part IV tackles ‘Globalization and modernization’, and, finally, Part V focuses on ‘Regional and thematic issues’. Bernard Spolsky's opening chapter on ‘What is language policy?’ clears the discursive and theoretical space for much that follows, with Spolsky cogently resolving the often confusing issue of where language ‘policy’ ends and ‘planning’ begins thus: I find it appropriate then to name the field as a whole ‘language policy’, and see it as made up of three inter-related but independent components [...] The first of these is the actual language practices of the members of the speech community […] The second component, formed in large measure by the first and confirming its influence, is made up of the values assigned by members of a speech community to each variety and variant and their beliefs about the importance of these values. […] The third component is what used to be called ‘planning’ and what I prefer to call ‘management’, efforts by some members of a speech community who have or believe they have authority over other members to modify their language practice, such as by forcing or encouraging them to use a different variety or even a different variant. (5)

Language ideology or language practice? An analysis of language policy documents at Swedish universities

AbstractThis article presents an analysis and interpretation of language policy documents from eight Swedish universities with regard to intertextuality, authorship and content analysis of the notions of language practices and English as a lingua franca (ELF). The analysis is then linked to Spolsky’s framework of language policy, namely language practices, language beliefs, values (and ideology), and language planning or management (Spolsky 2004). The results show that the language policy documents refer heavily to official documents that have as their primary aim to protect and promote the Swedish language (e.g., the Language Act 2009), which appears to have been the point of departure for the language policy work in these settings, reflecting their protectionist stance towards the local language, Swedish. Little focus is put on actual language practices in these policy documents. The description of language practices is often limited to the description of the existing situation, based on concerns about Swedish losing ground as a result of the widespread use of English. Similarly, the notion of ELF is used primarily for description of the existing situation without sufficient guidance as to how students and staff in these university settings are to use English in their everyday practices. These results bring to the fore the question of what the purpose of university language policy documents should be with reference to a speech community’s everyday practices. It is suggested here that university language policy documents would benefit from taking research on actual language practices as their starting point and base their work on research on language practices, striving to provide guidance on local choices made for communicative effectiveness.

Heritage language maintenance and cultural identity formation: the case of Korean immigrant parents and their children in the USA

This study explores the beliefs and attitudes that Korean immigrant parents and their children in the USA hold about their heritage language. Data were collected through interviews. This study addresses how parents' perspectives and their actual heritage language practices with their children influence their children's cultural identity and heritage language maintenance. Findings suggest that immigrant children's peers and teachers at school who are not from the same ethnic group (co-ethnics) might play a crucial role in helping children to have positive attitudes regarding learning their heritage language, ultimately influencing their positive cultural identity.

Linguistic diversity and language loss: a view from integrational linguistics

This article offers an integrational linguistic critique of the way in which the notions of linguistic diversity and language loss/death are theorised within orthodox linguistics. The fundamental issue concerns the ontological status of languages. While orthodox approaches take the existence of separately identifiable languages or language varieties (lects) as a foundational theoretical postulate even in the absence of any consistent definitional criteria, from an integrational perspective languages are nothing more than second-order metalinguistic abstractions from actual language practices. Consequently, any theory of first-order linguistic diversity based on the enumeration of individual languages is automatically suspect. Furthermore, since languages do not exist as ontological realia, it cannot be the case that linguistic diversity is declining due to language loss. To suppose otherwise rests on a conflation of the linguistic and the metalinguistic, a failing endemic to orthodox linguistics. The discussion concludes by offering an integrational view on some of the epistemological and language-political issues which commonly surface in discussions of linguistic diversity and language loss.

Multilingual interaction and minority languages: Proficiency and language practices in education and society

In this plenary speech I examine multilingual interaction in a number of European regions in which minority languages are being revitalized. Education is a crucial variable, but the wider society is equally significant. The context of revitalization is no longer bilingual but increasingly multilingual. I draw on the results of a long-running project on the ‘Added value of multilingualism and diversity in educational contexts’ among secondary school students, and show that there are interesting differences and similarities between the minority language (Basque or Frisian), the majority language (Spanish or Dutch) and English. The focus on multilingualism is applied inside and outside the school. The discussion demonstrates the complexity of everyday multilingual practices and the outcomes have implications for the gap between education and society and for further research into the linkages between language proficiency and actual language practices.