ERIC Number: EJ1216340
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2019
Pages: 17
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0143-4632
EISSN: N/A
Elite Bilingual Identities in Higher Education in the Anglophone World: The Stratification of Linguistic Diversity and Reproduction of Socio-Economic Inequalities in the Multilingual Student Population
Preece, Siân
Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, v40 n5 p404-420 2019
As universities in the Anglophone world attend to operating on a global stage, linguistic diversity in the sector has intensified. Historically, higher education has adopted language-as-problem orientations to managing linguistic diversity, viewing multilingual repertoires largely as an obstacle. An emerging body of work informed by language-as-resource orientations seeks to counter these deficit views. However, while timely, it risks treating the multilingual student population as a homogeneous group. This paper addresses this issue by developing a finer-grained understanding of student experiences of their multilingual repertoires with two groups of students from different socioeconomic backgrounds: working-class Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) undergraduate students and international postgraduate students from more socially elite families. By examining students' experiences of their multilingual repertoires in the institution, I demonstrate how universities stratify the linguistic diversity in their midst, arguing that this is resonant with elite-plebeian views of bilingualism. I contend that language-as-resource informed curriculum and pedagogy needs to attend to institutional practices that stratify linguistic diversity to avoid reinforcing a situation in which the multilingualism of students from professional and socially elite groups is reinforced while little is gained when it comes to the multilingualism of working-class BME students.
Descriptors: Bilingualism, Self Concept, Higher Education, Multilingualism, Universities, Educational Experience, Working Class, Undergraduate Students, Minority Group Students, Blacks, Graduate Students, Advantaged, Ethnic Groups, Language Attitudes, Teaching Methods, Reputation, Institutional Characteristics, Writing Instruction, Academic Language, Student Attitudes, Comparative Analysis, Foreign Countries, Foreign Students, Language Variation, English (Second Language), Second Language Learning, Native Language, Language Usage, Study Habits
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: United Kingdom
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A