The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies 9781800412040

Table of contents :
Contents
Contributors
Series Editors’ Preface
The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies: An Introduction
Part 1: Multilingual Practices
1. Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)
2. Şexbizinî Facebook Groups: Virtual Communities as Spaces for Practice, Maintenance and Exploration of an Endangered Language
3. The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk: Who is Involved in Language Planning, and How?
Part 2: Facilitating Voice
4. Reclaiming Voice in the Austrian Refugee Context through Experiences of Ambiguity
5. Giving Voice to Mothers from Refugee Backgrounds: Their Agentic Roles in Children’s Learning
6. Reclaiming Voice through Family Language Policies: Parental (Socio)linguistic Citizenship in Castilian-Spanish-Dominated Multilingual Settings
Part 3: Building Communities of Voicing
7. (Socio)linguistic Citizenship in Rural Tanzania: A Perspective from the Capability Approach
8. Deaf Capabilities in the Global South: Reflections on Sign Languages and Emancipation Using the Capabilities Approach
9. Forming (Socio)linguistic Citizenship through Philanthropy on Facebook Pages of the Vietnamese Diaspora in the UK
10. Reclaiming a Plurilingual Voice in EMI Classrooms: Co-creating Translanguaging Space through the Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle
Afterword: Localising (Socio)linguistic Citizenship

Citation preview

The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies

CRITICAL LANGUAGE AND LITERACY STUDIES Series Editors: Professor Alastair Pennycook (University of Technology, Sydney, Australia) and Professor Brian Morgan (Glendon College/York University, Toronto, Canada) and Professor Ryuko Kubota (University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada) Critical Language and Literacy Studies is an international series that encourages ­monographs directly addressing issues of power (its flows, inequities, distributions, trajectories) in a variety of language- and literacy-related realms. The aim with this series is twofold: (1) to cultivate scholarship that openly engages with social, political, and historical dimensions in language and literacy studies, and (2) to widen disciplinary horizons by encouraging new work on topics that have received little focus (see below for partial list of subject areas) and that use innovative theoretical frameworks. All books in this series are externally peer-reviewed. Full details of all the books in this series and of all our other publications can be found on http://www.multilingual-matters.com, or by writing to Multilingual Matters, St Nicholas House, 31–34 High Street, Bristol, BS1 2AW, UK. Other books in the series Examining Education, Media, and Dialogue under Occupation: The Case of Palestine and Israel Ilham Nasser, Lawrence N. Berlin and Shelley Wong (eds) The Struggle for Legitimacy: Indigenized Englishes in Settler Schools Andrea Sterzuk Style, Identity and Literacy: English in Singapore Christopher Stroud and Lionel Wee Language and Mobility: Unexpected Places Alastair Pennycook Talk, Text and Technology: Literacy and Social Practice in a Remote Indigenous Community Inge Kral Language Learning, Gender and Desire: Japanese Women on the Move Kimie Takahashi English and Development: Policy, Pedagogy and Globalization Elizabeth J. Erling and Philip Seargeant (eds) Ethnography, Superdiversity and Linguistic Landscapes: Chronicles of Complexity Jan Blommaert Power and Meaning Making in an EAP Classroom: Engaging with the Everyday Christian W. Chun Local Languaging, Literacy and Multilingualism in a West African Society Kasper Juffermans English Teaching and Evangelical Mission: The Case of Lighthouse School Bill Johnston Race and Ethnicity in English Language Teaching Christopher Joseph Jenks Language, Education and Neoliberalism: Critical Studies in Sociolinguistics Mi-Cha Flubacher and Alfonso Del Percio (eds) Scripts of Servitude: Language, Labor Migration and Transnational Domestic Work Beatriz P. Lorente Growing up with God and Empire: A Postcolonial Analysis of ‘Missionary Kid’ Memoirs Stephanie Vandrick Decolonising Multilingualism in Africa: Recentering Silenced Voices from the Global South Finex Ndhlovu and Leketi Makalela English Learners’ Access to Postsecondary Education: Neither College nor Career Ready Yasuko Kanno English Linguistic Imperialism from Below: Moral Aspiration and Social Mobility Leya Mathew

CRITICAL LANGUAGE AND LITERACY STUDIES: 29

The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies Edited by

Julia Gspandl, Christina Korb, Angelika Heiling and Elizabeth J. Erling

MULTILINGUAL MATTERS Bristol • Jackson

DOI https://doi.org/10.21832/GSPAND2033 Names: Gspandl, Julia, editor. | Korb, Christina, editor. | Heiling, Angelika, editor. | Erling, Elizabeth J., editor. Title: The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies/Edited by Julia Gspandl, Christina Korb, Angelika Heiling, and Elizabeth J. Erling. Description: Bristol; Jackson: Multilingual Matters, [2023] | Series: Critical Language and Literacy Studies: 29 | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: “Drawing upon the framework of linguistic citizenship, the chapters in this book link questions of language to sociopolitical discourses of justice, rights and equity, as well as to issues of power and access. They present powerful evidence of how marginalized speakers reclaim their voices and challenge power relations” — Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2023007264 (print) | LCCN 2023007265 (ebook) | ISBN 9781800412026 (paperback) | ISBN 9781800412033 (hardback) | ISBN 9781800412040 (pdf) | ISBN 9781800412057 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Multilingualism—Social aspects. | Sociolinguistics. | Linguistic minorities. Classification: LCC P115.45 .P69 2023 (print) | LCC P115.45 (ebook) | DDC 306.44/6—dc23/eng/20230411 LC record available at https://lccn.loc. gov/2023007264 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023007265 Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue entry for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN-13: 978-1-80041-203-3 (hbk) ISBN-13: 978-1-80041-202-6 (pbk) Multilingual Matters UK: St Nicholas House, 31–34 High Street, Bristol, BS1 2AW, UK. USA: Ingram, Jackson, TN, USA. Website: www.multilingual-matters.com Twitter: Multi_Ling_Mat Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/multilingualmatters Blog: www.channelviewpublications.wordpress.com Copyright © 2023 Julia Gspandl, Christina Korb, Angelika Heiling, Elizabeth J. Erling and the authors of individual chapters. All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the publisher. The policy of Multilingual Matters/Channel View Publications is to use papers that are natural, renewable and recyclable products, made from wood grown in sustainable forests. In the manufacturing process of our books, and to further support our policy, preference is given to printers that have FSC and PEFC Chain of Custody certification. The FSC and/or PEFC logos will appear on those books where full certification has been granted to the printer concerned. Typeset by SAN Publishing Services.

Contents

Contributors

vii

Series Editors’ Preface

xiii

The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies: An Introduction Julia Gspandl, Christina Korb, Angelika Heiling and Elizabeth J. Erling

Part 1: Multilingual Practices

1  Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) Mary Edward 2  Şexbizinî Facebook Groups: Virtual Communities as Spaces for Practice, Maintenance and Exploration of an Endangered Language Agnes Grond 3  The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk: Who is Involved in Language Planning, and How? Vlada V. Baranova

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3

22

41

Part 2: Facilitating Voice

4  Reclaiming Voice in the Austrian Refugee Context through Experiences of Ambiguity Sandra Radinger

61

5  Giving Voice to Mothers from Refugee Backgrounds: Their Agentic Roles in Children’s Learning Melissa Barnes and Katrina Tour

82

6  Reclaiming Voice through Family Language Policies: Parental (Socio)linguistic Citizenship in Castilian-Spanish-Dominated Multilingual Settings Anik Nandi, Maite Garcia-Ruiz and Ibon Manterola

v

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Part 3: Building Communities of Voicing

7  (Socio)linguistic Citizenship in Rural Tanzania: A Perspective from the Capability Approach Danny Foster 8  Deaf Capabilities in the Global South: Reflections on Sign Languages and Emancipation Using the Capabilities Approach Eilidh McEwan 9  Forming (Socio)linguistic Citizenship through Philanthropy on Facebook Pages of the Vietnamese Diaspora in the UK Khoi Nguyen 10  Reclaiming a Plurilingual Voice in EMI Classrooms: Co-creating Translanguaging Space through the Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle Phoebe Siu, Bong-gi Sohn and Angel M.Y. Lin

Afterword: Localising (Socio)linguistic Citizenship Ben Rampton, Mel Cooke, Constant Leung, Dermot Bryers, Becky Winstanley and Sam Holmes

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146

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189 211

Index229

Contributors

Vlada Baranova graduated from St. Petersburg State University, and European University at St. Petersburg (sociolinguistics), PhD in anthropology (2007). She worked as an Associate Professor at the High School of Economics Campus in St. Petersburg and resigned in 2022. Her research interest are in the fields of multilingualism, language revitalization and language documentation. She is also particularly interested in language activism and how networks efforts of individual actors can interact with policymakers and official language planning. Melissa Barnes is Associate Professor at the School of Education at La Trobe University and is an adjunct Senior Lecturer at Monash University. Her research interests are situated within the fields of teacher education, pedagogy, assessment, policy and TESOL. She has recently led research initiatives which focus on policy construction, interpretation, and enactment, with a focus on how policies impact and shape teaching and learning. Melissa is trained as both a primary school and an English as an Additional Language (EAL) teacher. Melissa has published in journals such as Teaching and Teacher Education, Critical Studies in Education and Educational Review. Dermot Bryers founded and co-runs the adult education charity English for Action (EFA), London. He currently teaches ESOL in three communities in London (Greenwich, Streatham and Battersea) and delivers training in participatory ESOL for teachers and activists across the country. Along with his colleagues and students, he is involved in several campaigns, including the Living Wage Campaign, Action for ESOL (defending ESOL from funding cuts) and local campaigns led by students on issues such as affordable housing. Alongside colleagues Becky Winstanley and Melanie Cooke, he has published research on participatory methods and is currently working on a project called ‘Our Languages’ in collaboration with King’s College London where he is an Associate Researcher. Mel Cooke is currently Lecturer in ESOL Education at King’s College, London. Her books include Brokering Britain, Educating Citizens (2019, with Rob Peutrell), The Routledge Handbook of Language and Superdi-

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versity (2018, section editor with James Simpson) and ESOL: A Critical Guide (2008, with James Simpson). She has published in TESOL Quarterly, Language and Education, Linguistics and Education, Language Assessment Quarterly, Journal of Language, Identity and Education and Gender and Language. She was a co-organiser of the ESRC seminar series ‘Queering ESOL’ (with John Gray and Mike Baynham) and has collaborated with Dermot Bryers and Becky Winstanley on several participatory ESOL projects. Mary Edward holds a PhD (Linguistics) from the University of Brighton, UK. She is a field linguist with research experience in Ghanaian Sign Language, Adamorobe Sign Language, Nigerian Sign Language, Magajin Gari Sign Language and Akan. She is a multilingual signer in Ghanaian Sign Language, Adamorobe Sign Language, American Sign Language and British Sign Language. Her research interests include iconicity in sign languages, sign language typology (foreign-based and indigenous sign languages), Multilingualism, Deaf Culture, diverse areas of the sociolinguistics of Deaf communities in Africa among others. She is currently a linguist with Save the Deaf and Endangered Languages Initiative. Elizabeth J. Erling is Professor of ELT Research and Methodology at the University of Education Upper Austria. She was recently awarded an Elise Richter Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship and is leading a research project on understanding the disparities in English language education in Austria at the University of Vienna. She is particularly interested in using multilingualism as a resource and supporting equity in (English) language education. Danny Foster has worked in language development since 2002. His main work has been to provide training in applied linguistics for people who wish to serve their own or other language communities, especially in minoritised, indigenous contexts. From 2003 to 2012 he worked for SIL International with multiple language communities across Tanzania and Uganda. He holds a PhD in Education from the University of Bristol. In 2014 he was appointed as President of the Canada Institute of Linguistics in Vancouver, British Columbia. Maite Garcia-Ruiz is currently finishing a PhD in Basque Linguistics at the Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (UPV/ EHU). She holds a MA in TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language) by the University of Idaho (UoI) (2015). She is a member of the ELEBILAB research group as well as the UNESCO Chair of World Language Heritage (UPV/EHU). Her personal experience as a Basque speaker together with her motivation for language teaching have contributed to her interest for sociolinguistics and the importance of language attitudes towards language revitalisation.

Contributors ix

Agnes Grond holds a university assistent position at the Department of Translation Studies, Research unit Translation – Migration – Minorities, University of Graz. Her research on Kurdish diapora languages in Austria draws on the concepts of critical sociolinguistics with a special focus on new methodological approaches and the development of a practical framework for a broader understanding of the relation between environmental input, language policies, and language ideologies on language use in multilingual communication. She is co-editor of the Vienna Kurdish Studies Yearbook (praesens Verlag). Julia Gspandl is a sign language sociolinguist in the Plurilingualism Research Unit at the University of Graz, Austria. She was recently awarded the Theodor-Körner-Preis 2022 for her PhD project on the languaging competencies of deaf migrants. Her research interests include sign language acquisition, the intersection of sign language and gesture as well as sociolinguistics with a focus on minority languages. Angelika Heiling attained her MAs in the fields of English and American Studies and Gender Studies at the University of Graz and University of Aberdeen. She is currently employed at treffpunkt sprachen – Plurilingualism Unit and pursues her PhD on the sociolinguistic situation of a translocal family with a Southern African background. Her main research interest lies in critical sociolinguistics with a focus on urban multilingualism, migrant and minority language contexts. Sam Holmes is CEO of Causeway Education, a charity which supports young people to overcome barriers in accessing higher education and apprenticeships. Before co-founding Causeway, Sam worked as a secondary school teacher and coordinator for English as an additional language. His PhD research focused on monitoring of ethnic and linguistic diversity in schools, and he has designed education programmes focused on multilingual creativity for a number of education and cultural organisations. Christina Korb attained her BA and MA in Linguistics at the University of Graz and University of Iceland. She received a PhD in Sociolinguistics from the University of Graz, where she currently works as an affiliated researcher at treffpunkt sprachen – Plurilingualism Research Unit. She does critical sociolinguistics, and her interests cover urban multilingualism, educational linguistics and language policy. Her PhD project addressed issues of de facto language policies in linguistic diverse schools in Graz, Austria. Constant Leung is Professor of Educational Linguistics in the School of Education, Communication and Society, King’s College London. His research interests include academic literacies, additional/second language teaching and assessment, language policy, and multilingualism. He is coeditor of Language Assessment Quarterly, editor of research issues of

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TESOL Quarterly, and serves as a member of the editorial boards of Language and Education and the Modern Language Journal. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences (UK). His work in developing the English as an Additional Language Assessment Framework for Schools (funded by the Bell Foundation) won the 2018 British Council ELTons International Award for Innovation. Angel M.Y. Lin is Professor and Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Plurilingual and Intercultural Education in the Faculty of Education, Simon Fraser University, Canada. She is well-respected for her interdisciplinary research in Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL), classroom interaction analysis, bilingual and multilingual education, academic literacies, and language policy and planning in postcolonial contexts. She has published over 90 research articles and six research books including Language Across the Curriculum and CLIL in English as an Additional Language (EAL) Contexts. Ibon Manterola holds a PhD in linguistics at the Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (UPV/EHU). He is member of the ELEBILAB Bilingualism research group and the UNESCO Chair of World Language Heritage, both at the UPV/EHU. Currently he is an assistant professor in the Department of Linguistics and Basque Studies (UPV/ EHU). The role of bilingual/multilingual education on the revitalization of Basque constitutes a major focus of interest in his research, which includes the following domains: child bilingualism, immersion education, language didactics and family language policy. Eilidh Rose McEwan is an Advice and Guidance Officer with National Deaf Children’s Society. Her research interests are in deaf education, international development with deaf communities in the Global South and sociolinguistics. In 2021 she completed work on a Covid19 research project while based at the University of Roehampton. The project examined the impact of social restriction measures on deaf, hard of hearing and vision impaired students in mainstream schools. She obtained her doctorate degree from the University of Central Lancashire in 2021, titled ‘The capabilities of deaf people in development projects in the Global South.’ Anik Nandi specialises in language policy and planning research. He is currently a Juan de Cierva Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of the Basque Country (Spain) where he is investigating family transmission of Basque language. He also works as an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Humanities, Liberal Arts & Social Sciences of the Alliance University (India). Nandi is a Senior Research Associate (Hon.) at the Royal Galician Academy (Spain) and his work frequently features in the Galician media, and his research papers appeared in many international scientific journals linked to cultural studies and linguistics.

Contributors xi

Khoi Nguyen completed his PhD in linguistics at the University of Manchester. His work explores a practice-based approach to heritage language use in a variety of settings and for different purposes. This includes social spaces, commercial imagery and writing, religious environments as well as social media pages. His main interest lies in how multilingual and multimodal communicative practices are connected to complex heritage and diasporic indexicalities. Sandra Radinger is a doctoral candidate in applied linguistics at the Department of English and American studies, University of Vienna, Austria. Her research is inspired by engagement with English as a lingua franca, language policy and multilingualism research, rich experience in language education contexts of various (national) settings and audiences, and philosophical practice. She is currently completing her dissertation project in which she investigates the notion of ‘availability of linguistic resources’ in languaging research in the light of lived (language) experience of participants and examines the potential for theory and practice of combining applied linguistic research with philosophical practice. Ben Rampton is Professor of Applied and Sociolinguistics at King’s College London. Using linguistic ethnography and interactional sociolinguistics, his work covers urban multilingualism; youth, ethnicity and social class; conflict and (in)securitization; and language education policy and practice. He is the founding editor of Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies. Phoebe Siu is a lecturer at College of Professional and Continuing Education, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Siu is a doctoral candidate (English Language Education) at The University of Hong Kong. Her research projects focus on multimodalities, content and language integrated learning, social semiotic awareness and EMI higher education. Siu has presented her international conference papers at AERA, AAAL, AILA, IWAC and ISFC. She is a postgraduate researcher in the Translanguaging-Transsemiotizing (TL-TS) Research Group developed by Prof Angel M.Y. Lin. In 2020-22, Phoebe has co-authored several book chapters for EMI higher education, focusing on creativity, trans-semiotic agency and translanguaging. Bong-gi Sohn is an instructor at the University of Winnipeg. Her research focuses on international student mobilization in higher education and multilingual/minority family language policy and practices. In her doctoral study, she elaborated how current scholarship on global chains of care and so-called feminized multilingual development explains the ways in which immigrant wives selectively move on to become bilingual workers in service of the host country’s preparation for its global future. In her current work, focusing on experience of international/multilingual education, she is playing a role in co-designing a discipline-specific content and language integrated learning (CLIL) curriculum with teachers and students.

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Ekaterina (Katrina) Tour is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Education at Monash University. Katrina’s research focuses on the digital literacies of children and adults from refugee and migrant backgrounds. She investigates the ways in which these groups use digital technologies for life, learning and employment, and explores how these experiences can be used to enhance educational policies and pedagogies for digital literacies in EAL/TESOL settings. Katrina is an author of Digital Literacies: EAL Teachers’ Guide (https://www.digitalliteracies.info) and a recently published book Enhancing Digital Literacies with Adult English Language Learners: Theoretical and Practical Insights. Becky Winstanley has worked in ESOL teaching and teacher education since 1995 and her main interests are participatory and social justice approaches to ESOL and sociolinguistics and ESOL. Alongside co-authors Melanie Cooke and Dermot Bryers, she has published classroom research related to these areas. Her work teaching adult migrants from Bangladesh has also given her an interest in Bangladeshi languages and she is currently carrying out doctoral research at SOAS into Sylheti language practices in east London. She is a member of the Hub for Education and Linguistic Diversity (HELD) at the Centre for Language, Discourse and Communication at King’s College London.

Series Editors’ Preface

Some time between October and December, 2023, Australians will vote in a referendum for a proposal for a ‘Voice to Parliament,’ an advisory body to the Australian parliament and government in relation to the social, spiritual and economic wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Opposition to the proposed amendment to the constitution has come in various forms: Some have objected that this move is divisive, even racist, in singling out First Nations people for special access to government (though this argument depends on both historical blindness in relation to colonization and an a priori racialization of Indigenous people); others are concerned that there is no need to change a representative democratic system that works well enough (this argument evidently overlooks the many ways in which current practices and arrangements remain discriminatory and inadequate); for others, the proposal does not go far enough (there are calls for a treaty before this process of recognition and concerns that it will not provide the means to address the many forms of disadvantage faced by Indigenous Australians). It is not clear, at the time of writing, how this referendum will turn out. The point, however, as far as this book is concerned, is that ‘The Voice’, as it is commonly known, is a profound political struggle for people to be heard. It is about history, colonization, violence, disadvantage and transformation. If reconciliation and rectification can have any real meaning, it is about setting up a process by which Indigenous people can be heard and non-Indigenous people are obliged to listen (though not necessarily to act, a misguided claim by reactionary opponents, and a concern for those looking for greater change). It is this sense of voice that is central to this book, an understanding that communication is a far more complex political process than models of production and reception would have us believe. The notion of voice can be easily misunderstood or co-opted for liberal (and less critical) projects. Voice, in its liberal conception, can be a notion akin to agency, an individual capacity to speak or act, something we can give people or that people can use. Or, we might view it as an intrinsic human quality, something we bring to light and develop, particularly through schooling. In this way of thinking, the broad inhibitions on agency or voice (social structures and ideologies in the classic sociological model) are given little space; instead, the issue is one of the xiii

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individual managing to speak or act. The limits on voice – all those ways in which people are silenced, the institutional practices that make it hard, if not impossible, for women, people of colour, people using a second language, deaf people, Indigenous people, and many more, to be heard – may be downplayed to bring an emphasis on an individual capacity to speak. Several books in the Critical Language and Literacies Studies (CLLS) series have examined such inhibitions in detail, offering guidelines for transformative policy and practice. Ndhlova and Makalela (2021), for example, take up the marginalization of diasporic, multilingual voices from the Global South. The authors describe a prevailing deficit orientation in how receiving nations integrate disadvantaged migrants and refugees (i.e. denizens), devaluing their rich multilingual repertoires, aspirations and potential contributions. They also provide strong recommendations towards the decolonisation of the dominant linguisitic models involved. The title of Lorente’s (2018) award winning CLLS book, Scripts of Servitude, foregrounds the domestication of voice and suppression of agency through the provision of language training for transnational Filipina workers, whose wage remittances maintain existing social hierarchies in the Philippines. The function of education policy and curricula in these systemic forms of silencing are also prominent in other CLLS books, for example, in Kanno’s (2021) discussion of Brighton High School and its habitus of dysfunction in its ongoing failure to encourage or adequately support higher education aspirations amongst its English Language Learning population. In Sterzuk’s (2011) book, classroom data reveal a continuing stigma against Indigenous Englishes and a white settler perception of its speakers as poor learners. As these texts indicate, the realization/ expression of one’s essential or preferred voice is no simple achievement. This book deals with multilingualism - including sign languages and already, therefore, a more complex idea than the speaking voice – with a particular focus on two key concepts: voice and (socio)linguistic citizenship. Both aim to work from a bottom-up, grassroots understanding of how people are able to articulate their positions on and through languages. Claire Kramsch (2021) asks what it takes for language learners and users not just to be understood, but to be valued, taken seriously, treated with respect. This is a question – all too often silenced in language education and applied linguistics – of symbolic power, of being listened to rather than just heard. This is not, therefore, a question just of getting a chance to speak, of speaking one’s mind, of finding the right words (or signs), but rather of creating a means to have one’s words taken up in more significant ways. As the emphasis in this book on sign languages suggests, this notion of voice has much less to do with the act of speaking than with the capacity to be understood. Voice from this perspective can be seen as both a capacity to articulate what is not being heard and part of the

Series Editors’ Preface  xv

material being of language, the physical presence of spoken and signed language (Bucholtz & Hall, 2016). Likewise the notion of citizenship – all too often seen as a comfortable community membership for those granted such status, yet more evidently a site of struggle for all those not allowed in – has to be understood in terms of political contestation. Various sociolinguistic frameworks have used the idea of citizenship in this more metaphorical sense: citizen sociolinguistics (Rymes, 2020; Svendsen, 2018) seeks to put sociolinguistic research in the hands of ordinary people, while (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2018) looks at the ways that people position themselves linguistically in the search for new possibilities of political speakerhood. Sociolinguistic citizenship is often seen in this sense as an alternative to the problematic notion of language rights, and like the idea of voice, suggests a focus on the ways in which language users seek to establish a position from which they can articulate their own wishes, desires, concerns and political needs. This book, therefore, is about the ways in which refugees, sign users, language learners and others work to get the things they want to articulate taken up by others. References Bucholz, M. and Hall, K. (2016) Embodied sociolinguistics. In N. Coupland (ed.) Sociolinguistics: Theoretical Debates (pp. 173–197). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kanno, Y. (2021) English Learners’ Access to Postsecondary Education: Neither College Nor Career Ready. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Kramsch, C. (2021) Language as Symbolic Power. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lorente, B.P. (2018) Scripts of Servitude: Language, Labor Migration and Transnational Domestic Work. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Ndhlovu, F. and Makalela, L. (2021) Decolonising Multilingualism in Africa: Recentering Silenced Voices from the Global South. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Rymes, B. (2020) How We Talk About Language. Exploring Citizen Sociolinguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sterzuk, A. (2011) The Struggle for Legitimacy: Indigenized Englishes in Settler Schools. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Stroud, C. (2018) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Svendsen, B.A. (2018) The dynamics of citizen sociolinguistics. Journal of Sociolinguistics 22, 137–160.

The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies: An Introduction Julia Gspandl, Christina Korb, Angelika Heiling and Elizabeth J. Erling

Multilingual Societies: Challenges and Opportunities

The majority of the world’s societies are multilingual; as such, multilingualism is not only ubiquitous, but also the natural default of human societies (Coulmas, 2018). In multilingual societies, each person has a diverse linguistic repertoire consisting of different languages, language varieties, registers and styles. Consequently, multilingual societies are a rich collection of individual linguistic repertoires (e.g. Arnaut et al., 2016; Blommaert & Backus, 2012; Coulmas, 2018). Multilingual societies can generate a multitude of opportunities based on diverse repertoires, which are connected to a rich cultural and ethnic diversity and the associated unique repositories of knowledge, wisdom and creativity, as well as the great potential to use multilingualism and language diversity for communication. At the same time, multilingual societies are faced with issues and ideologies that challenge multilingualism and language diversity and simultaneously work against heterogeneity among people. Such challenges are, for instance, language policies, education policies, or language attitudes and practices that are based on certain dominant language ideologies. At the core, these language ideologies are concerned with underlying power relations, hierarchies, and homogenization practices. The true conflict is not about languages per se but about what people think of languages, or more importantly, what they think of the users of these languages. Thus, beliefs about language lead to actions and measures on language, which have been enforced throughout history and continue until now. xvii

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Some languages (and thus the users of those languages) have been positioned centrally in more powerful domains such as economy, politics, education, health care, etc., while users of other languages are kept from accessing these domains and become marginalized. Language functions as an important tool to establish and maintain power relations in society. Through language policies and language regimes, language is used to mediate power. Power relations are particularly visible when looking at language use in different domains. In public domains, for instance, usually only a small number of languages (or quite often only one language) is present and accepted. In contrast, in private domains, such as the family, a multiplicity of languages is used on a daily basis. As a consequence, some language users are more socially vulnerable, since their languages are only accepted in domains that hold less power but excluded from domains that have a strong influence on society, its values, and the distribution of resources and political power, and that are associated with prestige, which in turn reflects and reinforces the stigmatization of groups whose languages are not present there. Thus, linguistic diversity is typically not neutral but characterized by linguistic and sociopolitical stratification. For that reason, languages and their users are not positioned equally. This language-based marginalization influences individuals’ access to critical resources and services such as healthcare, education, legal and administrative services. In addition, the marginalization of language users limits their public participation, i.e. the ability to express their opinions and exert influence over decision-making processes that affect the public. We see that in a modern nation-state, there is a thin layer of privileged languages above a thick layer of marginalized ones (De Swaan, 2001; Piller, 2016). Although diversity is a characteristic of all societies, this dynamic leads to situations in which the diversity of socially dominant groups is often either acknowledged without stigmatization or even actively valued, while the languages of minority populations are problematized. The symbolic power different languages hold is directly connected to their socioeconomic environment. This is what Kramsch (2020) describes as the paradox of symbolic power: it is non-arbitrary, but in order for it to operate, people must (be made to) believe it is arbitrary, i.e. natural facts of life (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977; Kramsch, 2020). On the one hand, power relations in language use are a reflection of society as a whole, mirroring uneven distributions of social, economic and linguistic resources (Bourdieu, 1991; Kroskrity, 2000; Makoni & Pennycook, 2007) within a society. At the same time, language use also constructs and manipulates social reality. In this way, it can be used politically by the powerful to ‘create, enhance and justify their power’ (Lakoff, 1990: 7) and either reinforce or transform existing power structures, which in turn can either include or exclude certain language users. Although originally symbolic, the power of language can then have tangible and serious consequences for minority language communities in multilingual contexts.

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Typically, language users acquire the language of the majority which can be associated with new economic opportunities and upward social mobility. In some cases, however, a person may be kept from acquiring the majority languages to the extent that is required to properly participate in these domains. This applies, for example, to deaf individuals who simply do not perceive the auditory input necessary to learn spoken language without severe effort, or language users in areas where the majority languages are not easily accessible to all social groups. At the same time, even for those for whom it is possible, the acquisition of the majority language is not necessarily merely positive: rather, it can mean a negation of their own sociocultural identity and a yielding to the social pressures that force them to conform to the majority society they are embedded in. The learning and teaching of majority languages is connected to financial and economic gain for the majority as well as cultural dominance. In this way, it can be interpreted as a reinforcement of immigrant and minority groups as being subordinate. Many scholars have discussed this phenomenon as ‘symbolic violence’ which hurts a person’s freedom and agency, and damages their dignity and self-respect (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977). However, although dominant voices remain dominant, hegemonic and monolingual, today’s societies are subject to constant and accelerating change due to global migration and ongoing democratization processes and the sociopolitical and sociocultural developments of the past decades (such as increased mobility, transnational networking and communication technologies) which have opened up new modes of language use and multifaceted perspectives on language in general. In these spaces, there is evidence of marginalized voices coming through. These voices of speakers and signers of minority languages can drive change through grassroots movements on language revitalization, changes in language education toward the use of translanguaging practices and languages and varieties previously confined to private domains, measures to grow visibility of languages in public spaces and the use of diverse linguistic repertoires on social media as well as a growing presence of languages online. Thus, power relations that have remained mostly undisputed are now being challenged by users of minority languages, such as the languages of migrants, minority languages, languages in postcolonial contexts, or sign languages. These language users demonstrate agency in their respective multilingual contexts through different means. They challenge contexts that usually follow a strict language regime by using various resources from their linguistic repertoires. They make themselves heard using social media, challenge existing power dynamics through grassroots movements or bottom-up family language policies. By using languages in the ways they need them, signers and speakers exercise agency for transformative purposes in institutionalized democratic frameworks (cf. Stroud, 2018b: 4) – in other words, they exercise (socio)linguistic citizenship. In these struggles for recognition, they are aided by spaces and forums that

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reaffirm to them that their voices are worth hearing, that social structures can be reimagined, that their languages matter. The notion of linguistic citizenship (LC) refers to ‘what people do with and around language(s) in order to position themselves agentively, and to craft new, emergent subjectivities of political speakerhood, often outside of those prescribed or legitimated in institutional frameworks of the state’ (Stroud, 2018b: 4). Linguistic citizenship has been proposed as an alternative to the Linguistic Human Rights (LHR) approach which has a longer history in the minority language context. While the framework has gained much traction (as readers will see in this volume), some works (in particular by May, 2018) warn against a complete dismissal of LHR for all contexts, as a complete reliance on LC may under-emphasize structural constraints, highlighting our point above that not all resources are equally available to all language users. While acknowledging the quality of Christopher Stroud and Lionel Wee’s work, May (2018) argues that some individuals and groups may still find it helpful to seek public recognition of minority languages through a traditional LHR approach, despite its limitations. Linguistic citizenship nevertheless offers a framework for conceptualizing linguistically mediated change driven by language users in multilingual contexts that promotes democratic participation and the transformation of power relations. This democratic participation is central to (socio)linguistic citizenship and is achieved through an emphasis on cultural and political ‘voice’ and agency, the acceptance of all linguistic practices including those that are mixed or low-status, and a focus on grassroots movements outside formal institutions (Rampton et al., 2018). The term ‘voice’ has been taken up and used differently – as it is in this volume – by scholars in various fields investigating a range of notions. Most generally, it refers to the expression of ideas, the assertion of authority and the projection of style through language (Erling & Bartlett, 2008: 176). Hymes (1996) investigated voice from a sociolinguistic perspective, referring to the potential social exclusion of those who do not have a command of the socially esteemed language varieties that are prevalent in educational and civil contexts. Bernstein (2000) used the term similarly to discuss the relationship between the right to be heard and the use of non-standard linguistic styles in realising this right (see further, Bartlett, 2013). Giving a ‘voice’ to the experiences of those disenfranchised by history and politics is a key aim in development and postcolonial studies (Spivak, 1988). It is a way of challenging the inequalities embedded in society and critiquing the way they are systematically reproduced. The term ‘voice’ has also been used to refer to the use of participatory and qualitative research methods to capture disadvantaged people’s own accounts of their lives. However, critics have pointed out that even when local voices are cited, the matrix discourses in which they are recontextualized and in response to the impetus provided by outsiders are still often characterized by a reproduction of social hierarchies, thereby limiting the autonomy of marginalized communities (Kong

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et al., 2020). Moreover, as Kramsch (2020: 10) has pointed out, populist movements have appropriated the idea of giving voice to the voiceless and reoriented the narrative toward ‘age-old resentment against immigrants, racial minorities and anyone who challenges traditional gender hierarchies’. In this volume, we pay particular attention to voice as the communicative power and effective expression of a language user’s views and perceptions in a given context. Voice is not only about being heard but also about the ‘freedom to develop a voice worth hearing’ (Hymes, 1996: 64). If minority language users are to be taken seriously, they need to understand and connect with the people and contexts that they seek to change. Cultivating this voice takes time, effort and the support of others through education, whether formal or informal (Rampton et al., 2018). According to the framework of (socio)linguistic citizenship, language is the ‘medium whereby citizenship is enacted and performed’ (Stroud, 2009: 217). Through a ‘variety of semiotic means’, users of minority languages ‘express agency, voice and participation in the everyday politics of language’ (Williams & Stroud, 2015: 408). They use linguistic practices to emphasize what is important to them (social and political issues) and thereby claim rights and justice within certain areas of life, and as such, obtain power in political institutions (Williams & Stroud, 2015). Moreover, when language users themselves regain control through language practices in various contexts, vulnerable speakers and signers ‘exercise control over their language for a variety of purposes precisely to avoid the othering that comes with linguistic imposition’ (Stroud, 2018b: 7). About this Book

This volume aims to capture evidence of language users’ voices in various contexts globally and show how they seek to contest and transform power relations despite challenges. Specifically, we aim to reveal how signers and speakers actively confront inequities in society such as the unequal distribution of resources. Through bottom-up initiatives and conscious involvement in language use, documentation, and the spread of languages to new language domains, speakers can address issues of language-based marginalization and discrimination and reclaim their linguistic and cultural identity. In this way, linguistic diversity in itself poses opportunities for heterogeneous societies to facilitate constructive dialogue, address issues of alienation, and enable access and contribution to information and knowledge for all members of a society. We draw upon the concept of (socio)linguistic citizenship (Rampton et al., 2018; Stroud, 2001, 2018a) to investigate power relations and unequal distributions of social, economic and linguistic resources within a society. (Socio) linguistic citizenship is a central concept for understanding the way ‘the relationship between state, citizen, identity, and (civil) society is linguistically mediated and organized, as well as contested and transformed through struggles over language’ (Stroud, 2008: 45).

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Supported by the framework of (socio)linguistic citizenship, chapters in this volume link questions of language to sociopolitical discourses of justice, rights and equity, as well as to issues of power and access within a political and democratic framework. Although bottom-up approaches are a key objective of (socio)linguistic citizenship, their facilitation is connected to a range of challenges, particularly in connection to the sustainability of any such efforts. Therefore, a particular focus is devoted to voice, including voices from the grassroots, and the importance of an engaged, committed community. Our ambition with the volume is to take a step beyond discussions of language policies toward initiatives by speakers and signers. Thus, with this volume, we aim to further establish research carried out through the lens of (socio)linguistic citizenship and find new approaches for practice (e.g. language in education, urban multilingualism). Within the chapters, acts of (socio)linguistic citizenship connected to voice and agency are investigated in a variety of countries and contexts, focusing on the active involvement of language users. We therefore invited authors who are particularly close to or actively involved in their contexts of research themselves in order to promote agency in the academic context and prevent issues of appropriation and epistemological violence. This book is divided into three parts: Part 1 focuses on multilingual practices by covering different modalities of languages and settings of language use. Part 2 illustrates how the researchers and practitioners contributing to this volume facilitate voice, in particular the voices of migrants, refugees and minority language users. Finally, Part 3 shows how communities of voicing are built with a focus on contexts in the Global South. Chapters in the first part highlight the self-determination and active involvement of speakers and signers. In Chapter 1, Mary Edward presents research on the voices of signers of Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL). She describes the multilingual situation in Adamorobe, Ghana, consisting of multiple spoken languages, Adamorobe Sign Language, and other sign languages. While the diverse linguistic repertoires can be a tool for empowerment, they also affect the different signing communities negatively by fostering marginalization and possible language shift among signers. Based on interviews with deaf signers, Edward proposes an integrative approach to multilingualism in Adamorobe strengthening the support for AdaSL. Chapter 2 by Agnes Grond documents how speakers of an endangered language create spaces online to share their linguistic repertoires, experiences, beliefs and stories. The focus of this chapter is on speakers of the endangered Kurdish language Şexbizinî and their language use online. Through Facebook groups, Şexbizinî speakers attempt to combat language shift, make their language writable and visible, and establish social cohesion in the context of migration. The chapter illustrates how, despite being located transnationally across Turkey and in various European countries, the members of the group have created and maintained shared

The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies: An Introduction  xxiii

spaces online, documenting their development of voice and agency and finding social cohesion. The final chapter of Part 1 by Vlada Baranova examines grassroots initiatives of young speakers of Kalmyk. The chapter describes a language revitalization movement mostly led by young Kalmyks. Relying on new teaching methods and using different language varieties in online communication, they address issues such as which varieties are legitimate and claim an identity as ‘new speakers’ in order to revitalize the language. Part 2 is concerned with contexts that facilitate voice of language users. The chapters display how speakers of minority languages as well as languages of migrants and refugees create their own spaces and how practitioners can provide spaces for language users in order to have the chance to be heard. Chapter 4 by Sandra Radinger shows how the researcher can actively provide spaces for speakers of minority languages to cultivate and use their voice. The chapter reports on a participatory project with refugees and language teachers in Austria in which multilingual spaces of interaction were created in order to address the experiences of refugees in the Austrian immigration context. Emphasizing the importance of spaces of vulnerability, Radinger discusses how participants reimagined the definition of what it means to use a language ‘successfully’. Similarly, Chapter 5 by Melissa Barnes and Katrina Tour is concerned with voice and agency of speakers from refugee backgrounds. The chapter focuses on the role of Afghani mothers living in Australia in their children’s learning environment. Through a participatory case study, it examines how women from refugee backgrounds act as agents in their children’s learning, providing opportunities for the mothers to demonstrate not only their awareness of the barriers they face but also their agency to mediate opportunities for learning at home for both their children and themselves. Chapter 6 by Anik Nandi, Maite Garcia-Ruiz and Ibon Manterola focuses on the family domain and its implications on wider language policies. It examines family language policies and parents’ decisions in two settings: Galicia and the Basque Autonomous Community. In both contexts, the parents actively decided to bring up their children in the respective minority languages, not only making the languages available to the children, but also supporting literacy development and increasing the languages’ prestige. The authors show how the parents’ participation in policy decisions is an act of (socio)linguistic citizenship that can lead to bottom-up language policies. Part 3 illustrates the building of communities of voicing. It focuses on the Global South with an array of multilingual voices spanning across the context of language learning in educational settings and the family domain through grassroots initiatives and activities online. Moreover, the chapters illustrate how voices move beyond specific domains and thus actively transform multilingual societies. Chapter 7 by Danny Foster examines the voices of parents from a rural, minoritized language community – the Malila – in Tanzania. The

xxiv  The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies

chapter focuses on parents’ deeply held ideological beliefs about language, language learning and languages of instruction at school. Connecting the capability approach and (socio)linguistic citizenship, it illustrates inequalities in Tanzania based on different language repertoires. In Chapter 8, Eilidh McEwan also uses the capability approach in the framework of (socio)linguistic citizenship to explore deaf communities in the Global South, focusing on the voices of deaf signers in Vanuatu, Timor-Leste, Mexico, Malawi, Vietnam, India, Uganda and Ghana. The chapter explores deaf individuals’ capabilities to achieve wellbeing, such as access to sign languages, fully accessible education, and opportunities to voice their needs. A central point of this chapter is deaf participants’ abilities to independently campaign for more control on issues that affect them. Chapter 9 by Khoi Nguyen examines social and semiotic online practices of Vietnamese diasporic communities in the UK. The chapter focuses on activities in response to wider society events which create a sense of collective liability (in this case: Central Vietnam floods and the Covid-19 pandemic). The diverse voices of the Vietnamese diaspora are revealed in the ways the language users exercise agency and increase visibility of their multimodal and multilingual repertoires online. The final chapter of Part 3 by Phoebe Siu, Bong-gi Sohn, and Angel M.Y. Lin is concerned with tertiary education in Hong Kong. The chapter investigates the potential of multilingual and multimodal language use to create translanguaging spaces in English-medium instruction education. Through the proposed method, college students were able to draw on their plurilingual repertoires when interacting in the classroom, co-create a multilingual learning space, and fulfil class assessments. The approach challenges the monolingual language education policy in Hong Kong’s tertiary classrooms connected to the postcolonial prestige of English. The Afterword by Ben Rampton, Mel Cooke, Constant Leung, Dermot Bryers, Becky Winstanley and Sam Holmes focuses on experiences of applying the concept of (socio)linguistic citizenship in the UK by the Hub for Education and Language Diversity (HELD). HELD operates in consistency with the core principles of (socio)linguistic citizenship: commitment to democratic participation, voice, and the heterogeneity of linguistic resources. The chapter discusses the roles that state-policies and institutions such as universities play in promoting it. In addition, Rampton and colleagues focus on two concepts – the ‘Total Linguistic Fact’ and the ‘diasporic local’ – that have potential in complementing the framework of (socio)linguistic citizenship by adding sociolinguistic perspectives and possibilities for application in the classroom. Negotiating Power Dynamics through Voice

In conclusion, the language users treated in this volume desire not only for their languages but also for themselves to be recognized. They seek

The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies: An Introduction  xxv

legitimacy: the recognition that they have a right to express themselves and be listened to, to be taken seriously. Using their languages in new contexts, flouting norms and challenging linguistic hierarchies can have symbolic power, leading to change in the way people perceive and construct reality, transforming multilingual societies by changing the view of the world around them and, as a consequence, individuals’ action on the world. This not only changes their social image and respect (for themselves and from others), but also widens their opportunities in life based on newly obtained access to domains where they had previously experienced gatekeeping and communicative difficulties based on their different linguistic repertoires. The awareness that the dominance and power of certain languages and their users is not natural and inevitable but rather a construct based on social and historical developments must be prevalent and universally acknowledged if we seek to change the discourse on linguistic minorities, the social and political actions of stakeholders, and, most importantly, the lived experience of minority language users in many countries. References Arnaut, K., Blommaert, J., Rampton, B. and Spotti, M. (eds) (2016) Language and Superdiversity. New York: Routledge. Bartlett, T. (2013) Constructing local voices through English as a lingua franca: A study from intercultural development discourse. In E.J. Erling and P. Seargeant (eds) English and Development: Policy, Pedagogy and Globalization (pp. 163–181). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Bernstein, B. (2000) Pedagogy, Symbolic Control and Identity: Theory, Research, Critique. Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield. Blommaert, J. and Backus, A. (2012) Superdiverse repertoires and the individual. Tilburg Papers in Culture Studies 24, 1–32. Bourdieu, P. (1991) Language and Symbolic Power. Oxford: Polity Press. Bourdieu, P. and Passeron, J.C. (1977) Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Coulmas, F. (2018) An Introduction to Multilingualism: Language in a Changing World. Oxford: Oxford University Press. De Swaan, A. (2001) Words of the World: The Global Language System. Cambridge: Polity Press. Erling, E.J. and Bartlett, T. (2008) Making space for us: German graduate student voices in English. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching 2 (2), 174–188. Hymes, D. (1996) Ethnography, Linguistics, Narrative Inequality: Toward an Understanding of Voice. London: Taylor & Francis. Kong, S.T., Banks, S., Brandon, T., Chappell, S., Charnley, H., Hwang, S.K., Rudd, D., Shaw, S., Slatcher, S. and Ward, N. (2020) Extending voice and autonomy through participatory action research: Ethical and practical issues. Ethics and Social Welfare 14 (2), 220–229. Kramsch, C. (2020) Language as Symbolic Power. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kroskrity, P.V. (2000) Regimenting languages: language ideological perspectives. In P.V. Kroskrity (ed.) Regimes of Language: Ideologies, Polities, and Identities (pp. 1–34). Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research Press.

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Lakoff, R. (1990) Talking Power: The Politics of Language. New York: Basic Books. Makoni, S. and Pennycook, A. (2007) Disinventing and reconstituting languages. In S.  Makoni and A. Pennycook (eds) Disinventing and Reconstituting Languages (pp. 1–41). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. May, S. (2018) Commentary – Unanswered questions: Addressing the inequalities of majoritarian language policies. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 65–72). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Piller, I. (2016) Linguistic Diversity and Social Justice: An Introduction to Applied Sociolinguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science Education 17 (4), 68–83. Spivak, G. (1988) Can the subaltern speak? In C. Nelson and L. Grossberg (eds) Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture (pp. 271–313). Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press. Stroud, C. (2001) African mother-tongue programmes and the politics of language: Linguistic citizenship versus linguistic human rights. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 22 (4), 339–55. Stroud, C. (2008) Bilingualism: Colonialism and post-colonialism. In M. Heller (ed.) Bilingualism: A Social Approach (pp. 25–49). Basingstoke: Palgrave. Stroud, C. (2009) Towards a postliberal theory of citizenship. In J. Petrovic (ed.) International Perspectives on Bilingual Education: Policy, Practice and Controversy (pp. 191–218). New York: Information Age Publishing. Stroud, C. (2018a) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Stroud, C. (2018b) Introduction. In: L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 1–14). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Williams, Q. and Stroud, C. (2015) Linguistic citizenship: Language and politics in postnational modernities. Journal of Language and Politics 14 (3), 406–430.

Part 1 Multilingual Practices

1 Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) Mary Edward

Although multilingualism has great advantages for African economies, in Deaf communities, it has always worked against minority or indigenous sign languages in rural communities of Africa. The diverse linguistic repertoires of African communities affect the different signing communities. This chapter focuses on multilingualism in Adamorobe, Ghana and its implications for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL). In Adamorobe, multilingualism is a tool for Deaf empowerment and at the same time a catalyst for the marginalisation and possible endangerment of AdaSL. This chapter explores the economic and pedagogical advantages of multilingualism in Adamorobe. It also considers the linguistic imperialism against AdaSL and the possible language endangerment due to language shift. Finally, the chapter proposes an integrative approach to multilingualism in Adamorobe using the notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship (Rampton et al., 2018; Stroud, 2018) which allows us to reimagine a transformative notion of language. Introduction

Multilingualism is common in African communities, and among the different languages is usually a regional one that serves as a language of instruction in schools (Brock-Utne, 2017). The complexity of multilingualism in signing communities is due to the fact that Deaf signers are either unimodal multilinguals with knowledge of different sign languages or bimodal multilinguals with knowledge of different signed and spoken languages (Woll et al., 2001; Zeshan & Webster, 2019). Research on both unimodal and bimodal sign language bi/multilingualism has received comparatively little attention (Berent, 2013). As noted by Berent, increasing numbers of signers are gaining knowledge of two or more sign 3

4  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

languages. In Adamorobe (Ghana), this phenomenon is common because Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) signers are increasingly gaining formal and informal knowledge of Ghanaian Sign Language (GhSL). Formal knowledge refers to the school-based use of GhSL. The informal knowledge emerges from contact with GhSL users and the past attempt to establish a school for the Deaf1 in Adamorobe (Nyst, 2007a). AdaSL signers who acquired GhSL in schools generally have equal proficiency in AdaSL and GhSL (Edward, 2021a). Contrastively, the signers who acquired GhSL informally have different levels of proficiency depending on their exposure to it (Edward & Akanlig-Pare, 2022). That is, in Adamorobe, most deaf signers are bimodal multilinguals. Although multilingualism has great advantages for African economies (Brock-Utne, 2017), in African Deaf communities, multilingualism has always worked against minority or indigenous sign languages in rural communities. The diverse linguistic repertoires of African communities affect the different signing communities. The literature on indigenous African sign languages predicts endangerment and extinction of most indigenous African sign languages (Asonye et al., 2020). Most users of indigenous African sign languages are formally educated in urban sign languages which have caused signers to use these urban sign languages even in their indigenous communities. The present chapter focuses on multilingualism in Adamorobe (Ghana) and its implication for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL), proposing an integrative approach to multilingualism that ensures the sustainability of AdaSL. Sign languages are natural languages used by Deaf communities all over the world and fulfil all requirements of full-fledged human languages. Signed and spoken languages share the same levels of linguistic analysis, i.e. both have phonology, morphology, semantics, syntax, etc. (Sandler & Lillo-Martin, 2006; Pfau et al., 2012). There have been several attempts in the past to educate deaf students with speech in an oral approach. Infamous among these attempts was the Milan Conference of 1880 on Deaf education that concluded that oral education was better than signs and therefore banned the use of sign languages in European and US-American schools. The claim that sign language is ‘harmful for intellectual and educational development’ (Wilcox, 2015: 667) delayed the linguistic acceptability of sign languages. Sign languages can be classified into a dichotomy of urban sign languages and rural (indigenous/village) sign languages according to their features. AdaSL is a rural sign language used by deaf and hearing signers in the Adamorobe community in the Eastern Region of Ghana. It is believed to have existed as far back as 1733 as a language used by both hearing and deaf people in Adamorobe (Okyere & Addo, 1994). Nyst (2012) refers to communities where deaf and hearing people live together as shared signing communities. GhSL is the sign language of the urban deaf community and the language used in Deaf education in Ghana. It

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  5

developed from the sign language (possibly American Sign Language) introduced by Andrew Foster in 1957. The Adamorobe community is noted for its unusually high incidence of hereditary deafness which is currently at 1.3% of the total population (Edward, 2021a). In comparison, the estimated incidence of deafness in developed countries is 0.1% (Nyst, 2012). However, earlier research conducted in Adamorobe recorded even a higher incidence of deafness. For example, Nyst (2007a) identified a 2% incidence of genetic deafness. The reduction in the number of deaf people in Adamorobe is a result of both internal and external factors. The internal pressures are caused by the marriage law which was instituted by a former chief of Adamorobe to prevent marriage between two deaf people (Kusters, 2012a; Nyst, 2007a) and other socioeconomic factors that have caused some deaf individuals to leave the community (Edward, 2018a). The external pressure is mainly due to the migration of different hearing people into the community (Edward, 2018a). Deaf people in the Adamorobe community are believed to have been the first substantial historical group of African people known to have used a formal sign language. The term ‘formal’ is preferred in this context because AdaSL is the first regulated sign language recorded in SubSaharan Africa. In fact, AdaSL is a traditional deaf sign language, possibly with a history as long as French Sign Language or American Sign Language (Frishberg, 1987; Miles, 2004, 2005). The earliest record of AdaSL dates as far back as the 18th century (Miles, 2004, 2005). AdaSL emerged in a period of oral historical narration, and the first documentation of the coexistence of deaf and hearing people in Adamorobe is very recent (in the 1970s, see Frishberg, 1987; Okyere & Addo, 1994). As to what could have been the cause of the hereditary deafness or the higher numbers of deaf people in Adamorobe, the stories are scattered in myths and oral narratives (Kusters, 2012a, 2012b; Nyst, 2007a; Okyere & Addo, 1994). For example, Kusters (2012a: 2769) gives an account of the river stories in ‘which deities or spirits that live in or around two rivers in Adamorobe are said to cause the deafness in the village’. Although earlier research discovered that almost everybody in the village could communicate in the sign language (Frishberg, 1987), current research shows a decline in the numbers of hearing signers (Edward, 2018a). Data for this chapter are taken from demographical and metalinguistic data of different field trips I have made to Adamorobe between 2011 and 2018. I will also consider previous research works on Adamorobe and make inferences from them as well. As mentioned, the language of education in Ghana is English which was left to the West African country through British colonisation. Although the educational framework in Ghana promotes the use of indigenous languages during the first three years of primary education, this seems to be practised only in villages and remote regions, rather than urban and cosmopolitan areas. The challenge

6  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

of using one indigenous Ghanaian language to teach in most schools is caused by the multilingual repertoires of the students. Deaf students from Adamorobe just like their peers in other communities in Ghana use GhSL as the language of instruction at school. Multilingualism in Adamorobe

In a multilingual country like Ghana, the daily use of two or more languages is common in both urban and rural communities. As noted by Edwards (2013: 5), ‘[b]ilingualism and multilingualism have both de facto existences and important places in the psychological, political, and social debates that define social and ethnic groups, communities, and regions’. In Ghana, multilingualism is a necessary tool for communication, but many Ghanaians express different levels of competency in the use of different languages. Although English is the official language of Ghana, 60 to 80 local languages are used in the country (Dakubu, 2015). Multilingualism in individual communities in Ghana means that communication in public domains can take place in one or two of the popular languages used in the community. The dominant language used in Adamorobe is Akuapem Twi which is a dialect of Akan. Other languages used actively and on a daily basis are Ewe, Ga, Krobo, English, AdaSL and GhSL. When speech is used by Deaf signers, ‘its production can take different forms’; it ‘can be vocalized, whispered, or mouthed’ (Berent, 2013: 354). Mouthing is defined as the production of visual/vocal syllables while signing, which also occurs in AdaSL. In AdaSL, mouthing is generally done in Akuapem Twi. Exceptions include the sign BIG which has the mouthing agbo which is a Ga word. Amid this highly condensed multilingual environment, AdaSL is the language that mediates between deaf and hearing people. Knowledge of AdaSL in Adamorobe is not ubiquitous. Sign language is mainly used by Deaf Adamorobeans as well as family and friends of the Deaf. AdaSL is not used outside Adamorobe, neither is it used in the educational context. The majority of hearing signers2 in Adamorobe can be grouped into two categories: children of deaf adults (CODA) and siblings/spouses of deaf adults (SODA). CODAs have acquired AdaSL together with Akuapem Twi and are proficient signers in AdaSL. SODAs on the other hand have acquired AdaSL as either L1 or L2 depending on exposure; siblings mainly acquired AdaSL at an early age as compared to spouses. 3 Table 1.1 provides different linguistic repertoires of deaf and hearing signers in Adamorobe contrasted with hearing non-signers (Edward, 2021a; Edward & Akanlig-Pare, 2022). This chapter does not provide details on the linguistic competence of Deaf Adamorobeans in languages other than AdaSL, GhSL, Akuapem Twi and English. Similarly, the linguistic competence of CODAs and SODAs in GhSL is not treated as this has not been systematically investigated.

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  7

Table 1.1.  Multilingual repertoires in Adamorobe from the interviews conducted with deaf signers in Adamorobe: Akuapem Twi is the L1 of Deaf Adamorobeans since the language is the lingua franca or the dominant language used in Adamorobe Hearing status

AdaSL

Akuapem Twi

GhSL

English

Other languages

Deaf (formal education)

L1

L1

L2 (balanced bilingual with AdaSL)

L2 (writing and reading proficiency)

–

Deaf (no formal education)

L1

L1

L2 (different levels of proficiency)

–

–

Hearing (CODA)

L1

L1

–

L2 (Language of education)

Different levels of proficiency

Hearing (SODA)

L1/L2

L1

–

L2 (Language of education if educated)

Different levels of proficiency

Hearing (nonsigner)

–

Depends on L1 of speaker

–

L2 (Language of education if formally educated)

Different levels of proficiency

Deaf education in Ghana is recent (1950s) as compared to other places in the world. Most deaf adults in Adamorobe have not received formal education, but most deaf children, teenagers and middle-aged individuals have received at least basic education. Since Deaf education is conducted in GhSL and English, all Deaf Adamorobeans who have gone through the formal education system are exposed to GhSL and English. Other forms of informal education among the Deaf community take place in AdaSL. The acquisition of GhSL by AdaSL signers who have not gone through formal education is not systematic which accounts for different levels of proficiency. In May 2018, I interviewed 11 Deaf adults from Adamorobe. Only two out of the 11 had received formal education and as such are equal bilinguals in AdaSL and GhSL. The two formally educated Deaf individuals also had linguistic competency in Akuapem Twi and were also proud of their ability to read and write in English. The other nine complained about their lack of formal education and how it has affected their ability to advance in life (Edward & Akanlig-Pare, 2022). Although all 11 signers reported having some proficiency in GhSL, I was able to assess that the two formally educated signers were more proficient than the other nine. What does signing GhSL and understanding and writing English mean for Deaf persons in Adamorobe? What role does English play in the lives of Deaf Adamorobeans? Why is the knowledge of GhSL relevant for Deaf Adamorobeans? What are signers’ reasons for desiring to know more than AdaSL? Is the knowledge of GhSL and other languages a threat to the survival of AdaSL? These questions will be explored in the following sections.

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Linguistically, AdaSL is independent of the other sign languages used in Ghana including Ghanaian Sign Language (GhSL) and Nanabin Sign Language (NanaSL). It is also independent of the main spoken language in Adamorobe (Akuapem Twi dialect of Akan) though Nyst (2007a) has identified some influence of Akan on AdaSL structure. Even though the influence of other spoken languages has not yet been systematically examined, one instance of such an influence can be found in the earlier mentioned Ga mouthing for the AdaSL sign BIG. Only the young deaf Adamorobeans who have received formal education understand English. Overall, the most linguistic influence on AdaSL comes from GhSL which is the language of Deaf education in Ghana. The vocabulary and grammatical structure of AdaSL has been influenced by GhSL. For example, although Nyst (2007a, 2007b) identified the absence of entity classifiers for motion events and simultaneous constructions, Edward (2021a) found entity classifiers for motion events and simultaneous constructions in AdaSL. GhSL is mainly used by formally educated (school-based learning) Adamorobeans as well as adult deaf signers who have not received formal education. Whereas all Deaf Adamorobeans are native signers of AdaSL, the level of competency in GhSL depends on the exposure (Edward & Akanlig-Pare, 2022). In Adamorobe, knowledge of GhSL is considered important and even signers with very minimal exposure to GhSL have been recorded to produce GhSL words and phrases in their communication (Edward, 2015a, 2021a). Language contact with GhSL has led to the production of structures akin to GhSL in AdaSL narratives (Edward, 2021a). AdaSL–GhSL contact was mainly triggered by deaf education which is organised in GhSL. Nyst (2007a) and Edward (2015b) consider AdaSL an endangered language. Issues of Deaf education, empowerment, linguistic barriers (Edward & Akanlig-Pare, 2022) and ideological views (Kusters, 2014b, 2019) have given a dominant role to GhSL in Adamorobe. Although Kusters (2012a) views AdaSL as a thriving language because its users have positive views about it, Edward (2015b, 2018a, 2018b) sees these positive attitudes as merely a veil that hides the more pervasive effect of the linguistic barriers and the social inequalities in Adamorobe. The role of GhSL in a multilingual and multimodal Adamorobe moves beyond the language of the educated Deaf individuals. According to Edward (2015a) and Edward and Akanlig-Pare (2022), the co-existence of AdaSL and GhSL has resulted in the use of communicative strategies such as switching between AdaSL and GhSL by both educated and uneducated members of the Deaf community. In a recent data collection project in Adamorobe (Edward, 2018b, 2021a), the earlier mentioned communicative strategy was found to be used more by the Deaf adults (who have not received formal education conducted in GhSL) as compared to the younger signers (who have received formal education conducted in GhSL). Two

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  9

issues can be addressed regarding the linguistic attitudes of Deaf signers. The first issue is the awareness of the presence of two different sign languages and the preference for one over the other. The second issue is that Deaf adults are potentially unaware of their gradual shift towards GhSL. Both factors give reason for concern for the fate of AdaSL in a linguistically diverse community. As noted by Lüpke and Storch (2013: 2), in multilingual Africa, ‘speakers’ profiles can be better described and understood in terms of registers and repertoires than in terms of discrete languages’, and these choices depend on the domain, contexts, addressee, and many other factors. In Adamorobe, languages and varieties within individuals’ repertoires are used selectively according to pragmatic needs, and AdaSL has a special place in the sociolinguistic ecology of the village (Edward, 2015b). However, the perception of deaf signers towards their language is that the signing is hard4 and difficult to be understood by outsiders (Kusters, 2014b, 2019). Deaf Adamorobeans therefore use GhSL as an alternate language to bridge the linguistic barrier between AdaSL users and the general Deaf community in Ghana. The use of GhSL in Adamorobe according to Kusters (2014b) is for practical reasons and ‘some deaf people found it pleasant to be able to use another language than AdaSL’ (Kusters, 2014b: 152). A further practical use of GhSL in Adamorobe is to gossip about hearing people, particularly those who sign AdaSL (Kusters, 2014b; Edward, 2015a). The desire to be able to use another sign language other than AdaSL is understandable considering the linguistic diversity of Adamorobe (and Ghana as a whole). Minority Languages in a Multilingual Community

The advocacy for minority language rights has been considered from perspectives such as sociolinguistics, language policy and planning and discourses on human rights (May, 2003). This section will consider Linguistics Human Rights (LHR) and (socio)linguistic citizenship (LC) and how LHR bolsters linguistic marginalisation of minority languages. According to Murray (2015: 379), the major goal in deaf-led advocacy in many countries ‘has been promotion of the right to use sign language in a variety of settings, from those involving the larger society to those surrounding deaf children’s use of sign language’. Asonye et al. (2020) consider many indigenous African sign languages to have suffered because of the imposition of American Sign Language (and other foreign sign languages) and other policies that have hindered the development of these indigenous sign languages. Murray (2015) and Asonye et al. (2020) argue for the linguistic rights of Deaf communities and maintain that access to sign languages is a core right to ensure the full participation of deaf people in society. Haualand and Allen (2009) list four basic factors in relation to human rights for deaf people. These are:

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(1) Recognition and use of sign language(s), including recognition of and respect for Deaf culture and identity. (2) Bilingual education in sign language(s) and the national language(s). (3) Accessibility to all areas of society and life, including legislation to secure equal citizenship for all and prevent discrimination. (4) Sign language interpretation. (Haualand & Allen, 2009: 9) The recognition of sign languages and their linguistic study began six decades ago, and over this time, different Deaf communities have had their sign languages recognised as national languages. At the time of this research, Ghana and many other African nations do not have recognised national sign languages. However, GhSL is used in Ghana as the official sign language for Deaf education, mass media and other social engagements, even though it has not been declared a national sign language. AdaSL and other indigenous sign languages are yet to be given any official recognition. Out of the four factors on the human rights for deaf people listed by Haualand and Allen (2009), only one can be confidently attested in Adamorobe: bilingual education in sign language(s) and the national language(s). Deaf education in Ghana is conducted in GhSL which means that many deaf people from different communities in Ghana including Adamorobe do not have access to education in their mother tongue. The other three factors in relation to human rights for deaf people cannot be attested for in Adamorobe (and other areas in Ghana). The question we need to ask is, ‘Who should be held accountable for this failure to provide basic human rights?’. Stakeholders and policymakers have failed to ensure that deaf people have access to the basic linguistic needs. Edward (2021b) mentions that indigenous Deaf people in Africa have faced several challenges in recent times, and these challenges include ‘societal policies that have led to the gradual reduction of the number of individuals in indigenous African Deaf communities’ (2021b: 2), such as the marriage law and the exclusion of AdaSL from Deaf education. However, no person or institution has thus far been held accountable for the discrimination and denial of the basic linguistic rights of deaf people in Adamorobe. The linguistic rights of users of indigenous sign languages such as AdaSL in multilingual settings are at risk of being breached due to internal pressures from other languages (local languages) and the external pressure from education (which takes place in the urban or national sign languages). In the face of linguistic imperialism (Branson & Miller, 1998), there is a need for a comprehensive approach to navigate access to education and the right to indigenous signed languages for Deaf education. As noted by Edward and Akanlig-Pare (2022), economic progress and development among Deaf individuals in Adamorobe is directly linked to their fluency in GhSL and their ability to read and write English. This presents a dilemma for Deaf individuals in Adamorobe who cannot read and write.

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  11

When considering the issues of linguistic rights for Deaf Adamorobeans, it is also necessary to discuss the possible challenges of using AdaSL as a language of instruction for Deaf individuals in Adamorobe. Currently, no pedagogical provision has been made to promote the use of AdaSL or any other minority sign languages in Deaf education. In fact, even for GhSL, most of the available resources to aid teaching and learning were produced by private individuals or non-governmental organisations, such as the Ghana National Association for the Deaf (GNAD). Linguistic rights for deaf individuals in multilingual societies and in shared signing communities such as Adamorobe remain a struggle. As deaf people navigate through the dynamics of life in a shared signing community such as Adamorobe, Kusters (2015) notes the need to strategize by creating their own physical space and network among themselves. In this environment where the ‘Adamorobean Deaf voice’ seems to be truncated in a multilingual and bimodal setting, there is the need to redefine language rights, so they acknowledge the voices of minority language users and give them room to be heard within other socioeconomic and sociocultural contexts. Redefining language rights considers the individual’s right to voice, to be heard and to use different dimensions of their linguistic repertoire depending on circumstances and purposes (Heugh, 2018). Rampton et al. (2018) define voice as the communicative power and effectiveness of individuals for specific events within the here and now. Based on this definition, I consider the use of AdaSL within different communicative networks (including individual physical spaces and shared spaces) in the shared signing community of Adamorobe. The integration of minority languages is best achieved using the framework of (socio)linguistic citizenship (LC). According to Rampton et al. (2018: 4), ‘LC works with developments in sociolinguistics that allow a more open and inclusive position, attending to the diversity of linguistic practices that people use/need to get themselves heard in arenas that affect their wellbeing’. In other words, it considers the different linguistic practices that (deaf) people use to be heard in different spheres that directly affect their growth and wellbeing (Rampton et al., 2018). (Socio)linguistic citizenship, according to Stroud (2018), offers an integrative view of language policy and planning in areas of education and politics. In a comparison of LC and Linguistic Human Rights (LHR), Stroud (2001: 351) argues that: One of the more serious problems with a rights discourse is that it fails to engage with the deep level at which marginalisation is interlarded with language, even though this is precisely what it was designed to accomplish.

For example, although Ghana and many other African countries have declared the use of pupils’ mother tongues in education in primary levels, it has not stopped the marginalisation of the different local languages.

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The economic power of English in Ghana is the major reason for the preference of English over other local languages in education. Considering the differences in the operationalisation of LHR and LC, it is appropriate to prefer LC over LHR because of the different ways the framework of LC allows signers and speakers to exercise control over their language (Stroud, 2001). LHR on the other hand replicates colonial identity. When users of minority languages exercise their (socio)linguistic citizenship, they create a space for the ‘negotiation of political visibility, and formulate new demands for justice and redistribution’ (Stroud, 2001: 352). For instance, within the different Deaf communities, deaf activists have opened conversations on specific needs of deaf individuals. These conversations have become channels to express political views and opinions. Multilingualism as a Tool for Development or Marginalisation

Multilingualism in Adamorobe presents diverse avenues for both development and marginalisation. In Adamorobe, multilingualism is a tool for Deaf empowerment and at the same time a catalyst for the marginalisation and possible endangerment of AdaSL. This section explores the economic and pedagogical advantages of multilingualism in Adamorobe. It also considers the linguistic imperialism against AdaSL and the possible language endangerment due to language shift. We shall briefly consider the circumstances under which multilingualism in Adamorobe may become a tool for either development or marginalisation. Multilingualism as a tool for development

According to Lüpke and Storch (2013: 8), the positive aspect of African multilingualism in Africa is that ‘inspiring tolerance, social cohesion strategies and creative accommodation efforts needed to create successful multilingual societies’. Being a multilingual Deaf person in Adamorobe has economic and academic advantages. Multilingual Deaf Adamorobeans use AdaSL, understand GhSL, understand Akuapem Twi (the majority spoken language) and additionally, the educated signers write and understand English as well (see Table 1.1). This type of multilingualism is bimodal (sign/speech). The perception of Akuapem Twi is possible through lipreading as the auditory elements of the language are not accessible for the Deaf. The average multilingual Deaf signer in Adamorobe can negotiate conversations with both deaf and hearing people from Adamorobe tentatively. These conversations include day-to-day interactions, trade negotiations and conversations at work in Adamorobe. Most Deaf Adamorobeans work trade and menial jobs; the ability to understand a language other than AdaSL enables them to do business. Business transactions in the informal sector of Ghana’s economy mainly rely on local languages, rather than English which is the official language.

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  13

In Adamorobe, day-to-day interactions are held mainly in Akuapem Twi and occasionally in Ga, Ewe, Krobo and English. The economic advantages of multilingualism in Adamorobe allow multilingual Deaf signers to navigate different business ventures other than farming and mining. Furthermore, multilingualism enables signers to create friendships and build rapport outside their usual networks and physical spaces in Adamorobe. Although GhSL is regarded as the language of prestige and influence in Adamorobe (Edward & Akanlig-Pare, 2022), it also serves as a link between the Adamorobe community and other Deaf communities in Ghana. For example, most social interventions for Deaf signers in Adamorobe are initiated by people outside Adamorobe. Most of these events are interpreted in either AdaSL or GhSL. These social events are good platforms for Deaf Adamorobeans to create networks with other deaf people and to make new friends. Kusters (2014b, 2019) also identified the practical use of GhSL in Adamorobe as the ability to use another language and the experience of ‘sweet, delightful signing’. To borrow the words of Edwards (2013: 5), multilingualism in Adamorobe offers ‘opportunities for interpersonal and intercultural exchange’. That is, the multilingual signer can increase their prospects in terms of communication, job opportunities, social networks and create new spaces for interaction. The expansion of the linguistic repertoires of Deaf signers in Adamorobe also has educational motivations. The average school-going child in Ghana is bilingual in their mother tongue and English. However, the school-going child in a multilingual society in Ghana has a varied linguistic repertoire which includes English, the mother tongue and other languages used in the community. The deaf child from Adamorobe has AdaSL as an L1, is exposed to Akuapem Twi and will acquire GhSL and English at school. Multilingualism is socially motivated in Adamorobe, and the average deaf child in Adamorobe is exposed to different languages. The sign language choice is also motivated by the setting. At school, the AdaSL signer switches to GhSL and English. In Adamorobe, the signer’s language is not motivated by education alone but by the cultural and social setting. Therefore, the ability to communicate in GhSL is relevant for inter- and intra-community interactions. For example, the young signers communicate mainly in GhSL with each other and switch to AdaSL when adults join the conversation. The ability to read and write English is relevant for social growth and development. It is therefore not surprising that only two out of the 11 people interviewed use cell phones, and the reason is the other nine lack the knowledge of English. The role of English in the lives of Deaf Adamorobeans goes beyond reading and sending text messages. It gives them access to assimilate into the wider Ghanaian community, to be in the know about current news and to be educated on issues of importance. Multilingualism has scientific advantages as well. GhSL, for instance, is used to teach scientific subjects in schools. Contrastively, AdaSL does not

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have signs for scientific concepts, and the main reason is that it is only recognised and used in Adamorobe and has not been systematically developed. Therefore, a reliance on English and GhSL is necessary to teach, explain and discuss issues of scientific concern. Multilingualism as a tool for marginalisation

While we might be quick to identify the benefits of multilingualism, in indigenous communities such as Adamorobe, the effect can be detrimental as minority languages tend to be suppressed by the languages used by most people. Although multilingualism itself is a powerful tool for Deaf empowerment, the wrong approach to multilingualism in Deaf communities can also lead to marginalisation. Deaf Adamorobeans make up only 1.3% of the population of Adamorobe and as such constitute a linguistic minority group. The history of Adamorobe documents the coexistence of deaf and hearing people (Okyere & Addo, 1994; Nyst, 2007a), but Deaf Adamorobeans have to create their own physical spaces to cope with life (Kusters, 2015). Furthermore, the societal perception of deaf people in Adamorobe and the silent but pervasive stigmatisation causes the minority Deaf community in Adamorobe to be at the mercy of societal norms (Akanlig-Pare & Edward, 2020). For example, the infamous marriage prohibition between two deaf individuals (Kusters, 2012a) and its consequences has led to the gradual reduction of deaf people in Adamorobe (Akanlig-Pare & Edward, 2020).  The unequal distribution of power and wealth in Adamorobe and the circle of poverty among deaf individuals (Edward, 2018a) requires deaf signers to assimilate to the language that can give them economic and social power. The fundamental use of AdaSL is pushed to the periphery, and other languages take the core positions. Pietikainen and Kelly-Holmes (2013: 3) define the core ‘in terms of its advancement, metropolitanism, and political, economic and trade power, while the periphery is characterized as marginal, the opposite of the core, the boundary or outer part of it’. In Adamorobe, the languages of economic and trade power include English, Akan (Akuapem Twi), GhSL and the other spoken minority languages (Ga, Ewe, Krobo). English is the language of the ‘elite’ in Adamorobe, and Akan is the dominant spoken language. GhSL is the prestigious sign language that is used for both ‘practical reasons’ and to bridge the linguistic barrier between deaf signers from Adamorobe and other deaf groups. Whereas English, Akan and GhSL perform the functions identified as the core, AdaSL performs the peripheral functions. The linguistic imperialism against minority languages begins with an imposition to use a foreign language for core roles. However, the lack of scientific materials and pedagogical tools in indigenous sign languages does not make it possible for indigenous sign languages such as AdaSL to be used in formal educational settings. According to Edward (2021b), the

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  15

infiltration of foreign sign languages in Sub-Saharan Africa began with the introduction of American Sign Language (ASL) and other foreign sign languages. AdaSL is exposed to foreign sign systems through the gradual emergence of AdaSL signers into GhSL (which is a daughter language of ASL). While GhSL is used in Deaf education, religious meetings in the Adamorobe Deaf church are conducted partially in GhSL and AdaSL (see Kusters, 2014a). In an interview with 11 (age 24–72 years) deaf signers from Adamorobe, the participants measured how their quality of life was impacted by their linguistic repertoires and how knowledge of other languages (GhSL/ English) has enabled them to succeed in life (Edward & Akanlig-Pare, 2022). The analysis of the same interview also identified that the ability to read and understand English is associated with higher achievement in life. This belief system is established among deaf Adamorobeans and has led to the widespread lament of the older deaf generation about their lack of formal education as compared to the young adults and the children who have received formal education. For example, Akua, a deaf woman from Adamorobe, lamented her lack of education, her inability to understand English and the stigma associated with being a deaf woman. In Akua’s view, she lost her child 5 to her previous partner because of her deafness and the linguistic challenges associated with it. The belief system that a deaf person in Adamorobe needs GhSL and English to thrive has led some signers to develop low self-esteem in their linguistic abilities. The Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)

In the multilingual situation in Adamorobe, understanding the power dynamics and its consequences for linguistic choices is important. For example, based on the dynamic use of AdaSL by both deaf and hearing signers in different contexts, we can postulate that these ecological functions have the likelihood of ensuring the sustainable use of AdaSL. However, AdaSL performs only periphery functions in Adamorobe, and its sustainability largely depends on its use by the Deaf community. Deaf– deaf conversations are held in AdaSL among deaf adults but in GhSL among the younger ones. If the preference for GhSL in peripheral domains are not contained, the sustainable use of AdaSL in Adamorobe is threatened. From the discussions above, we identified that AdaSL with its few fluent users and few native signers could be under a linguistic threat considering the multilingual situation in Adamorobe. Users of AdaSL are connected by family and intra-community ties, and if these ties are broken by internal (marriage law) and external factors (migration), the chance for the survival of AdaSL is small. In this section, I consider bridging the linguistic gap and discuss ways of protecting AdaSL in Adamorobe besides the communal use of the language. Furthermore, the section proposes that adopting the notion of

16  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

(socio)linguistic citizenship (LC) in multilingual Adamorobe can aid in the revitalisation of AdaSL because LC offers an integrative view of language. As a minority language in Adamorobe, AdaSL bridges the communication gap between deaf and hearing signers. Although ‘outsiders’ (i.e. non-signers) may be excluded in deaf-hearing conversations, AdaSL still functions as the lingua franca mediating between the deaf and the hearing in Adamorobe, while at the same time being an ‘insider’ community language that excludes outsiders (Edward, 2015b). Even as we consider this important role of AdaSL in Adamorobe, we should also consider the surge in use of GhSL and how this seems to erode the influence of this function. The influence of GhSL in Adamorobe has been recorded by Nyst (2007a), Kusters (2014b) and Edward (2021a). Specifically, Edward ­identifies that Adamorobe signers are gradually shifting to use linguistic structures attributed to GhSL. It is important to note that in deaf–deaf conversations that seek to exclude hearing signers (AdaSL), the use of GhSL is preferred. That is, AdaSL is losing some of its periphery functions as a medium of communication between deaf signers as GhSL is preferred over it in certain instances. This will likely increase the linguistic gap between the deaf–hearing signers. According to Edward (2015b), for the deaf community, its loss will likely have the effect of increasing barriers in terms of understanding hearing people and the shared sense of belonging to a place. In other words, AdaSL is gradually losing its role as an ‘insider language’, and this can have a long-term effect if hearing signers pick up words and phrases from GhSL. The result of such will be the gradual loss of AdaSL in Adamorobe. Beside the use of GhSL in Adamorobe, we have also identified the different languages that are used in Adamorobe on a day-to-day basis. In the following paragraphs, I will consider what measures can be taken as we advocate for sustainable practices for AdaSL. To understand the power dynamics in multilingual communities in Africa, ‘we start from the premise that changing core–periphery relations play an important role in understanding and reconfiguring multilingualism in minority language spaces’ (Pietikainen & Kelly-Holmes, 2013: 5). Multilingualism according to LC is understandable through ‘respectful and deconstructive negotiations around language forms’ (Stroud, 2015: 34). In other words, LC proposes an alternative way for the accommodation of different languages and the practical engagement of different languages. In other words, LC considers ‘language through the lens of citizenship at the same time that we rethink understandings of citizenship through the lens of language’ (Stroud, 2015: 22). One other important aspect of LC is ‘voice’. The effort to push forward marginalised languages has been premised on the need to project minority voices. However, not all such projects have been successful because of the absence of support for marginalised languages. As noted by Stroud, LC is

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  17

‘an interruption of normative regimes of language and an inclusiveness of voice in ways that repairs and rejuvenates relationships to self and others’ (2015: 34). This aligns with Hymes (1996: 64) who discusses voice as ‘freedom to develop a voice worth hearing’. In other words, society could have different kinds of voices. Therefore, a more sustainable approach to deal with the negative effect of multilingualism in Adamorobe is to initiate a viable negotiation around the language voices. For example, AdaSL is not used in formal (school-based) education, but it has very important roles in informal education in Adamorobe. Community-based language development will consider the need for ‘Deaf voices’ to be heard in multimodal Adamorobe. Thus, encouraging the use of AdaSL in informal contexts may ultimately amplify the Adamorobean Deaf voice. LC encourages the building of broad affinities of speakers/signers and the practical awareness of individual’s multiplicity and negotiates linguistic cohabitation. The use of AdaSL in traditional activities (e.g. puberty rites, naming ceremonies, traditional marriages and informal education) may ensure the sustainability of AdaSL. These ‘other’ voices can be the persuasive channels of transmitting AdaSL to different people. The purpose of initiating these other voices in communicating and disseminating AdaSL is that it has the potential to transfer the language to other people. That is, promoting grassroot participation and use of AdaSL for ­self-sustainability. For example, using AdaSL in conducting puberty rites, naming ceremonies and marriages (involving deaf and hearing people) will promote grassroot participation in multilingual Adamorobe. When we alter core-periphery roles in multilingual settings such as Adamorobe, we create space for minority languages to thrive. Notwithstanding the advantages of giving voice to AdaSL, it is also important to note that without the proper negotiations, the Adamorobean Deaf voice will be ineffectual. When users of AdaSL lose interest in their own language (because of the preference for another language), the Adamorobean Deaf voice will be limited to the very few committed users. Subsequently, grassroot participation and promotion of AdaSL will be stalled. Adamorobe is a multimodal community, and navigating this shared signing community involves an understanding that all the languages deserve recognition, thus linguistic cohabitation is relevant. The implication of advocating for individuals to engage in language politics through forms of LC in Adamorobe is that deaf people can identify the specific informal use of AdaSL. Further research in AdaSL can consider the specific informal use of AdaSL that will likely promote participation and use of AdaSL by both signers and non-signers. Conclusion

The different issues raised in this chapter are critical for the survival of AdaSL in Adamorobe. Maintaining an indigenous minority language

18  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

in a multilingual community like Adamorobe starts in the homes where the language is used. The linguistics practices can then be extended to the community, and this can reshape the practices that influence power and voice. The current linguistic situation in Adamorobe has resulted in different linguistic phenomena including language contact, code-switching and in hybridised forms of AdaSL, causing the language to lose much of its distinctiveness (Edward, 2015b). The linguistic ecology of Adamorobe places AdaSL under threat, but with the right linguistic attitude and the right language policy, AdaSL stands the chance to continue its important roles in Adamorobe. What practical steps can be taken to ensure the sustainability of AdaSL? Language documentation has been proposed as one of the means to keep AdaSL in Adamorobe (Edward, 2018b). However, another important step that has been identified in the preceding sections of this chapter is to change the core–periphery relations (Pietikainen & Kelly-Holmes, 2013). One way of doing that is for policymakers, language users and linguists to engage in meaningful dialogues with the language. That is, engaging different others, recognising different languages and the readiness to listen to others. LC provides a framework that allows minority languages to thrive even amid economic and cultural misrecognition. As noted by Stroud (2015), viewing language from the viewpoint of citizenship and considering citizenship through the viewpoint of language helps to accommodate the different linguistic repertoires and the use of these. This chapter argues that multilingualism has great advantages in Adamorobe and provides opportunities for development. The multilingual Deaf individuals in Adamorobe can explore the world and add value to their lives. However, considering multilingualism from the perspective of LHR is a retrograde remedy that stalls progress, growth and development of minority languages. On the other hand, considering multilingualism from the viewpoint of LC recognises different ‘others’ and provides a framework for critically interrogating political and socioeconomic considerations of the language. Notes (1) I use the conventional ‘Deaf’ with a capital D to refer to the Deaf community and its members as a distinct group with sign language as their medium of communication. The lowercase ‘deaf’ is used to refer to the audiological condition. (2) The minority of hearing AdaSL signers are friends and neighbours of the Deaf. (3) Marriage patterns in Adamorobe are influenced by the societal law that banned deaf– deaf unions (Kusters, 2012a) and its imminent societal perceptions (Akanlig-Pare & Edward, 2020). Currently, there are more deaf–deaf unions as compared to deafhearing unions. (4) ‘Hard’ refers to the energy exerted in signing AdaSL as compared to the flexibility of the hands and body in signing GhSL. (5) Over 20 years ago, Akua’s previous partner took their child away without her consent, and Akua has not seen nor heard from both the partner and the child since then.

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  19

References Akanlig-Pare, G. and Edward, M. (2020) Societal perception of hearing impairment in Ghana: A report on Adamorobe. Lancaster University Ghana Journal on Disability 2, 62–84. Asonye, E., Edward, M. and Emma-Asonye, E. (2020) Linguistic genocide against development of indigenous signed languages in Africa. In E.-A. Urua. F. Egbokhare, O. Adésolá and H. Adeniyi (eds) African Languages in Time and Space: A Festschrift in Honour of Professor Akinbiyi Akinlabi (pp. 472–507). Ibadan: Zenith Book House. Berent, G.P. (2013) Sign language-spoken language bilingualism and the derivation of bimodally mixed sentences. In T.K. Bhatia and W.C. Ritchie (eds) The Handbook of Bilingualism and Multilingualism (pp. 351–374). Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Branson, J. and Miller, D. (1998) Nationalism and the linguistic rights of Deaf communities: Linguistic imperialism and the recognition and development of sign languages. Journal of Sociolinguistics 2 (1), 3–34. Brock-Utne, B. (2017) Multilingualism in Africa: Marginalisation and empowerment. In H. Coleman (ed.) Multilingualisms and Development (pp. 61–78). London: British Council. Dakubu, M.E. (2015) The Languages of Ghana. New York: Routledge. Edwards, J. (2013) Bilingualism and multilingualism: Some central concepts. In T.K. Bhatia and W.C. Ritchie (eds) The Handbook of Bilingualism and Multilingualism (pp. 5–25). Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Edward, M. (2015a) We speak with our hands and voices: Iconicity in adamorobe sign language and akuapem twi (ideophones). Unpublished Master thesis, University of Bergen, Norway. Edward, M. (2015b) Signing out: Linguistic contact and possible endangerment of the Adamorobe sign language. Paper presented at the BAAL language in Africa SIG annual meeting on 22 May 2015 at Aston University, Birmingham on 22 May 2015. Edward, M. (2018a) Behind the veil: The impact of deafness on rural livelihoods in Ghana (Case study of a Deaf couple in Adamorobe). Lancaster University Ghana Journal of Disability (LUGJD) 1, 126–148. Edward, M. (2018b) Our signs matter: Protecting sign language in Adamorobe (Ghana). In T. Koumakpai, T.A. Alabi, T.G. Kodjo Sonou, S.O. Olatunji and C. Ojonkpot (eds) Language and Literature for Communication in Human Societies: Papers in Honour of Late Dr Elisabeth Amageh De Campos (pp. 277–288). Porto-Novo: Editions Africatex Media. Edward, M. (2021a) Iconicity as a pervasive force in language: Evidence from ghanaian sign language and adamorobe sign language. PhD thesis, University of Brighton. Edward, M. (2021b) African sign languages are not American product: Indigenous African Deaf people and indigenous African sign languages. Academia Letters 426, 1–4. Edward, M. and Akanlig-Pare, G. (2022) Education and language: A case study of deaf persons in Adamorobe. In Y.N. Offei and E.M. Maroney (eds) Signed Languages, Interpreting, and the Deaf Community in Ghana and West Africa (pp. 58–84). Oregon: Open Oregon Educational Resources. Frishberg, N. (1987) Ghanaian Sign Language. Gallaudet Encyclopedia of Deaf People and Deafness 3, 778–779. Haualand, H. and Allen, C. (2009) Deaf People and Human Rights. World Federation of the Deaf Global Survey Report. Helsinki: World Federation of the Deaf and Swedish National Association of the Deaf. https://www.rasit.org/files/Deaf-People-andHuman-Rights-Report.pdf. Heugh, K. (2018) Commentary - Linguistic citizenship: Who decides whose languages, ideologies and vocabulary matter? In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 174–189). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

20  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

Hymes, D. (1996)  Ethnography, Linguistics, Narrative Inequality: Toward an Understanding of Voice. London: Taylor & Francis. Kusters, A. (2012a) ‘The gong gong was beaten’ – Adamorobe: A ‘Deaf Village’ in Ghana and its marriage prohibition for Deaf partners. Sustainability 4 (10), 2765–2784. Kusters, A. (2012b) Adamorobe: A demographic, sociolinguistic, and sociocultural profile. In U. Zeshan and C. de Vos (eds) Sign Languages in Village Communities: Anthropological and Linguistic Insights (pp. 347–352). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Kusters, A. (2014a) Deaf sociality and the Deaf lutheran church in Adamorobe, Ghana. Sign Language Studies 14 (4), 466–487. Kusters, A. (2014b) Language ideologies in the shared signing community of Adamorobe. Language in Society 43 (2), 139–158. Kusters, A. (2015) Deaf Space in Adamorobe: An Ethnographic Study of a Village in Ghana. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press. Kusters, A. (2019) One village, two sign languages: Qualia, intergenerational relationships and the language ideological assemblage in Adamorobe, Ghana. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 30 (1), 1–20. Lüpke, F. and Storch, A. (2013) Repertoires and Choices in African Languages. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. May, S. (2003) Rearticulating the case for minority language rights. Current Issues in Language Planning 4 (2), 95–125. Miles, M. (2004) Locating deaf people, gesture and sign in African histories, 1450s–1950s. Disability & Society 19 (5), 531–545. Miles, M. (2005) Deaf people living and communicating in African histories, c. 960s–1960s. Independent Living Institute. www.independentliving.org/docs7/ miles2005a.html (accessed 25 August 2021). Murray, J. (2015) Linguistic human rights discourse in deaf community activism. Sign Language Studies 15 (4), 379–410. Nyst, V. (2007a) A descriptive analysis of the Adamorobe Sign Language (Ghana). PhD thesis, University of Amsterdam. Nyst, V. (2007b) Simultaneous constructions in Adamorobe. In M. Vermeerbergen, L. Leeson and O. Crasborn (eds) Simultaneity in Signed Languages: Form and Function (pp. 125–127). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing. Nyst, V. (2012) Shared sign languages. In R. Pfau, M. Steinbach and B. Woll (eds) Sign Language: An International Handbook (pp. 552–574). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Okyere, A.D. and Addo, M. (1994) Deaf culture in Ghana. In C. Erting, R.C. Johnson, D.L. Smith and B.D. Snider (eds) The Deaf Way: Perspectives from the International Conference on the Deaf Culture. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press. Pfau, R., Steinbach, M. and Woll, B. (2012) Sign Language: An International Handbook. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Pietikainen, S. and Kelly-Holmes, H. (2013) Multilingualism and the periphery. In S. Pietikainen and H. Kelly-Holmes (eds) Multilingualism and the Periphery (pp. 1–16). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science Education 17 (4), 68–83. Sandler, W. and Lillo-Martin, D. (2006) Sign Language and Linguistic Universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Stroud, C. (2001) African mother-tongue programmes and the politics of language: Linguistic citizenship versus linguistic human rights. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 22 (4), 339–355. Stroud, C. (2015) Linguistic citizenship as utopia. Multilingual Margins: A Journal of Multilingualism from the Periphery 2 (2), 20–37.

Multilingualism in Adamorobe and the Case for Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL)  21

Stroud, C. (2018) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Wilcox, S. (2015) Signed languages. In E. Dabrowska and D. Divjak (eds) Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics (pp. 668–689). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Woll, B., Sutton-Spence, R. and Elton, F. (2001) Multilingualism: The global approach to sign languages. In C. Lucas (ed.) The Sociolinguistics of Sign Languages (pp. 8–32). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Zeshan, U. and Webster, J. (2019) Sign Multilingualism. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

2 Şexbizinî Facebook Groups: Virtual Communities as Spaces for Practice, Maintenance and Exploration of an Endangered Language Agnes Grond

‘Şexbizinî’ is the (self-)designation for a Kurdish tribal confederation and recently has more and more become the designation of its language. This language is linguistically not described and, at the same time, endangered. Even in the main settlement area of Central Anatolia, it is only spoken by the generation of parents and grandparents. Nevertheless, there is a growing interest in the language by its speakers manifested in social media. This contribution investigates Facebook groups with a thematic connection to Şexbizinî. The main question concerns the development of communicative practices that can combat language shift. These practices evolve under the conditions of orality and non-standard. Speakers of Şexbizinî using social media platforms therefore have to develop strategies to make their language writeable and visible in the social media channels. Analyzing Facebook-postings thus means analyzing the development of agency and voice by a minoritized community. The data analysis is based on an online ethnography, the data consisting of a corpus of wall events that is analyzed regarding language use, the discursive position of Şexbizinî within the Kurdish languages, and the function of the groups with respect to social cohesion in the context of migration, as well as a questionnaire which aims to embed the results in a wider sociolinguistic context. Introduction

The term ‘Şexbizinî’ is the designation of a western Asian tribal confederation and refers more and more to the language spoken by these 22

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  23

tribes. The main settlement area of the Şexbizinî tribes in Turkey is the Central Anatolian province Ankara, more exactly, the county Haymana; smaller groups live in Konya, Erzurum, Düzce, Samsun, Sinop, Amasya, Bursa, İstanbul, Sakarya, Diyarbakır, Iğdır, Şanlıurfa, Adıyaman, Kastamonu, and Çorum. Şexbizinî is a Western Iranian language belonging to the Kurdic group together with Northern Kurdish, Central Kurdish, Southern Kurdish, Zazaki and Gorani (Anonby et al., 2016; Haig & Öpengin, 2018; Matras, 2017). The number of speakers in the main settlement area of Central Anatolia is reported to be decreasing (Akın, 2016; Çelebi, 2017: 72). The number of speakers in Iran and Iraq is unknown. A considerable Şexbizinî community lives in the Austrian cities of Vienna and Graz (Grond, 2018). The use of Şexbizinî in Turkey is nowadays restricted to rural areas, family domains and older persons. Younger people do not acquire it any longer as their first language (Çelebi, 2017). Therefore, Şexbizinî can be regarded as shifting (=level 7) according to the 10-level expanded intergenerational disruption scale (EGIDS) of Ethnologue (Simons & Fennig, 2017). To date, Şexbizinî is undocumented and undescribed, but the language is met with newly arising interest both from the part of its speakers and from the part of linguistic research. The first linguistic description was published by Mahmûd Lewendî in 1997. Lewendî provides a detailed overview on the settlement areas, a survey on the most important grammatical characteristics, suggestions for an alphabet and standardization issues, comparisons with other North-western Iranian languages such as Kurmanji, Zazaki and Laki, as well as short narrative texts (Lewendî, 1997). After this quite comprehensive article, the language and its speakers disappeared again from the attention of research, and it was only in the recent few years that this linguistic community became more visible and that the number of contributions on the linguistics and sociolinguistics of Şexbizinî on conferences increased (see e.g. Akın, 2016; Çelebi, 2016, 2019; Grond, 2018, 2019). In this chapter, the phenomenon of growing interest in the language by its speakers is taken up, and the reflection of this interest in Facebook entries is examined. In line with the technological development of the past two decades, the awakening of the Şexbizinî community takes place, first and foremost, in social media. The growth of computer-mediated-­ communication (CMC) and, in this field, especially the development of interactive technologies (‘Web 2.0’) has started a sociolinguistic change which is deeply affecting communicative practices and interaction patterns. Under these reorganized conditions, new opportunities for social interaction are arising but are not equally available to the speakers of all languages. For little documented languages, access to new technological developments is incomparably more difficult than for well-documented languages. Kornai (2013) assumes that 59% of the global population use the internet, whereas only 5% of languages have online representation. Especially with regard to developments such as speech recognition and

24  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

artificial intelligence, enormous barriers arise for poorly documented languages, as speech recognition software requires a high degree of linguistic description at all linguistic levels. At the same time, languages that are not written and standardized are confronted with various problems on social media platforms in contrast to educational or state languages. Despite this so-called ‘digital language divide’ (Kornai, 2013) and the challenge to raise one’s voice in the never practiced written form, social media online sites can represent niches where minority languages are used and explored in new domains and in various written forms. This form of explorative language use – despite uneven access to necessary resources – is described for Udmurt (Pischlöger, 2016), Frisian (Jongbloed-Faber et al., 2016), Low German (Reershemius, 2017) and Irish (Kelly-Holmes & Atkinson, 2017). In the same way, the speakers of the various minority languages of Turkey create spaces on social media that make them visible, enable social exchange in migration contexts, and provide the possibility for written language use of non-standardized languages. Documented examples are Pomak (Karakusheva, 2016), Lazuri, Kurmanji and Cirkassian (Türk, n.d.). Social media, thus, have the potential to serve as experimental spaces for the written use of oral languages. The main interest of this chapter lies on the preconditions that enable online groups to represent such experimental spaces where individual and community voices can be heard and circumstances such as linguistic endangerment and minorization can be combated. The chapter draws especially on the works of Gertrud Reershemius on Low German on Facebook (2016) who investigated language choice, bilingual practices, and questions of literacy of a language other than the dominant standard in a given linguistic environment. I owe the idea of interpreting groups on social media along the Fishmanian concept of the ‘breathing space’ to Belmar and Heyen (2019) and Belmar and Glass (2019). The concept of breathing space was introduced by Joshua Fishman in 1991 and, since then, has been taken up several times and applied to newly arising medial contexts. Breathing Spaces

In his works on language shift, Fishman (1991: 57) identifies ‘population transfer’ as the major threat to the ‘intergenerational language-inculture continuity’. Population transfer shows its effects on three dimensions: on the physical, the social and the cultural-linguistic dislocation. These dimensions of dislocation have an impact on all community members: they weaken those who go because they are exposed to unfamiliar and in most cases power-imbalanced situations rendering language maintenance difficult. In the same way, they have an impact on those who stay. The remaining populations are not only weakened demographically but also socially and culturally via the direct effects of dislocation on

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  25

language transmission within families and neighborhoods. Dislocation can be a physical phenomenon and refer to geographic dislocation, but most minoritized groups also suffer from social dislocation (Fishman, 1991: 59) which refers to social inequalities in terms of resource control, access to education, literacy and, consequently, low incomes and poverty. Since language transmission is a question of resources (for the KurdishTurkish contexts: Brizić & Hufnagl, 2016; Brizić et al., 2021), social dislocation assists language shift to at least the same degree as physical dislocation. Physical and social dislocation lead to the erosion of cultural independence. Cultural dislocation very often goes hand in hand with migration and causes dependencies that make the reestablishment of traditional cultural pursuits difficult or impossible. Breathing spaces are conceptualized as counterparts to physical, social, and cultural dislocation caused by various phenomena as voluntary and involuntary migration or urbanization. Fishman defines breathing spaces as ‘demographically concentrated space where Xish [=the respective language] can be on its own turf, predominant and unharassed’ (Fishman, 1991: 58). Such spaces have the potential to become centers of increased cultural self-regulation and, thus, foster the agency of the language’s speakers and enable them to apply their voice. The idea of the breathing space was followed up by Ofelia García. She applied the concept on learning spaces and emphasizes the importance of preserving ‘a space, although not a rigid or static place, in which the minority language does not compete with the majority language’ (García, 2009: 301). Likewise, Cenoz and Gorter (2017: 9) propose the creation of spaces ‘where only the minority is spoken. Such a space could be a village, an area, a classroom or a school’. For García and Cenoz and Gorter, such separate spaces are always concrete, physical spaces. Alcalde and Albizu (2016) crucially widen the notion of breathing space. They investigate minority language printed press by analyzing the correlation between speaker density and the circulation of printed media in the Basque language. The paper at hand intends to answer the question if virtual communities have the potential to constitute a breathing space for minoritized languages. Belmar and Heyen (2019) analyzed Frisian Facebook groups and postulated the following four criteria for virtual breathing spaces on social media: (1) The minority language is used exclusively. (2) The minority language is the preferred language, though another language (namely, the respective majority language and/or English) is accepted (this applies often for learners of the language). (3) The minority language is the subject of discussion, especially if these discussions are IN the language. (4) The minority language is not contested (that means that it is not called a dialect or an ‘inferior’ version of the majority language).

26  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

Methodology

The present study deals with the relatively new Şexbizinî Facebook groups that have emerged as a result of the speakers’ awakening interest in their language. The conception of the study was guided by the following research interests: it aims at an analysis of language use in the postings, of the discursive positioning of Şexbizinî among the Kurdic group by the users and, finally, it intends to answer the question, if the groups under investigation can be breathing spaces for Şexbizinî. To approach these interests, an online ethnography (Androtsopoulos, 2013) based on a sixmonth period of online observation of Turkey-based Şexbizinî Facebook groups was conducted. This included blended data collection by (1) collecting screen-based and user-based data through observation during visits to the Facebook groups, (2) compiling a corpus of postings and subsequently and (3) establishing contact with a sample of participants who were asked to complete an online questionnaire concerning their language biographies. During the observation period, the following Facebook groups dedicated in various forms to Şexbizinî as listed in Table 2.1 were investigated. The geographic distribution of the groups corresponds with the main settlement areas of the Şexbizinî tribes in Turkey as described by Lewendî (1997). Many of them are connected to a specific city or region in Southeastern Turkey, along the Black Sea coast and Central Anatolia. This correlation to a concrete geographic place is usually visible directly Table 2.1  Sample of investigated Şexbizinî Facebook groups Group/page

Languages

Members/ Followers

Likes

Posts 

Şexbizini aşireti

Turkish; Kurmanji

653

6323

16

Şeyhbızın aşireti (şexbızıni aşireti)

Turkish

624

648

2

Şeyhbızın Kürtleri

Turkish

177

182

0 

Şeyhbızın Aşireti

Turkish; Kurmanji; Şexbizinî, German, Danish, English, Arabic

7163

6350

10

Bayburtlu Sheybızınlar

Turkish; Kurmanji; Şexbizinî

703

Düzceli Şeybizinlar

Turkish

480

Havzalı Şehbızınların Buluşma Noktası

Turkish; Kurmanji

890

Şeybıziniler

Turkish

57

59

1

Denge Bacihesar

Turkish; Kurmanji; Şexbizinî

4197

2482

98

Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî

Şexbizinî; Kurmanji; Turkish; Zazaki; Sorani; Arabic; Farsi; English; German

2105

20542

189

Rîzwani Kurdî Şexbizinî

Şexbizinî; Kurmanji; Turkish

439

433

77

38 469

1 132

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  27

in the group name or in the group description. While the groups are physically located, the structure of their users is clearly transnational. The members are widespread in Turkey and in various European countries. The most prominent function of these groups is keeping these diaspora communities together. This is often displayed in the group description or in the rules of conduct. The group Şexbizini aşireti describes its intention as follows: ‘şexbizini aşiretinden olan ve birçok ilde yaşayan insanları bekliyoruz’ [we invite people belonging to the Şexbizinî tribe and living in various districts]. The number of members/followers varies substantially, ranging from 57 (Group Şeybıziniler) to 7163 (Şeyhbızın Aşireti). Some groups were very active in terms of postings and member interactions; others released none or only a few postings during the observation period. For this contribution, three groups were chosen for a detailed analysis in terms of screen data and user profiles based on the questionnaire. Types of Interaction and Language Use

In this section, the following three groups are compared in terms of activity types, structure of posts, user profiles, and language use: • Denge Bacihesar [the voice of Balcıkhisar] • Şeyhbizin Aşireti [the Şexbizinî tribe] • Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî [the Kurdish language Şexbizinî] The units of analysis are sequences of postings. In reference to Dell Hymes’ (1972: 151) ‘speech events’, Jannis Androtsopoulos (2013: 193) refers to such sequences as ‘wall events’. Wall events can consist of sequences of interactions displayed on the wall of a group or a user. A wall event can be a single post, and it can be followed by likes or comments. Analytical categories are member roles, types of initial postings, the relation of initial posts and comments, and the expansion of the wall in space and time. The seven examples analyzed in this contribution represent typical linguistic acts with regard to the development of a Şexbizinî voice as a community-wide participatory endeavor. The group Denge Bacihesar is related to the city Balcıkhisar in the Central Anatolian district of Haymana. It has members with a background in Balcıkhisar, many of them living now in other parts of Turkey or in Europe. With 4197 members, Denge Bacihesar is among the larger groups of the sample. Denge Bacihesar shares videos related to the community. During the period of observation, 98 videos were posted by Denge Bacihesar and commented by community members. The following types of activity were observed (see Table 2.2): The languages Turkish, Kurmanji, and Şexbizinî are used in the initial posts, videos, comments and conversations. Typically, a video is introduced with some information on the performer, the song or the event. Most interactions are short comments expressing pleasure,

28  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

Table 2.2  Distribution of activity types in the group Denge Bacihesar 1

Private events (such as video recordings of weddings)

56%

2

User presenting a song

22%

3

User sharing videos of a Kurdish professional singer

19%

4

Videos remembering events in Kurdish history or historical regional personalities 

3%

congratulation-formula to the singer, performer or reciter. Sometimes, conversations evolve around a video presented in the initial post as shown in the following example: Example 1:

The video under examination is titled Bazdan & Gowend by Denge Bacihesar and contains a dancing scene at a wedding ceremony. Under the video, the following conversation unfolds throughout several weeks (the indications of time refer to their distance to the initial video): 1

A: Ere hamiriyel eyane gi cine hec gi ay Kurre Elike memo Süleyman nivij rujig nezana anco bazdan u koceki diki eyve law… [Yes, everybody went to the hadj, the sons of Eliko, Memo and Süleyman are dancing here and playing music, what a shame...]

7 weeks

2

B: Polis ale ve budala... [The policeman Ali and a fool…]

2 weeks

3

C: Sanki sap ditepisini solo ile memo [Sülo and Memo dance like a stick]

7 weeks

4

D: Cek. Sulo baba. Cekk. Can. Abimm benimmm [Dance, Sülo father. Dance. My beloved brother]

6 weeks

5

E: viki bey simdi bisey desem gene nerden ciktin diyecen soyle bir bak bir halayda kimler var abini degil fasisliketmeyim.soldangirip memet abi murat abi oy viki bey [Mr. Viki, If I say something, you will say where did this one come from, look who joined the dance. I should not be fascistic that’s why I am going from the left brother Mehmet, brother Murat oy Mr. Viki]

5 weeks

6

A: O bitek onu görmüs sanki birisi abinisini sahiplenecek [O, he only looked at him as if someone owned his brother]

1 week

7

E: hayretle baktim ne kadar para attin adeta şook şook şook oldum [I wondered how much money you have thrown, I was shoked, shoked, shoked]

6 weeks

8

F: Ne yapiyo bu hanzolar halaymi bu [what are they doing these fools, are they dancing?]

7 weeks

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  29

9

G: Son model halay ismide Sülo ile budalayı tarzı halayı [This is the latest model of dance, its name is Sülo-and-the fool’s-style-dance.]

1 week

10

H: Namaz yok niyaz yok [no pray, no sweets]

6 weeks

Example 1 contains a sequence of 10 statements. The first commenter (A) provides humorous comments about the video and the persons he recognizes. The following statements react to precedent comments. User A retakes the turn in comment 6. While his initial post is in ŞexbizinîKurdish, his second post is Turkish. The timeframe of this conversation comprises seven weeks. Between comment 8 (=question) and 9 (=answer), five weeks have passed. This example shows how temporal dislocation within the virtual community can be overcome in such spheres. Example 2:

This posting is titled Serbülent Kanat – Heco by Denge Bacihesar. It contains a video clip of the Kurdish musician Serbülent Kanat who is not directly from Balcıkhisar but from the rural surroundings of Konya (also Central Anatolia). He is perceived as local by the Denge Bacihesar community, which is reflected in numerous postings containing his music and texts and formulations such as ‘our Serbülent’. The video clip presents a traditional lament for Heci Buxurci who is called Orta Anadolu Kürtlerin Son isyancısı [the last revolutionist of the middle Anatolian Kurds]. The video is followed by a rather long text of approximately 350 words that informs about Heci Buxurci’s feats and his execution by the administration of Atatürk. The posting produced six comments by six different users. Unlike the comments presented above, these comments are not related to each other but rather represent a loose sequence of comments with remarks on the fate of Heci Buxurci (2, 3), personal observations and remembrances related to the song or to the story of Heci Buxurci (1, 4, 5) and a congratulation message to the singer (6). The language of the lament is Kurmanji; the introductory text as well as the comments are in Turkish: 1

A: A  llah rahmet eylesin mekanı cennet olsun 19 hours inşallah….kürtün en kötüsü bizim için candır, şereftir..ben bunu gözlerimle mapusta gördüm… [May god’s mercy be with him, his place may be in paradise god willing …The worst of the kurds is beloved and honoured for us..I have seen such things in prison…]

2

B: Allah rahmet eylesin Heco gibi yigitleri halk unut- 1 day turmuyor aradan asirlar gecmesine ragmen isimleristranlarda kitaplarda yüreklerde [May god’s mercy be with him, heroes like Heco are not forgotten by the people. Even if they hang them, their names stay in the songs, the books and the hearts]

30  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

3

C: Orta anadolu ne kürt biter ne isyancı Heci Buxruci 1 day atamız rahat uyusun [In Central Anatolia, Kurds and revolutionists never will be defeated. Our ancestor Heci Buxruci can rest in peace]

4

D: Biz iç ana dolu kürtleri tarihimizden çok uzak 3 days kalmışız [we, the Inner Anatolian Kurds, are very far from our history]

5

E: Babam haci boğurciyi çok severdi ne yiğitler git- 3 days tiler hepsine allah rahmet eylesin mekanı cennet olsun inşallah [my father liked Haci Boǧurci very much, what heroes have gone, may god’s mercy be with all of them, may their place be the paradise, god willing]

6

F: Azina saglik [Health to your mouth = congratula- 3 days tion, well done]

Other examples of this type address the poison gas attack in Halabja in 1988, the Suruc attack in 2015, or biographies of historical figures. Through the references to the common history, they have an identitycreating effect and can thus maintain social cohesion. The other groups do not have such a strong connection to a specific place or region. They want to reach members of the Şexbizinî tribe all over Turkey. The community of the group Şeyhbizin Aşireti describes itself as denge seihbiziniyel [voice of the Şexbizinîs] and has members from Haymana but also from other regions and cities of Turkey such as Diyarbakır, Adıyaman, Bayburt and Erzurum, and various European cities and regions. With 7163 members, it is the largest community of the sample. During the observation period, 10 interactions were started by Şeyhbizin Aşireti, and nine interactions were initiated by group members. The activity profile is similar to that of Denge Bacihesar, with the difference that the members themselves can share their postings in the group as summarized in Table 2.3. Table 2.3  Distribution of activity types in the group Şeyhbizin Aşireti 1

Posting of aphorism that involves group members in conversations 

40%

2

User sharing videos of a Kurdish professional singer

31%

3

User post presenting a song

19%

4

User post private events (such as video recordings of weddings)

10%

Example 3:

This example presents a dancing scene at a wedding ceremony taking place somewhere in the Haymana district. Unlike Example 1 whose conversation unfolds in the course of several weeks, this post received 3700

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  31

views and 47 comments within the period of a few hours. The excerpt shown here contains 15 comments by 13 users: 1

A: haymanada su an 20 kisi 8zliyor [In Haymana, at this 8 weeks moment, 20 people are watching]

2

B: Diyarbakirdan aşiretime selamlar rabbim Mesut etsin 8 weeks dayimi [greetings from Diyarbakır, may god make my uncle happy]

3

C: Viyanaya selam olsun hepiniz bizim canimzsınz 8 weeks [Greetings to Vienna, you are all our souls]

4

D: İstanbul şeyhbızın lardanda selam olsun [Also greet- 8 weeks ings from the Şexbizinîs of Istanbul]

5

E:  H AYMANA Bahçeçikten köyönden selamlar 8 weeks [Greetings from the village Bahçeçik in Haymana]

6

A: Manisadan.Hepinize. Selam.turunlu.muzo [greetings 8 weeks from Manisa to all of you. Muzo from Turun]

7

E: Maşallah maşallah aşiretime [Maşallah maşallah to 8 weeks my tribe]

8

F: Govende xoş vıgrin [Dance well!]

8 weeks

9

G: Hayırlı olsun birangim [bless you my brother]

8 weeks

10

H: B  elçikadan selam olsun aşiretime [Greetings from 8 weeks Belgium to my tribe]

11

I: Selamlar isvecten [Greetings from Sweden]

8 weeks

12 J: C  an size can erzurumdan selam lar [greetings from 8 weeks beloved Erzurum to beloved you]  13

K: S inoptan sizlere selam olsun [Greetings from Sinop to 8 weeks all of you]

14

L: o  smana soyle segbizince soylesin [Tell Osman, he 8 weeks should sing in Şexbizinî]

15

M: J e diyarbakirdan selam bu na şeğbiziniğel [Greetings 8 weeks from Diyarbakır to all Şexbizinîs]

The individual postings are created at short intervals, almost simultaneously. They contain greetings that are addressed, on the one hand, to those who attend the wedding on site and, on the other hand, to those who watch the video online. In addition, the greetings address the entirety of the Şexbizinî community (in statements such as ‘aşiretime’ [to my tribe]). The comments show the geographical dispersion of the Şexbizinî diaspora. Unlike Example 1 which overcomes distance in time, this wedding dance unites spatially dispersed community members. The languages of the comments are Şexbizinî (8, 15) and Turkish.

32  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

Example 4

The following wall event consists of a posting in Şexbizinî and a comment in Kurmanji. It provides a vivid illustration of how the speaker comprehensively makes use of their literal resources in order to realize written comments in an unwritten language. The spellings are experimental and reflect the writing experiences of the writers. The basis of the Şexbizinî transcription is the Kurmanji Hawar alphabet with the extensions proposed by Lewendî (1997: 83). Additionally, the writer feels the necessity to use three graphemes for the central vowel /ɨ/: , , and . While the origin of (Turkish alphabet) and (Hawar alphabet) is undoubted, the source for the grapheme is not so obvious. The grapheme could originate from the phonetic transcription method used in foreign language (mainly English) education. Together with diacritics for stressed vowels [İmé] and the extensions introduced by Lewendî, the writer employs a highly graded system for the representation of the vowel inventory of Şexbizinî. The comment in Kurmanji is based on Turkish orthography with its continuous use of the grapheme for the central vowel: 1

A: İmé ci Şexbızınîyım. Lə Səkərya akyazı rünişin, lə Kərkük- 3 days Sülemaniyə hatiyin. [We are also Şexbizinîs. We are living in Sarkarya-Akyazı, we came from Kerkuk-Sulaymania]

2

B: Ez gurmancım mın gışt fahmkır te xweş nivisiye ­kekémin [I 1 day am Kurd, I understand everything, you have written very well, my brother]

The next example group is Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî. It is a group with the explicit aim to teach and learn the Şexbizinî language. With 2105 members, it is not only the smallest; it differs from the groups discussed in this contribution in other ways as well. The group obtains 20,542 ‘likes’ which is by far the highest number of ‘likes’ during the period of observation. Şeyhbizin Aşireti, which is the group with the largest number of members, obtains 6350 ‘likes’ in the same period. Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî does not have a foundation in a specific settlement area. The social and geographical background of the group members is more diverse than that of the other two groups. Another special feature is the focus on the topic of the Şexbizinî language and language in general. The rules of conduct give a first indication of the key role that language issues play in the group: the first rule restricts the content of postings to comments on Şexbizinî and other Kurdish languages and dialects. The second deals with the aim of standardization and the development of the language, while the third and fourth rule concern the etiquette toward speakers of other languages and religions. In the same way, the distribution of activities differs from the two groups discussed

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  33

Table 2.4  Distribution of activity types 1

May your day be fine!

35%

2

How do you say xxx in yyy Kurdish varieties?

18%

3

Issues of standardization and writing

15%

4

Presentation of pictures

12%

5

Presentation of pedagogical materials to learn Şexbizinî

12%

6

Presentation of video clips

8%

7

Presentation of links

4%

before. They revolve around the topic of language in most of the postings as indicated in Table 2.4. Example 5

Example 5 is an illustration of the most common activity type in Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî, paraphrased as ‘may your day be fine!’ in the list above. This type of language use is analyzed as ‘copy/paste language’ by Androtsopoulos (2013: 189). Copy/paste language makes use of aphorisms, parts of well-known song texts, or greeting formulas and serves as an identity marker in multilingual communication, especially in cases where the speaker is not fully competent in the respective language. In this example, the initial post is in Şexbizinî, the comment in Kurmanji: 1

A: Rûjê nûwetan xweş wû. [Your new day may be fine.]

2

B: Roja te jî xweş û geş be [Your day may be fine and bright as 19 hours

19 hours

well] Example 6

The following wall event is typical for the multilingual language use in all Şexbizinî groups. It contains self-standing arguments in Şexbizinî (not copy/paste language) as well as a translation. It consists of an initial posting in Şexbizinî which is on his part a reaction on an external webpage that equates Şexbizinî with Farsi. It is followed by a comment that translates the initial posting to Zazaki (Dimili). The next comment supports the argument of the initial posting in Kurmanji: 1

A: Şexbizinî, farsî nîye; kurdî vaşûr e. Kes nêtanî zwanê 11 weeks îme wikerî farsî! Lûtfen, ey rûwelge paşerī û xweşhatî mekerin. Ra her kes azadî hestin; yeki ke dixwazî wiwû Fars wele îme Kurd în û zwaniman kurdî ye. [Şexbizinî is not Farsi. It is Southern Kurdish. Nobody should call our language Farsi. Please, do not follow and like this page. Everyone is free to see himself as a Persian. But we are Kurds and our language is Kurdish.]

34  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

2

B: Bi kirdî (dimilî) [In kirdî (dimilî)] 11 weeks Şexbizinî, farsî nîya; kurdîya vaşûr a. Kes nêşêno ziwanê ma bikero farsî! Lûtfen, ena rûpelge taqîb û ecibnayîş mekerên. Le her kes azad o, yewo ke biwazo bibû Farz, .. Labelê ma Kurd î û zimanê ma kurdî yo.[comment B is a literal translation of comment A from Şexbizinî to Zazaki: Şexbizinî is not Farsi. It is Southern Kurdish. Nobody should call our language Farsi. Please, do not follow and like this page. Everyone is free to see himself as a Persian. But we are Kurds and our language is Kurdish.]

3

C: Ne Farsî ye. Zimanekî İranî (Aryan) ye. Farsî bi xwe 11 weeks jî zimanekî İranî ye [It is not Farsi. It is an Iranian (Arian) language. Farsi itself is an Iranian language as well.]

Example 7

The group attaches great importance to the orthography it propagates. Deviations in postings are taken up and discussed. ‘Right’ and ‘wrong’ are central categories in the argument. In contrast to example 4, experimental spellings are hardly tolerated in this group. The ­following example (Figure 2.1) illustrates these discussions using the self-designation Şexbizinî:

Figure 2.1  Postulation of the right spelling of the self-designation, illustrated with examples of circulating wrong spellings

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  35

Language Use and User Repertoires

The languages used in the groups are as follows: Turkish, Kurmanji, Şexbizinî, Arabic and Farsi. Turkish and the official languages of the diaspora countries are the educational languages for most users. Turkish is the language of the overwhelming majority of the wall events; the official languages of the diaspora countries do not appear in the postings. In this point, the choice of language in the Facebook groups differs greatly from that in everyday offline life, which the users sketch in the questionnaires. In offline life, the official languages do play a central role in the areas of education, coping with everyday life, and social participation. Then follow – far behind – Kurmanji and Şexbizinî. Kurmanji has the function of a ‘language of wider communication’; Şexbizinî is often used in initial postings (Example 1), while a different language is used in responsive postings. Arabic is used when referring to religious contexts, Farsi with reference to the original settlement areas of the Şexbizinî tribes in Iran. When Şexbizinî is written, experimental spellings are often used that are based either on the Hawar alphabet for Kurmanji or on the Turkish orthography. However, this language distribution does not apply to two groups, namely, the Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî group and the Rîzwani Kurdî Şexbizinî group. Here, the central languages of the ‘wall events’ are Şexbizinî and Kurmanji. The initial posting is often written in Şexbizinî, and the answer is then given in another language (see Example 5). Many users ask for translations from Turkish to Şexbizinî or Kurmanji; the initial posting in these cases is often Turkish, and the reply postings contain examples of translations. Translations into other Iranian – mostly Kurdish or Kurdic – languages and varieties, such as Laki, Sorani or Zazaki, are also common. The sequences are multilingual; the choice of language is often without relation to the language of the pre-posting. In many cases, a reply posting can represent a translation of the initial posting into another Kurdish language or variety, and communication then continues (see Example 6). The focus of these two groups is directed to the language, its transmission and expansion, which influences the language use. The spelling of many postings is based on the suggestions of Mahmûd Lewendî, who advocates an expanded Hawar spelling (Lewendî, 1997: 105). Breathing Space?

The Facebook groups that deal with Şexbizinî have largely two thematic orientations. Nine of the 11 groups examined relate to a specific region or city. The member structure called ‘networked audience’ by Androtsopoulos (2013: 190) consists of members of the Şexbizinî tribal confederation living in their home town in Turkey or in the European diaspora. The ‘networked individuals’ (Androtsopoulos, 2013: 190) that

36  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

make up the respective networked audience share a common history, common linguistic repertoires, and common linguistic experiences. In these nine groups, the use of Turkish dominates, and the use of Şexbizinî is limited to musical contributions (Example 2), to initial postings (see Example 1), lexical identity markers (see Example 3) and experimental spellings (see Example 4). The two groups Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî and Rîzwani Kurdî Şexbizinî thematically focus explicitly on the language of the Şexbizinî tribes and their preservation and development. Şexbizinî is (mostly) the language of the ‘wall events’, the content predominantly concerns the discussion of orthographic, grammatical, and lexical questions. A common activity is the sharing of and the commenting on texts in Şexbizinî, for example, those published by Lewendî and Çelebi. The networked audience is the same as that of the other two groups; many users are members of both a locally based group and a linguistically oriented group. Using the criteria formulated by Belmar and Heyen (see above) for the assessment of social media groups, there seems to be no doubt that both groups can be analyzed as breathing spaces: the language concerned is used (even if not exclusively); it is both a metalanguage and a subject of discussion; any doubt about its status as an independent language is argued against (see Example 6). At the same time, clear orthographic principles for Şexbizinî are followed (Example 7). Deviations from these to-be-­ established orthographic rules (see e.g. Example 4, posted in the group Şeyhbizin Aşireti) are not accepted. The other nine groups, in which the use of Turkish predominates in the foremost non-linguistic topics, do not seem to meet these criteria for breathing spaces. However, after taking a closer look at the communicative behavior of the networked audiences, the apparently clear initial findings get blurred. The nine groups belonging to the first thematic category (groups with regional content) are characterized by active participation in the wall events. The two wall events containing wedding videos (Examples 1 and 3) highlight the role that is played by these Facebook groups with regard to the maintenance of social cohesion: they enable participation in central sociocultural events despite temporal (Example 1) and spatial (Example 3) distance. Concerning the language use, there are no guidelines; users are free to use the resources of their repertoires and creatively expand them into new areas – such as employing lexical extensions or exploring the written domain (Example 4). The two groups in the second category (groups with a linguistic content) have smaller audiences than the other groups. Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî, however, consistently had over 2000 members during the observation period. The activity level is high: Zwanê Kurdî ye Şexbizinî has the highest number of postings and receives most likes in the comparison period. However, the active members form only a small pool of the audience. Many of them are people with tertiary education and literacy skills

Şexbizinî Facebook Groups  37

in, at least, Turkish and Kurmanji. Postings in experimental writing are stigmatized by either ignoring them or by singling out elements and commenting on them. The agenda of the two groups (standardizing Şexbizinî) excludes a large part of their audiences (namely, those who do not have the required literacy skills) from active participation. Participation in the case of insufficient language skills is only possible perceptually and becomes manifest in the high number of likes the groups receive. Therefore, the diagnosis of breathing space should also be questioned for these two groups. At this point, it makes sense to go back to the original idea of Joshua A. Fishman. Breathing spaces are intended to represent counter poles to the erosion processes caused by dislocation in terms of language transmission. Dislocation, in turn, is effective in three dimensions: in the spatial, the social and the cultural dimensions (see earlier). It is precisely at this level that the regionally based groups come into play again. They enable communities that are vulnerable due to population transfer to take part in socioculturally significant events such as births, weddings and deaths, and they enable exchange on historical identity-forming events, stories, and chants, and strengthen social cohesion in the form of a virtual common everyday life by sharing aphorisms and greetings. Everyone who wants to participate can join the communication. The resources of the entire repertoire of the group and the individual can be used to speak and to make oneself heard. So it seems to make sense to interpret the Facebook groups on Şexbizinî, whose networked audiences are largely congruent, in their entirety as breathing space: The groups established in the respective region/city of origin maintain social cohesion that is endangered through dislocation, while the linguistically oriented groups are active in language planning in the areas of writing and standardization and fostering language maintenance and transmission by expanding the language to new domains. Conclusion: Learning to Raise One’s Voice in a Breathing Space

Şexbizinî is a language without any visibility in the administration and educational systems of the countries of origin and in the diaspora. In both of them, its speakers are considered as a part of the Kurmanji-speaking community (see Fiğan, 2021, for the Turkish context and Brizić et al., 2021, for the diaspora context). The virtual communities constitute an opportunity to emphasize on cultural and political participation (Rampton et al., 2018) on the one hand, and to create the communities own look at historical events which is often very different from the view of the respective nation-states. This development of a community-voice is not only about the reinterpretation of one’s shared history, but also about the view of language. Here, too, there are differences to the concepts of the

38  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

respective nation states. While the country of origin, Turkey, as well as the European diaspora countries focus on the official language, and competence in and use of this language are linked to civil rights such as citizenship, the Facebook groups emphasize and practice linguistic diversity. In this way, it is possible for group members to contribute their individually specific linguistic resources, while at the same time creating a common sociocultural space. The Facebook groups in their entirety are clearly a grassroots activity that allows their members to mitigate the consequences of dislocation in all the aspects mentioned by Fishman. In this valuation of diversity, the concept of breathing space seems to be compatible with the idea of (socio)linguistic citizenship. In addition to the linguistic plurality practiced, there is another aspect that decisively determines the activities in the groups: In addition to the activities aimed at social cohesion, there is explicitly the aim of increasing the visibility of the language. One important part of this visibility is a standardized writing system. In this point, the groups are characterized by the meaningful use of their social resources. The majority of the groups are dedicated to sociocultural exchange with free language use and the opportunity to practice the language and to write down the previously unwritten language. Beside this experimental exploration of their own language, the domain’s literacy and standard are outsourced to certain community members and groups. People with the necessary linguistic resources develop a written and standardized Şexbizinî, followed and valued in the form of passive contributions (likes) by the whole community. For the linguistic community, the development of a ‘Şexbizinî’ voice means, on the one hand, the maintenance of social cohesion under the condition of migration and diaspora but also the external visibility as a ‘named’ language (Rampton et al., 2018) with a writing system and a generally accepted standard. References Akın, S. (2016) The Kurdish dialect continuum in Central Anatolia. Paper held at the 3rd international Conference on Kurdish Linguistics, 25–26 August 2016, University of Amsterdam. Alcalde, G.S. and Albizu, J.A. (2016) Mediacentric spaces and physical spaces in minority language use: A case study on the Basque language press. Catalan Journal of Communication & Cultural Studies 8, 227–243. Androtsopoulos, J. (2013) Networked multilingualism: Some language practices on facebook and their implications. International Journal of Bilingualism 19 (2), 185–205. Anonby, E. and Taheri-Ardali, M. (eds) (2016) Atlas of the Languages of Iran. Ottawa: Geomatics and Cartographic Research Centre. See http://iranatlas.net (accessed 3 November 2021). Belmar, G. and Glass, M. (2019) Virtual communities as breathing spaces for minority languages: Re-framing minority language use in social media. Adeptus 14. https:// doi.org/10.11649/a.1968. Belmar, G. and Heyen, H. (2019) A comparison of language use in north and west Frisian communities. Paper held at the ICML XVII, 22.-24. May 2019. Mercator European Research Center Leeuwarden, Netherlands.

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Brizić, K. and Hufnagl, C.L. (2016) Profile der vielsprachigkeit und ihr bildungserfolg. Der Deutschunterricht 6, 21–32. Brizić, K., Șimșek, Y. and Bulut, N. (2021) Ah, our village was beautiful. Towards a critical social linguistics in times of migration and war. The Mouth – Critical Journal of Language, Culture and Society 8, 29–63. Çelebi, C. (2016) Bezeynî–An endangered Kurdish language. Paper held at the Second International Symposium on Endangered Iranian Languages, 8–9 July 2016, CNRS, Université Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris. Çelebi, C. (2017) Bezeynî–Historie, migration, diaspora und linguistische besonderheiten In K. Brizic, A. Grond, C. Osztovics, T. Schmidinger and M. Six-Hohenbalken (eds) Sprache – Migration – Zusammenhalt. Kurdisch und seine Diaspora (pp. 63–79). Wien: praesens Verlag. Çelebi, C. (2019) Bezeynî–A previously uncharted Kurdish language. Paper held at the 4th International Conference on Kurdish Linguistics, 2–3 September 2019. University of Rouen. Cenoz, J. and Gorter, D. (2017) Minority languages and sustainable translanguaging: Threat or opportunity? Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 38 (10), 901–912. Fiğan, M. (2021) Etnisiteyi Sürdürmek. Haymana Kürtleri. Istanbul: Öteki Yayınevi. Fishman, J.A. (1991) Reversing Language Shift: Theoretical and Empirical Foundations of Assistance to Threatened Languages. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. García, O. (2009) Bilingual Education in the 21st Century: A Global Perspective. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Grond, A. (2018) Kurmanji and Şexbizinî in migration. Paper Held at the Conference Anatolia-the  Caucasus-Iran: Ethnic and  Linguistic Contacts, 10–12 May 2018. Russian-Armenian University, Yerevan, Armenia. Grond, A. (2019) The Şexbizinî speech community in migration. A qualitative investigation of multiple identities and shifting linguistic repertoires. Poster presented at the 19th conference of the Italian Association of Applied Linguistics, 21–23 February, Università degli studi di Cagliari. Haig, G. and Öpengin, E. (2018) Kurmanji. Kurdish in Turkey: Structure, variation, and status. In C. Bulut (ed.) Linguistic Minorities in Turkey and Turkic-speaking Minorities of the Peripheries (pp. 157–229). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Hymes, D. (1972) Models of the interaction of language and social life. In J.J. Gumperz and D. Hymes (eds) Directions in Sociolinguistics: The Ethnography of Communication (pp. 35–71). New York: Holts, Rinehart & Winston. Jongbloed-Faber, L., Van de Velde, H., Van der Meer, C. and Klinkenberg, E. (2016) Language use of Frisian bilingual teenagers on social media. Treballs de Sociolingüística Catalana 26, 27–54. Karakusheva, S. (2016) Digital ethnicities and (re-)construction of ethnic identities in social media. In A. Karatzogianni, D. Nguyen and E. Serafinelli (eds) The Digital Transformation of the Public Sphere (pp. 283–301). London: Palgrave Macmillan. Kelly-Holmes, H. and Atkinson, D. (2017) Perspectives on language sustainability in a performance era: Discourses, policies, and practices in a digital and social media campaign to revitalise Irish. Open Linguistics 3, 236–250. Kornai, A. (2013) Digital language death. PLoS ONE 8 (10): e77056. See https://doi. org/10.1371/journal.pone.0077056. Lewendî, M. (1997) Kurdên Şêxbizinî. Bîrnebûn 3, 78–100. Matras, Y. (2017) Revisiting Kurdish dialect geography: Preliminary findings from the Manchester Database. See http://kurdish.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/ PDF-Revisiting-Kurdish-dialect-geography.pdf (accessed 12 December 2021). Pischlöger, C. (2016) Udmurt on social network sites: A comparison with the Welsh case. In R. Toivanen and J. Saarikivi (eds) Linguistic Genocide or Superdiversity? New and Old Language Diversities (pp. 108–132). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

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Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science and Education 9, 68–83. Reershemius, G. (2017) Autochthonous heritage languages and social media: Writing and bilingual practices in Low German on Facebook. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 38 (1), 35–49. Simons, G.F. and Fennig, C.D. (eds) (2017) Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Twentieth edition. Dallas, Texas: SIL International. See http://www.ethnologue. com. Türk, G. (n.d.) What if they all start demanding it? Online presence of circassian, kurdish and laz associations advocating linguistic rights. Unpublished manuscript, Yıldız Technical University.

3 The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk: Who is Involved in Language Planning, and How? Vlada V. Baranova

The chapter aims at analyzing different aspects of bottom-up multilingual projects designed for maintaining Kalmyk with the focus on the agency of young speakers. Despite its status as the second official language in the Republic of Kalmykia, Russia, Kalmyk is an endangered language. Nowadays, Russian is the dominant language, and the majority of those who speak Kalmyk fluently belong to the senior age group. However, a revitalization movement started not so long ago, led mostly by young Kalmyks living in the cities and using a mixed Kalmyk-Russian code with low prestige. This chapter is based on narrative interviews with activists held in 2018–2020 and on observations of offline and online communication. It aims both to describe bottom-up Kalmyk revitalization initiatives as sociolinguistic practice and to analyze the activists’ efforts to include mixed or low-status language practices in the public sphere, which has usually been reserved for ‘pure’ standard Kalmyk. The revivalist initiatives in Kalmykia have created a group of people who share new teaching practices and who are trying to re-define the agency and understanding for reversing the language shift. It also makes visible ‘new speakers’ as members of the community. These language activists are laying claim to a (socio)linguistic citizenship in Kalmykia. The high visibility of these new mixed forms of Kalmyk sometimes provokes the reaction that the language of young Kalmyks is viewed as a ‘non-­ authentic’ code by older generations. Some language activists use ­different varieties in online communication and try to legitimize a mixed code as part of Kalmyk and as means for the revitalization of the language. 41

42  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

Introduction

Decades of research on revitalization and practices aimed at preventing language shift show that community actors can play a significant role in the process (Hornberger & King, 1996). This chapter deals with ­bottom-up Kalmyk revitalization initiatives and focuses on the empowerment of minority language speakers as a result of activists’ efforts. Describing the micro-level language policy and planning, it aims at analyzing the efforts of individual actors. The second topic is the speakers’ understanding of being part of the Kalmyk speech community and its transformation due to the fact that some language activists are ‘new speakers’ who use non-standard varieties in public communication and claim the right to speak ‘impure’ Kalmyk. The linguistic situation

Kalmyk belongs to the western, Oirat branch of Central Mongolic next to Khalkha-Mongolian (or Mongolian proper) in the center, Buryat in the north and Khorchin-Kharchin in the east. Other Oirat varieties are spoken in Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia (both in China), in western Mongolia, and in the Issyk Kyl province of Kyrgyzstan. In the 17th century, Kalmyks migrated to the current area of the steppe near the Volga River. The literacy of Kalmyk has a complicated history. In the 17th century, the Buddhist monk Zaya Pandita created a special vertical script for Oirat, Todo Bičig (‘Clear Script’), that has been used in religious translations from Tibetan, in the restricted original religious literature, and in several documents and private letters before the Soviet period. In the 1920s–1930s, the vertical script for Kalmyk was replaced by Cyrillic, later switched to Latin letters and then back to a slightly different version of Cyrillic used nowadays. Kalmyk is a ‘definitely endangered language’, according to UNESCO (Moseley, 2010). The Russification of ethnic minorities during the Soviet period was especially severe for the Kalmyks. In 1943, Kalmyks were deported to Siberia and until 1956 had to live in exile with reduced civil rights. The living conditions of these deported people were extremely harsh, and many Kalmyks died during this time. After their return to Kalmykia, the cultural and administrative autonomy was restored, and there were some measures supporting language in educational contexts (cf. Baranova, 2013). Nevertheless, it was not enough, and the gradual process of losing the language continued. The late 1980s–1990s were a period of ethnic revival and provided an impetus to a discussion on language maintenance. The first initiatives on language revitalization in Kalmykia started in the 1990s. Despite this, the next decades show a permanent decline of Kalmyk native speakers (Itogi, 2004: 49). Nowadays,

The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk  43

all Kalmyk speakers are bilinguals fluent in the dominant Russian language. Proficiency in Kalmyk ranges from full to very restricted. The language competence of a given individual can partially be predicted from age group and place of residence (like rural vs city, inside or outside Kalmykia). The official level of language policy

Kalmyk is the second official language of the Republic of Kalmykia. However, de facto Kalmyk does not occur in official contexts: for criminal proceedings, communication with government officials and the records of sessions of the local parliament, only Russian is used. All people in Kalmykia understand Russian and the officials at different levels usually choose the dominant language, as do the staff of private organizations. Kalmyk is taught in Kalmyk schools, but since 2018 parents can choose the program, so it is not obligatory. The local media provide some materials in Kalmyk, but most television and radio broadcasting are in Russian. It should be noted that the official language policy looks contradictory in the Russian Federation as a whole. The legislation is oriented toward the development of minority languages; nevertheless, when dealing with minority language speakers, it is often more restrictive than supportive. There is always a gap between the de jure and de facto levels of language planning. Recent research on Cheboksary, the capital of the Chuvash Republic of Russia (Alòs i Font, 2019), focuses on the impact on the linguistic landscape made by citizens who are actively involved in inspecting how the law on minority language usage is executed. In many regions with different sociolinguistic contexts, minority language speakers request to follow the rules to challenge monolingual communication. For example, a person accused of participating in an illegal meeting in early 2021 in the Republic of Komi appealed to its language law, asking to conduct the hearing in Komi and answering the Russian-speaking judge’s questions only in Komi, with the effect that the session was postponed (Alpaut, 2021). However, not everything is determined by official language policy. The individual actions of journalists, school principals, teachers and ­community leaders can be of no less importance than legislation. In the lack of official support for multilingualism, private individuals create new projects supporting the minority languages of the Russian Federation, including commercial cultural projects, supplementary schools, private media, online documentation (e.g. Grenoble & Bulatova, 2017, about Evenki) or using a minority language in art projects. The best-known case of language activism is the promotion of the Tatar language in the Republic of Tatarstan. There are different initiatives in popular music, video or blogging in Tatar in Tatarstan (Suleymanova, 2018) including the

44  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

launching of localized versions of popular board games in Tatar, the design of souvenirs and fashion, etc. Such impressive initiatives thus arise between activism and social entrepreneurship due to the growing popularity of local cultures. In Kalmykia, there is no movement of such strength and visibility. Existing projects have a smaller scope but still have an impact on the local situation of minority language usage. When top-down language planning fails to prevent language shift, it is crucial to look for other actors who are trying to change the situation. Who is involved in challenging monolingual communication and spreading multilingual awareness? Data

This chapter is based on interviews with activists held in 2018–2020 and on observations of offline and online communication in Kalmyk forums and social media during this period. The background of the study is my fieldwork in Kalmykia from 2006 concerning different parts of Kalmyk grammar and its sociolinguistic situation. The interviews were conducted mostly in Russian with occasional code-switching to Kalmyk; extracts are provided in English translation. In 2019, interviews were conducted offline while, during 2020, only interviews by video or audio applications were possible. For referring to the participants, I use pseudonyms. A relatively new part of fieldwork methods is online ethnography (Kozinets, 2010) and the analysis of Computer-Mediated Communication (Androutsopoulos & Staehr, 2017), entailing the question whether such data should be anonymized. Based on the idea of following participants’ own perceptions of what is public or private (Sugiura et al., 2016: 1), the data were divided into more public data like films, videos with stand-up comedy on YouTube, popular songs, etc. and into private communication like a blog in a social network, comments to posts, etc. which required anonymization. The online texts are cited in Russian and Kalmyk respectively in their authors’ orthography. The data from videoblogs are provided in transcription. Grassroots Initiatives in Language Planning and the Agency of Its Speakers The different voices of the minority language speakers

How to measure the success of language planning for a minority language? After all, even effective Language Policy and Planning (LPP) does not turn a minority language into a dominant language that is used in all communicative domains. It has some goals, for example, preventing language death, involving new speakers, or broadening the functions of a

The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk  45

language. Effective policies might reverse language shift and introduce some benefits from globalization and the spread of new technologies. It has to be based on cooperation with all speakers including those who use non-standard varieties but also have a right to have ‘a (socio)linguistic citizenship’ (Stroud, 2015; Rampton et al., 2018). Consequently, criteria for the success of LPP for a minority language have to evaluate the impact that a particular language situation has on the language community. For instance, one community might take the enrichment of vocabulary and the development of a written standard as important factors of LPP, but another might not. If successful LPP for a minority language presupposes its impact on a community, it seems logical to include local initiatives and the measures of supporting minority languages. The studies of the local contexts (Liddicoat & Baldauf, 2008) and the micro-level of language planning (Davies & Ziegler, 2015) have a focus on the process of implementing language policies and on contributions from different actors. It shifted to describing the actors’ motivations behind their language use. Hornberger and her colleagues (2018: 152) aim at describing ‘how people create, interpret, and at times resist language policy and planning’. The agency of native speaker within LPP is another important issue (Bouchard &  Glasgow, 2018). Ricento (2000: 206–208) emphasized that agency is ‘the role(s) of individuals and collectives in the processes of language use, attitudes and ultimately policies’. Who are the main actors in the grass-rooted revitalization of a minority language? They may be religious and cultural institutions, small business enterprises, or NGOs providing help for minority people. Zhao and Baldauf (2012) classify participants according to their role and possible actions or their type of involvement: people with expertise (for example, linguists or teachers), people with influence, people with power and people with interest. ‘People with influence’ are typically found among popular writers, journalists, actors, comedians and other cultural players. They possess ‘neither power nor personal prestige, but [are] passively or unconsciously involved in making decisions on language use for themselves’ (Zhao & Baldauf, 2012: 6). The language activism arises within that group in different contexts (see e.g. Urla, 2012, for Basque; Cru, 2015, for Maya). Language activists can play a crucial role in making language issues more visible. As Bucholtz et al. claim (2019: 173), ‘youth activism around language takes many forms, from claiming students’ right to use their heritage languages to demanding greater public awareness of and accountability for linguistic inequities’. What potential changes related to supporting Kalmyk can occur there and what factors are conducive to these changes? What are the linguistic varieties used by activists and how do they claim to be members of the linguistic community and to have a (socio) linguistic citizenship?

46  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

The continuum of competence

A recent approach to the concept of ‘speech community’ does not interpret it as something homogeneous but considers the distinctions between individual speakers. At the same time, urban sociolinguistics critically re-examined the understanding of ‘competence’ through the notion of a ‘truncated multilingual repertoire’ in global, diverse cities (Blommaert, 2010: 102; Blommaert & Backus, 2012), in order to represent the heterogeneity of language competence among speakers of a minority language and include low-status and mixed codes, in particular in a political stance (Stroud, 2015). Consequently, it is extremely important to take into account the diverse resources of a bilingual speaker. There are different types of speakers who use minority languages in other ways than traditional speakers. The most prominent term is ‘semispeakers’ (Dorian, 1982). In some theoretical contexts, they are called ‘heritage speakers’ who natively learn the language in childhood, but do not acquire full competence as they stop communicating in their native language due to the dominance of a more prestigious language or the diasporic status of their minority. Growing up, heritage speakers ‘do not develop uniform native-like competence in all grammatical domains’ (Benmamoun et al., 2013: 171), but can still communicate fluently in the minority language. Another notion for understanding the diversity of speakers is the ‘new speakers’ perspective (O’Rourke et  al., 2015; Smith-Christmas et  al., 2018). Contrary to the previous non-monolingual group, the competence of new speakers is not the result of acquisition in the family, but of learning the language in adulthood via a school system or individually (O’Rourke & Nandi, 2019). The non-family transmission among new speakers does not prevent them from acquiring fluency, choosing the minority language as preferred medium of daily communication or raising their children as bilingual (see e.g. O’Rourke & Nandi, 2019, about Galician parents’ community). The new speakers may or may not have an ethnic origin related to the minority language; however, they often identify themselves culturally with the minority language community, the region and even can be heritage speakers – the distinction between these groups is functional. In many revitalized communities, the language of new speakers has some peculiarities regarding grammatical mistakes and lexical restrictions. There are features typical for L2 bilinguals like syntactical alignment and structural priming as the speaker’s strategy to repeat structures from a previous sentence (Jackson, 2018). Priming implies the crucial role of the input – in particular recently heard or produced syntactic structures. It is important to mention that there are a range of bilingual speakers with incomplete competence. Unlike other L2 speakers, ‘new speakers’ fluently communicate in the minority language. They claim to be a part

The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk  47

of the community and play a substantial role for the overall visibility of the endangered minority language. If family-internal language transmission has ceased for long enough, as in the case of Manx, new speakers may be the only speakers of the minority language in the community (Ó hIfearnáin, 2015). The revitalization process can start from very different stages of language shift and, in extreme cases, the revival begins in a community without fluent speakers. For example, Schwartz (2018: 76) states that young people learning Chiwere (Siouan) pronounce it following the orthography because a spoken variant of Chiwere is not yet available to them. This can lead to structural changes in the minority language due to grammatical interference from a dominant language or due to analogy, alignment and other processes in bilingual speech. For instance, Arbes (2019) observed the development of a new form to express possession with abstract nouns among speakers of revived Cornish that differs from traditional Cornish. The peculiarities of the speech of heritage speakers or new speakers can lead to defining it as ‘non-authentical’ and ‘wrong’ (McLeod & O’Rourke, 2015). The native speakers of a minority language may create some barriers for new speakers: Sallabank and Marquis (2018: 77) show that elder speakers of Guernsey do not communicate with new speakers in the minority language and that the latter’s variant is ‘criticized and delegitimized’. Language Revitalization Projects in Kalmykia

This section provides a brief overview of the most important language activist projects in Kalmykia and the linguistic biography of participants of the revitalization movement. Grassroots revitalization initiatives

As mentioned above, the first initiatives for supporting Kalmyk have started in the 1990s. I will mention only those that are still relevant, most of which occurred in Kalmykia or online during the past few years. First of all, there are some projects documenting Kalmyk along with educational initiatives. Since the 1990s, online sites and forums have provided the possibility to exchange materials on Kalmyk, like dictionaries, textbooks and other sources, and opened up a venue for discussions among like-minded people. Starting points for such initiatives often were questions of ethnic identity, Buddhism and Kalmyk culture. As one of the most influential activists, Vitaly, remembers, And there is also the language of literature that is not clear for ordinary people. When I started with this religious language, I split it up in parts, in words, in special terms, and it became more clear (…) And this need,

48  Part 1: Multilingual Practices

the hunger [for information] was indeed there in the 1990s. There were few sources on the internet and I started to collect the books and scan, edit and convert them into the Word format. (m., 1962)

Additionally, some enthusiasts provided their technical skills for creating a Kalmyk keyboard layout for desktop, mobile phones, etc. Later, such initiatives moved to social networks (like VKontakte, the most popular social network in Russia) and groups on messaging apps like WhatsApp. In some respects, the language initiatives in the messenger groups and social networks became less visible and more private. At the same time, they partly turned from the theoretical discussion of Kalmyk to the dayto-day communication in Kalmyk among neighbors and friends via ­messaging apps that resonates with language practices of other speakers. For example, almost all inhabitants of one village reported that the main written communication in Kalmyk for them occurs in a special group of their village in Viber (a messaging app) which includes the local people and their relatives and friends in the city. They are interested in local gossip and online communication is intertwined with their interaction in real life. This kind of offline/online nexus (Blommaert, 2019) is an important factor for language revitalization projects in Kalmykia. For example, some very popular dancing open-air parties in an ethnic style took place in the center of Elista in 2014–2015. Everyone could participate in the event just by walking around the main square; nevertheless, most of my respondents stated that they learnt about the open-air dance from YouTube. There is a grassroots project aimed at teaching and learning the language, and creating an online community for parents who have made a conscious decision to raise their children as Kalmyk speakers and share their experiences via Instagram. There is no shared offline communication between them, but similarities in their practices of raising bilingual children provide them with a sense of belonging. Unified by the same hashtags (like #хальмгмама ‘Kalmyk mom’), they inspire new members among young parents who want to revitalize the language. Grassroots educational initiatives consist of free courses for adults and the language club. All the projects occurred in the capital of Kalmykia, Elista, and in the Club of Kalmyk language replicated outside Kalmykia, in Moscow and St. Petersburg. The educational projects are far from rural life and train new speakers, mostly of Kalmyk ethnic origin. As the leader of the Moscow Club states, ‘those who know Kalmyk a little bit helped those who do not speak it at all’  (f., about 28 years old; Terbish & Churyumova, 2018). The main role here is played by the free introductory course in Elista organized by the Buddhist church, particularly by one monk who also deals with charity and one university teacher who works here for free. It has been taking place for 11 years, one course runs two months and takes place twice or even three times a year. Many students start a course but drop out after some lessons, so toward the end of

The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk  49

the course, the number of participants may have dropped down from 70 to 25–30 students (see Baranova, 2021). There are good prizes from organizers for the best students, even a car in 2016. But, you know, this isn’t about getting a prize. The main goal of prizes and free courses – of course, none can learn [Kalmyk] in two months – is but to encourage… The most popular answer [to the question why]: ‘I do not know my national language, I want to learn it’. Naturally, I explain at the beginning: during the two months, I provide you the plan, the route. (m., 1974, the course teacher)

In 2019, the course lessons were put online on YouTube and, in 2020, the course was conducted online which led to a tenfold increase in the number of participants (field observation, Fall 2020). This was in line with the tendency of recent initiatives to integrate online and offline activities. During the last years, the creative industry and popular music became factors in maintaining the language. As is shown for other contexts, promoting minority languages through popular culture involves genres that heavily employ improvisation such as stand-up comedy or hip-hop (Moriarty & Pietikäinen, 2011; Moriarty, 2015). The language activists created the online radio broadcast-channel in Kalmyk (‘Radio Bumba’), but it existed for a relatively short time and later transformed from permanent broadcasting to a YouTube channel with music videos. Another interesting example is comics: for example, there are two issues of a manga about Očir – an ordinary guy connected to criminal networks of Elista in whom an Oirat warrior re-incarnates. Alongside Russian and Kalmyk texts in standard orthography, there are even elements of the traditional Todo bičig script.  One of the most popular Kalmyk bloggers focuses on the humoristic representation of rural life (Zamitki Mandzhika, 2017). In his short videos on Instagram, he provides comedy sketches or skits of one minute each that resemble stand-up comedy. His alias, Mandzhik or Mandzha, is a Kalmyk first name that sounds old-fashioned (while the blogger in real life bears a common Russian name). There are some popular characters in his videos: a young lazy man who wants to get rich (an alter ego of the blogger Mandzhik), a woman gossiping with her friends and neighbors, a middle-aged couple with a calm and somewhat dim husband and a wife who always nags him. In these dialogs, the blogger impersonates these characters and speaks in mixed Kalmyk-Russian code (see in detail below Section 4). Based on the characters and some popular episodes from his videos, in 2020 a film was released in widescreen format. The important question of voice and agency of the native speakers tightly integrated with the roles of actors who are involved in maintaining Kalmyk. At the same time, one person can combine different roles. For example, the head of one village (an elected low-level administrator) is also a language activist. During his work, he recommends to all other

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administrators to talk to visitors in Kalmyk and speaks Kalmyk himself. At the same time, he printed cardboard signs in Kalmyk reading ‘Энкр төрскн келәрн эрк биш күүндий!’ (‘Please speak in the beloved native language!’) and asked the school principal and a local shop owner to put it up. While his private initiative does not link directly to his ‘official’ position, it might have made his argument more compelling. The reconciliation of different roles and membership in several revitalization projects is typical for many activists. Some draw a line between their ‘professional’ life and their ‘volunteering’ or ‘hobby’ but often these are intertwined. For example, Phillip, a young man, started supporting the revitalization of Kalmyk in his teens; later, he entered a program on teaching Kalmyk and also participated in musical activities, first of all in the broadcast mentioned above. In 2014, finishing his Bachelor’s degree, he told me that his main objective, or even his mission, is promoting the knowledge of Kalmyk through school education. He mentioned that he is going to teach pupils Kalmyk and apply for a job in an ‘ordinary’ school in Elista because there are so many gaps in teaching Kalmyk in disadvantaged schools, while the situation in the special ‘national’ Kalmyk gymnasium is better. He was working as a teacher of Kalmyk for some years, and his musical projects were not his main activity, even though he became well-known as a dombra player and a singer of traditional Kalmyk music. Meeting in February 2020, he told me that he left school and now was investing most of his efforts in his musical career and in teaching the dombra at a musical college. His teaching activities in the official school system and his hobby-like playing of traditional music were thus variants of his effort for maintaining Kalmyk. The competencies of language activists and their reputation

Here, I briefly describe the varieties of Kalmyk spoken by language activists with special attention to their linguistic biography and possible incomplete or non-traditional competence. A number of language activists were recruited from the older generation and their speech is recognized by other Kalmyks as a rich and beautiful language role model. They develop their ‘native’ competence by adding new ‘rare’ words from epics, Old Kalmyk texts, proverbs and even from other Mongolian varieties. During my fieldwork, I observed some arbitrariness with regard to language conventions or the ‘right’ wording by language activists from the ‘old’ generation. The most prominent example is one very reputable language activist, Vitaly. In the classification by Zhao and Baldauf (2012), though, he is neither a ‘person with expertise’ nor ‘with influence’ (that draws its authority from other popular activities like sport or TV shows). Professionally, he is an animal specialist, but also grows watermelons and sells them at the market. However, he was one of the first language activists. At the age of 59, he took part in different language projects

The Grassroots Initiatives for the Revitalization of Kalmyk  51

supporting Kalmyk and was considered by all my respondents as ‘the most credible expert’ in any language issues, especially the elaboration of Kalmyk vocabulary and ‘standardization’ of some borrowings, etc. He is remembered in this role more than the formal institutions working on Kalmyk and professional linguists. Vitaly also accepted that role himself and in our interview in 2020, for example, started with his evaluation of one expression that I used in Kalmyk and his comments on the possible enrichment of my limited Kalmyk vocabulary. A language activist can have a non-traditional language competence deriving from formal education, knowledge of closely-related languages, the use of mixed codes, etc. As I mentioned, Mandzhik uses a mixed Kalmyk-Russian code in his blog, and one of my respondents, a professional linguist, describes his language as poor language typical for the young Kalmyk (f., 1980). Competence is not a stable or rigid quality, contrary to the naïve division between ‘to know’ or ‘not to know’ a language. The fluidity of competence is a factor that should be taken into account. I first met Phillip (mentioned above) in 2008, when he was still a teenager at school. He loved Kalmyk culture, so he tried to speak with the old generation. Living in Elista, he went to relatives in the countryside during the holidays to communicate in Kalmyk. During our fieldwork in Fall 2008, he helped the linguists to communicate with an old native speaker and even produced a text for our small spoken corpus (Baranova & Say, 2009). His text, a traditional fairytale, was not spontaneous, and it deviates in some grammatical points from the production of fully proficient speakers. Nevertheless, it was Kalmyk of a fairly high proficiency. Later, Phillip improved his Kalmyk further and is now considered a fluent speaker and skilled orator. The speaking in related languages or regional varieties of Kalmyk is not a barrier for being a language activist. One of the most interesting examples is Bairt, the author of the YouTube channel BAiRT (2020) dedicated to cooking. He is a native Oirat speaker born in Xinjiang (China) who moved to Russia for education in 1990, married a Kalmyk girl, and stayed in Kalmykia. He is a musician but, in 2020, he started a videoblog as part of language revitalization with collaboration from other language activists. In his videos, he shows how to cook traditional Kalmyk/Oirat or Mongolian dishes, as well as Chinese cuisine or regional food from Xinjiang. It is a recent project, so it is still difficult to assess his reputation in the community. He speaks a different variety of Oirat, even though he tries to adapt to local Kalmyk. Nevertheless, many comments on the videos emphasize the quality of his Kalmyk speech. Some people mention that they are learning Kalmyk by repeating the words from the video and no one is confused by the difference between Oirat varieties or his ‘foreigner’ status. To sum up, the competence of language activists can be far from the standard scenario of the native speaker who acquired the language within

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a family and was educated in Kalmyk and Mongolian linguistics (as is typical for official actors of LPP in Kalmykia). At the same time, the recent revitalization initiatives lead to the visibility of new speakers or other non-standard varieties of Kalmyk. The rights of such non-traditional codes and speakers to be a part of the language community and to have a (socio)linguistic citizenship are discussed within the community. The next section is devoted to claims of ‘new speakers’, so as to make the heterogeneity of their linguistic resources more visible and illustrate the peculiarities of their speech. Non-Standard Varieties of Kalmyk in Language Projects Attitudes to new speakers

The main focus of this chapter is on activists who promote multilingual practices, so the attitudes of the community are not described here in detail, but it is necessary to add some notes on how these activists are perceived. As was mentioned earlier, the majority of those who speak Kalmyk fluently belong to the senior age group among rural citizens. However, a revitalization movement mostly consists of young Kalmyks living in the cities and communicating on the internet. They are not separated from other speakers: the active learning or remembering of Kalmyk often leads to communication in Kalmyk with other types of speakers including their elderly relatives. Some people mentioned criticisms from their elderly relatives and tried to inspire other non-fully competent people. One young heritage speaker posted on Instagram a screenshot of her mobile messaging in which her mother does not answer to her Kalmyklanguage question but instead corrects her mistakes. To the screenshot of the message, she added the encouraging conclusion: ‘I’m learning Kalmyk again. I try to speak with mum. There are many mistakes but if you are afraid of mistakes, you never get anywhere’ (Baranova, 2021). Describing the language of new speakers, some fully competent traditional speakers and even some philologists have called it ‘baldyr’. The word baldyr usually refers to people with mixed ancestry, from Kalmyk-Russian marriage, ‘not pure Kalmyk’ and, figuratively, it can refer to a ‘mixed’ language. One linguist described the language of videoblog Zametki Mandzhika (2017) as baldyr. The appearance of a special term shows a particular awareness of traditional speakers to this ‘mixed language’ and its speakers. In the Basque Country, there is a similar term: euskaldunberri ‘new speaker of Basque’ (Urla, 2012). There are cases in which the term baldyr is used among language activists themselves, e.g. by Mandzhik in his blog. It is not a clear case of reclaiming a pejorative term because Mandzhik also put it into a somewhat dismissive context, but he intentionally uses mixed code in his video production, his blog and his film as a kind of transgressive language in the public sphere and art-scene.

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Baldyr language and the claim to public representation of non-standard code

The Instagram account Zametki Mandzhika is typical for the channel’s comic sketches in which a humorous effect is achieved, above all, by manner of speaking, while the content is not so important. Mandzhik, a foolish young man, describes for his followers the main events in the village, e.g. the news about the new car of his neighbor. Here is the beginning of the story: Mendut

kün-tä

mana

üür-müd,

kün-tä

mana

podpisčikmud! 

hallo

manASSOC

1PL

friend- PL

manASSOC

1PL

followerPL

endər

jir

sääxn,

ofigitelnyj endər bol-ǯa-na. 

today

very

beauty

fucking

today becomePROG-PRS

Juŋgad

gi-xlä

mini

sosed

Viitjä

šin

maši-ʁar

xul-ǯ

av-na-v. 

why

say-CVB. SUCC

my

neighbor

(name)

new

car-INS

buyCVB. IPF

takePRS3SG

O, jo!

bi

šud

nevčkən

zavidu-ju

gi-nä. 

Oh

1SG

just

few

envy-1SG

sayPRS

nado – ne nado

– ezd-it,

gi-nä.

Po šud narən- jov-ad, sovkhoz-u carən

onsovkhoz- just back. go-CVB. need NEG drive-3SG sayDAT and.forth ANT need PRS ‘Hello, all my friends, all my followers! Today is a nice, smashing day because my neighbor Vitya has bought a new car. Oh! I really am a bit envious, (I) say. He is driving around the state-owned farm (i.e. the village) back and forth, (regardless of) whether he needs or not (they) say’.

In the excerpt, there are many Russian elements (marked in bold). Some of them are due to code-switching and some are mixed code or adopted borrowings with Kalmyk affixes, e.g. podpisčik-mud. Later throughout the story, he masterfully includes many Russian words of different word class and meaning, even those which normally are not loaned such as mam-tan – pap-tan (Russian root)-assoc-refl ‘with mother and with father’. Instead of standard Kalmyk expression meaning ‘parents’, the duplex ekǝ-eckǝ ‘mother-father’, he uses Russian roots мама ‘mother’ and папа ‘father’ with Kalmyk affixes. The expression is intended to be humorous since kinship terms are normally not borrowed in Kalmyk.  The insertion of Russian verbs (as a code-switch or nonce-borrowing) includes Russian morphology, i.e. it is a ‘direct insertion’ in Wohlgemuth’s (2009) classification. At the same time, for spoken Kalmyk, it is typical to

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integrate nonce-borrowings with the infinitive form of the Russian verb and some form of the Kalmyk verb ke- ‘do’ (the light verb strategy in Wohlgemuth’s types). In the video, there is a tendency to use a word order that is acceptable in both Kalmyk and Russian. Another case of interference is the usage of the adverb ‘šud’ that originally means ‘direct(ly)’ and mostly occurs in spatial contexts. It has, however, an extended temporal meaning and is also used as an adverb of manner. According to the Russian slang usage of the word прямо ‘directly’ as a word with very broad meaning ‘just (now), right, actually’, Mandzhik uses šud very often (10 times in a one-minute-long video). How do the listeners perceive the mixed code in the channel? There are many positive metalinguistic comments pointing to the linguistic jokes, i.e. the strange or unusual code-switching or ad hoc borrowing. At the same time, some commentators correct some of Mandzhik’s forms. Most of all, this concerns the written part of the post, e.g. the title and some introductory information, but corrections that pertain to the spoken part also occur: Рынок – базр хальмгар ‘market’ is ‘bazaar’ in Kalmyk (the blogger uses the Russian form рынок). Some comments show that their authors are not fully fluent in Kalmyk. For instance, the author of the channel named his video in the right way, but his listener tries to correct him and provides a wrong spelling of the word ‘aunt (from father’s side)’, indicating the use of the initial voiced uvular stop [ɢ] instead of the voiced uvular fricative [ʁ]. ‘һаһа ач көвүн хойр, таасгдсн болхла, ❤ тәвчкн)’ – ‘Не һаһа, а гаһа это важно.’ Translation: Original post (in Kalmyk): ‘Paternal aunt and nephew. If you like it, put ❤.’ Comment (in Russian): ‘Not haha but gаha, it’s important!’

Sometimes the author of the channel replaces his Russian form with a ‘Mongolian’ root in reaction to comments. For example, in the early videos, the blogger called his followers ‘podpisčikmud’, as in the example above, but later he shifted to the neologism ‘daxčnǝr(mud)’, a noun derived from the Kalmyk verb dax- ‘to follow’. In other cases, he continues to use a mixed Kalmyk-Russian form representing the identity of young Kalmyks. The blog and film by Mandzhik are the most notable examples of claiming to include mixed Kalmyk in a piece of art. Other language activists describe non-standard codes as a heterogeneity of linguistic resources that facilitates a revitalization.  The baby always crawls before he can walk, right? The way of language is the same. You should not [criticize him] and tell a child that he is only crawling and cannot walk… The most important thing is that he crawls. His laps, legs, and spinal cord will become stronger and later he can stand up without a problem. As for this way [the progress in language acquisition], he cannot be standing upright immediately, do you understand? (m., 1962)

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In this extract, Vitaly in his metaphorical way of speaking pointed out two main things about the language of new speakers. Evaluating their competence as part of a natural progress from crawling to standing upright, he warns of the danger of criticizing them for their mistakes or of speeding up the process because people would not be ready for it and efforts from outside for enhancing their progress could lead to the absence of an important stage. So, for him, the non-standard varieties are not valuable themselves, but serve as an indispensable intermediate stage. Conclusion

Discussing the language activism in Kalmykia as part of LPP, it should be taken in account that both individual efforts and official state policy are important for revitalization projects, and they usually interact and complement each other. How can the different levels interact and complement each other? One of the problematic issues for collaboration is an incomplete competence of some language activists or their non-standard code. The linguistic rights of non-native or non-fully competent speakers are painful for traditional speakers of many endangered languages. Dorian (1982: 157) states that ‘the low-proficiency semi-speakers who speak very little Gaelic, and also the near-passive bilinguals… cannot easily be included in the East Sutherland Gaelic speech community’. Her notion of ‘speech community’ presupposes language proficiency for being a member of it. However, there are many semi-competent speakers of minority languages who just start their learning of a minority language or are trying to remember their heritage language, and our understanding of participation in a ‘speech community’ should not exclude them. The notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2015; Rampton et al., 2018) can help us to include the semi-speakers, heritage speakers or new speakers into the community. The attitudes toward the language of new speakers represent different positions, from critical to positive, and the language activists represent different positions. Some of them are tolerant, understanding such varieties as steps toward full competence in standard Kalmyk. Other people include non-standard codes and their speakers into the community. The intentional usage of mixed Kalmyk-Russian code in stand-up comedy, or in other forms of art, is a way of overcoming a disparaging attitude to the transgressive baldyr language. Being a part of cultural production, a nonstandard code acquires a linguistic right. At the same time, the mixed code is still merely part of humorous videos but not a ‘high culture’. The initiatives claiming the non-standard code as a part of Kalmyk language are few in number but already evident: the voice of the speakers becomes visible through online platforms and initiatives. The new technologies provide platforms for discussions and linguistic resources which,

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consequently, might lead to ‘an ideological transformation among speakers’ (Eisenlohr, 2004: 35).  Summing up, the competence and reputation of Kalmyk speakers are more complex and heterogeneous than one would expect from the simple dichotomy ‘traditional native rural old-aged speaker’ vs ‘young urban new speaker’. The actors in grassroots language projects can be ‘new speakers’, people from other linguistic groups, without special education or ‘professional’ relation to the language and culture, and their background does not prevent them from being an expert. Their efforts can legitimate new linguistic varieties, and some language activists try to integrate the mixed code to the public space through the art and popular cultural forms. Usage of baldyr code can be viewed as part of mixed identity and linguistic practice of ‘new speakers’ in the context of revitalization. Acknowledgments

I would like to express my deep gratitude to my respondents. I am also grateful to the participants of the conference ‘Languages in an Open World – LOW 2019’, the volume’s editors, the anonymous reviewers and Benjamin Brosig. The publication was prepared within the framework of the Academic Fund Program at the HSE University in 2020–2021 (grant No. 20-01-073). Abbreviations

1, 3 – 1, 3 person; ASSOC – associative; CVB.ANT – anterior converb; CVB.IPF – imperfective converb; DAT – dative; INS – instrumental case; PL – plural; PROG – progressive aspect; PRS – present tense; REFL – reflexive; PRS – present; SG – singular References Alòs i Font, H. (2019) Russian,  Chuvash  and  English:  Мinority-language activism,  tourism promotion  and the  evolution  of  municipal advertisements in Shupashkar/Cheboksary(2015‒2018). In A. Nikunlassi and E. Protassova (eds) Russian Language in the Multilingual World (pp. 68–86). Helsinki: University of Helsinki. Alpaut, R. (2021) Zashhitit’ sebja rodnym jazykom. Idel.Real, 16 February 2021. See https://www.idelreal.org/a/31105295.html (accessed 18 February 2021). Androutsopoulos, J. and Staehr, A. (2017) Moving methods online: Researching digital language practices. In A. Creese and A. Blackledge (eds) The Routledge Handbook of Language and Superdiversity: An Interdisciplinary Perspective (pp. 118–132). New York: Routledge. Arbes, D. (2019) Predicative possession in revived Cornish. In L. Johanson, L.F. Mazzitelli and I. Nevskaya (eds) Possession in Languages of Europe and North and Central Asia (pp. 27–49). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

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Baranova, V. (2013) Enseignement du kalmouk et situation linguistique (fin 1950–2000). In E. Simonato (ed.) L’édification linguistique en URSS: Thèmes et mythes (pp. 75–99). Lausanne: Cahiers de l'Institut de linguistique et des sciences du langage. Baranova, V. (2021) «Kakaja rech’ mozhet idti ob akcente, esli rech’ idet o sohranenii jazyka?»: Otnoshenie k nepolnoj jazykovoj kompetencii [‘How to speak about accent when it is the question of revival of the language?’: Attitudes to the non-fully competent speakers]. Forum for Anthropology and Culture 49, 11–29. Baranova, V. and Say, S. (2009) Kommentarij k korpusu tekstov [Comments to the corpus of texts]. Acta Linguistica Petropolitana 5 (2), 710–728. Benmamoun, E., Montrul, S. and Polinsky, M. (2013) Heritage languages and their speakers: Opportunities and challenges for linguistics. Theoretical Linguistics 39, 129–181. Blommaert, J. (2010) The Sociolinguistics of Globalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Blommaert, J. (2019) From groups to actions and back in online-offline sociolinguistics. Multilingua: Journal of Interlanguage Communication 38 (4), 485–493. Blommaert, J. and Backus, A. (2012) Superdiverse repertoires and the individual. Tilburg Papers in Culture Studies 24, 1–32.  Bouchard, J. and Glasgow, G.P. (eds) (2018) Agency in Language Policy and Planning: Critical Inquiries. New York: Routledge. Bucholtz, M., Casillas, D.I. and Lee, J.S. (2019) California Latinx youth as agents of sociolinguistic justice. In N. Avineri, L.R. Graham, E.J. Johnson, R.C. Riner and J. Rosa (eds) Language and Social Justice in Practice (pp. 166–175). New York: Routledge. Cru, J. (2015) Language revitalisation from the ground up: Promoting Yucatec Maya on facebook. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 36 (3), 284–296. Davies, W. and Ziegler, D. (eds) (2015) Language Planning and Microlinguistics: From Policy to Interaction and Vice Versa. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Dorian, N.C. (1982) Defining the speech community to include its working margins. In S. Romaine (ed.) Sociolinguistic Variation in Speech Communities (pp. 25–33). London: Edward Arnold. Eisenlohr, P. (2004) Language revitalization and new technologies: Cultures of electronic mediation and the refiguring of communities. Annual Review of Anthropology 33, 21–45. Grenoble, L. and Bulatova, N.J. (2017) Language standardization in the aftermath of the Soviet language. In P. Lane, J. Costa and H. De Korne (eds) Standardizing Minority Languages. Competing Ideologies of Authority and Authenticity in the Global Periphery (pp. 118–134). New York: Routledge. Hornberger, N.H. and King, K.A. (1996) Bringing the language forward: School-based initiatives for Quechua language revitalization in Ecuador and Bolivia. In N.H. Hornberger (ed.) Indigenous Literacies in the Americas: Language Planning from the Bottom Up (pp. 299–319). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.  Hornberger, N.H., Tapia, A.A., Hanks, D.H., Dueñas, F.K. and Lee, S. (2018) Ethnography of language planning and policy. Language Teaching 51 (2), 152–186.  Itogi (2004) Itogi Vserossijskoj perepisi naselenija 2002 goda po Respublike Kalmykija. Elista. [The results of Russian census 2002 from the Republic of Kalmykia]. Jackson, C.N. (2018) Second language structural priming: A critical review and directions for future research. Second Language Research 34 (4), 539–552.  Kozinets, R.V. (2010) Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online. London: Sage. Liddicoat, A.J. and Baldauf Jr, R.B. (2008) Language planning in local contexts: Agents, contexts and interactions. In A.J. Liddicoat and R.B. Baldauf Jr (eds) Language

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Planning  and Policy:  Language Planning in Local Contexts (pp. 3–17). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. McLeod, W. and O’Rourke, B. (2015) ‘New speakers’ of Gaelic: Perceptions of linguistic authenticity and appropriateness. Applied Linguistics Review 6 (2), 151–172. Moriarty, M. (2015) Globalizing Language Policy and Planning: An Irish Language Perspective. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Moriarty, M. and Pietikäinen, S. (2011) Micro-level language-planning and grass-root initiatives: A case study of Irish language comedy and Inari Sámi rap. Current Issues in Language Planning 12 (3), 363–379. Moseley, C. (ed.) (2010) UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger. Paris: UNESCO Publishing. Ó hIfearnáin, T. (2015) Sociolinguistic vitality of Manx after extreme language shift: Authenticity without traditional native speakers. International Journal  of the Sociology of Language 231, 45–62. O’Rourke, B. and Nandi, A. (2019) New speaker parents as grassroots policy makers in contemporary Galicia: Ideologies, management and practices. Language Policy 18, 493–511. O’Rourke, B., Pujolar, J. and Ramallo, F. (2015) New speakers of minority languages: The challenging opportunity – Foreword. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 231, 1–20. Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science Education 17 (4), 68–83. Ricento, T. (2000) Historical and theoretical perspectives in language policy and planning. Journal of Sociolinguistics 4 (2), 196–213. Sallabank, J., Marquis, Y. (2018) ‘We don’t say it like that’: Language ownership and (de)legitimising the new speaker. In C. Smith-Christmas, N. Ó Murchadha, M. Hornsby and M. Moriarty (eds) New Speakers of Minority Languages: Linguistic Ideologies and Practices (pp. 67–90). London: Palgrave Macmillan.  Schwartz, S. (2018) Writing Chiwere: Orthography, literacy, and language revitalization. Language & Communication 61, 75–87. Smith-Christmas, C., Ó Murchadha, N., Hornsby, M. and Moriarty, M. (eds) (2018) New Speakers of Minority Languages: Linguistic Ideologies and Practices. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Stroud, C. (2015) Linguistic citizenship as utopia. Multilingual Margins 2 (2), 20–37. Sugiura, L., Wiles, R. and Pope, C. (2016) Ethical challenges in online research: Public/ private perceptions. Research Ethics 13 (3–4), 184–199. Suleymanova, D. (2018) Creative cultural production and ethnocultural revitalization among minority groups in Russia, Cultural Studies 32 (5), 825–851. Terbish, B. and Churyumova, E. (2018) Bulgun Mankirova, Sanal Badmaev, A Kalmyk Language Club in Moscow [Video file]. Kalmyk Cultural Heritage Documentation Project, University of Cambridge. See https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/ handle/1810/276511 (accessed 10 September 2019). Urla, J. (2012) Reclaiming Basque: Language, Nation, and Cultural Activism. Las Vegas: University of Nevada Press. Wohlgemuth, J.A. (2009) Typology of Verbal Borrowings. Berlin: De Gruyter. Zametki Mandzhika (2017) Mandzhik’s diary [blog]. See https://www.instagram.com/p/ BXuWIF4guwd/ (accessed 1 September 2019). Zhao, S.H. and Baldauf Jr, R.B. (2012) Individual agency in language planning: Chinese script reform as a case study. Language Problems & Language Planning 36 (1), 1–24.

Part 2 Facilitating Voice

4 Reclaiming Voice in the Austrian Refugee Context through Experiences of Ambiguity Sandra Radinger

Taking a (socio)linguistic citizenship stance, this chapter zooms in on the role of ambiguity in the recognition of voice. By example of the Austrian immigration context, the chapter first illustrates how legal links made between residence rights and the notion of ‘the proficient language user’, as put forward by the Common European Framework of Reference (Council of Europe, 2001, 2018), reduce grassroots movements’ potential for granting refugees ‘a spectrum of expression outside of what is normatively (and narrowly) considered institutionally appropriate language to express agency, voice and desire for inclusiveness and participation’ (Stroud, 2018: 23). The chapter then reports on a participatory project in which refugees and volunteer language teachers reclaim definition over what it means to use language ‘successfully’. They explore the meaningfulness of experiences of ambiguity by means of applied linguistics and philosophical dialogue. The analysis of data reveals that refugees take both norm following and norm transcending actions to ‘constitute themselves (and others) as subjects of rights’ (Isin, 2009: 371). Thereby, they confront considerable challenges in interpreting actions related to learning the hegemonial language German. Considering that the structural conditions in place construe ambiguity as a private rather than a systemic problem, the study emphasizes the importance of spaces of vulnerability (Stroud, 2018: 18) in the public spheres. Introduction

In Austria, like in other European countries, integration requirements are tied up with language requirements in the official language(s) of the nation immigrated to. In the so-called Integration Agreement, the Austrian Integration Law (IntG, 2019: §7) states that immigrants from 61

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outside the EU are required to obtain a German language certificate for A2 level according to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) (Council of Europe, 2001, 2018) if residence is requested for up to three years. This certificate must be successfully completed within the first two years after having received entitlement for staying in the country (IntG, 2019: §7, §9). For permanent residence (defined as everything beyond five years) (NAG, 2005: §45), a certificate for B1 level is required. Thereby, the Austrian Integration Law sets an explicit link between language and residency and combines two very elaborate and powerful frameworks – legislature and the CEFR – to define both what has to be done, and how one has to be able to use the German language in order to obtain the respective certificate and residence rights (which are linked with substantial rights to social security). Additionally, Austria has centralized the management of assessing the fulfilment of the Integration Agreement. One sole institution, the Austrian Integration Fund (Österreichischer Integrationsfonds, henceforth ÖIF), has been commissioned with the production of officially recognized standardized tests, assessment, as well as with the provision of curricula, example tests, and teaching material targeted at language educators. Much of this material is freely available online (see ÖIF, 2021). The provision of materials, however, comes with monitoring claims, as both official language schools and grassroots initiatives need to be officially accepted as partners by the ÖIF to offer courses and assessment for A2 and B1 levels acknowledged by law (IntG, 2019: §4). Taking a (socio)linguistic citizenship perspective, Austria’s legal enforcement of disambiguation and centralization of power over defining communicative proficiency and linguistic needs in situations of relocation are concerning as regards the recognition of speakers’ voices. Voice has been defined as ‘the effective expression of one’s views and perceptions’ (cf. Stroud, 2008). To articulate voice, as Stroud (2018: 23) puts forward, ‘[s]peakers use a spectrum of expression outside of what is normatively (and narrowly) considered institutionally appropriate language to express agency, voice and desire for inclusiveness and participation’. Imposing one definition to fit them all, thus, stands in stark contrast to the plurality of lived language use. It furthermore appears particularly problematic in the given context, since the Integration Law affects two vulnerable groups of speakers: (i) persons entitled to political asylum and (ii) persons with subsidiary protection status (IntG, 2019: §3; NAG, 2005: §45). In this chapter, these two groups will be subsumed under the label ‘refugee’. Thereby, the third group legally defined and affected by the Integration Agreement, (iii) persons without citizenship from a country covered by the treaties of the European Trade Union or from Switzerland (IntG, 2019: §3; NAG, 2005: §45), is not considered in this chapter. What is critical in the Austrian context is that the combination of legal frameworks and language educational policy permeates language activities

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offered from the grassroots with the top-down definition of the ‘linguistically proficient and integrated migrant’. Grassroots movements play a central role in the recognition of speakers’ voices, as they are at least ‘partly sheltered from the cut and thrust of political struggle’ (Rampton & Holmes, 2018: 73). In the context of immigration, they furthermore constitute inherently multilingual spaces of interaction and thus have great potential in being construed as spaces of vulnerability, ‘where senses of self may be juxtaposed and refashioned as part of the deconstruction of dominant voices and more equitable linguistic engagement with others’ (Stroud, 2018: 18). Thus, grassroots movements are public spaces of interaction between locals and refugees important for positioning themselves as speaking subjects beyond these two roles and for building relationships with each other. In direct interaction with one another, speakers involved are confronted with the exigencies of linguistic diversity which makes the spectrum of expression of voice a part of the everyday-life experience. It is not surprising hence, that language educational activities (e.g. mediation of dominant languages in the local communities, but also mutual exchanges of language(s) like tandems and language cafés) are among typical offers of grassroots initiatives. Embedded in the structural conditions enforced by the Austrian Integration Agreement, however, language education practices are not innocent activities. Especially German language learning support goes hand in hand with support for passing legal language requirements and confronts speakers with considerable ambiguity in their actions. As a Viennese organization states on its website, there is an inherent ‘tension between the empowering element of second language mediation and the involvement of this language mediation in exclusionary policies and discourses’ (Verein Migrationspädagogische Zweitsprachdidaktik, 2021). This illustrates the difficulties in positioning the grassroots language classroom as a space of empowerment in the Austrian immigration context. While the ambiguity of German language teaching is more obvious, the practice of German language learning may pose similar difficulties in positioning for refugee language learners themselves. Without insight into their perspectives, it can only be assumed that fulfilling established ideas of the proficient language may take on a more existential meaning. Firstly, because it is linked with their residence status. In addition, however, apart from the significance of working their linguistic repertoires as it is imposed by law, Busch’s (2017) conceptualization of lived language experience makes clear that a transformative appeal to speakers emerges out of the situation of relocation itself. Relocation, as she highlights, ‘always means a change both in the life world (Lebenswelt) and in the linguistic environment with whose practices, discourses, and rules one is familiar’ (Busch 2017: 340, original emphasis). It therefore bears out an underlying experience ‘that one’s own linguistic repertoire does not (completely) “fit”’ (Busch, 2017: 342). Under favorable conditions, this appeal may be taken up as an opportunity to ‘reinvent oneself as a (speaking) subject’ (Busch,

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2017: 340). Under the strenuous conditions of forced displacement, however, refugees are more likely to experience it as ‘hardship or as a source of ongoing emotional stress’ (Busch, 2017: 340). This chapter reports on a study that enquired into the experience of ambiguity of refugees in the Austrian immigration context and contests the disambiguation enforced by law and policy by making visible ‘a more diverse cacophony of social voices’ (Stroud, 2008: 45; cf. Stroud & Heugh, 2004: 192). Firstly, theoretical considerations are made about the relationships between legal frameworks, lived language experience, ambiguity and voice. Then, a participatory research project is introduced, which combined applied linguistics and philosophical practice to enquire into lived language experience with a group of refugees and their volunteer German language teachers in a grassroots setting in Graz, Austria.  Legal Frameworks, (Socio)linguistic Citizenship and the Role of Ambiguity in the Recognition of Voice

As Stroud (2001) has pointed out in his criticism of the Linguistic Human Rights approach, the recognition of speakers’ voices is not so much a matter of distributing rights but of making accessible and acknowledging a broad spectrum of (linguistic) means of expression of voice. In the Austrian context, the fact that immigrants who seek permanent residence do not have the option for democratic participation by vote urges the need for public spaces in which they can claim their voices in (linguistic) forms ignored by the narrow sense of citizenship. Following this (socio)linguistic citizenship perspective, the notion of citizenship employed in this study hence moves beyond the ‘limited sense of nation-state citizenship’ (Stroud, 2018: 21; cf. Isin, 2009).  When taking a close look at the limitation of legal frameworks in grasping the broad spectrum of lived language use, the nature of demarcation paradoxically emerges as inextricably linked with plurality (the existence of different meanings, concepts, things, etc.) and ambiguity (the existence of different meanings attached to the same concept or thing which logically cannot be ‘true’ at the same time). As Seligman and Weller (2012) highlight, drawing lines of meaning by definition is essential to humans making sense of the world. It allows us to heave things out of an undifferentiated whole and to share meaning. Necessarily, however, delineations reduce and simplify experience and thereby exercise a bias toward the unambiguous. Seligman and Weller (2012) therefore emphasize that the kind of disambiguation we find in law and policy is a form of notating social order to provide us with an important basis for social life, but it does not get rid of ambiguity – we could have drawn our lines differently. Similar to (socio)linguistic citizenship perspectives, the authors therefore argue that ‘a genuine

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pluralism involves an approach to boundaries and their navigation that must make room for the ambiguous and poorly delineated just as much as for the clear conceptual distinctions on which our notational systems are based’ (Seligman & Weller, 2012: 10).  Following the understanding that ‘[a]mbiguity is built into any system of boundaries’ (Seligman & Weller, 2012: 23), managerial measures like standardization and centralization of practices, as we find them in language education in the Austrian immigration context, enforce a denial of ambiguity in legal systems and policy frameworks themselves. Dealing with plurality and ambiguity is thereby shoved off by the power to define and impose definitions on ‘the other’ (i.e. by linking language requirements with residence rights). This is essentially a form of denial of an inherent variability of language and non-observance of the vulnerability of all speaking subjects that makes language a political and ethical matter. A loss in grassroots movements as public spaces where these definitions can be contested may therefore be seen as significant for structural conditions that push back ambiguity and plurality into the private spheres and which construe them as individual rather than as systemic problems. Selfreflective accounts, like the one raised by the Viennese organization Verein Migrationspädagogische Zweitsprachdidaktik (2021; see earlier), are hence highly important to counteract such tendencies. The confrontation with ambiguity itself has furthermore been conceptualized as central to the emergence of acts of citizenship, i.e. the ‘deeds by which actors constitute themselves (and others) as subjects of rights’ (Isin, 2009: 371). Similar to Seligman and Weller (2012), Isin and Nielsen (2008) point to a considerable degree of inevitability of ambiguity in the attempt to organize social life. As they elaborate, acts of citizenship ‘may be cultivated by or may transgress practices and formal entitlement, as they emerge from the paradox between universal inclusion in the language of rights and cosmopolitanism, on the one hand, and inevitable exclusion in the language of community and particularity on the other’ (Isin & Nielsen, 2008: 11). The language classroom opened by grassroots movements seems to sit right in the middle of this paradox, since it is designed to attend to needs defined by the language of (citizenship) rights as well as to desires linked with community and particularity. Paradoxically, as regards refugee German language learners (who are always also users), the Austrian Integration Agreement on the one hand seems to recognize their agency as speakers by acknowledging their capacity as speaking subjects to learn and use the German language competently according to its own (CEFR) definition. On the other hand, the Integration Agreement allocates them to legally defined places in Austrian society and widely ignores their particularity and linguistic repertoire built over individual biographical life trajectories. While allocating and granting pre-defined speaker and residence status, the Austrian Integration Agreement does not grant inclusion in the ideal of the national community of ‘the Austrians’, nor can

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it grant inclusion in forms other than residence status, such as inclusion in local communities. The elaborations made above echo earlier views on agency as put forward by Emirbayer and Mische (1998: 2004) who have conceptualized agency and structure as two sides of the same coin. This relational view is crucial for recognizing how speakers assume agency in the given context of immigration. It reminds us that ‘freedom to have one’s voice heard, [and] freedom to develop a voice worth hearing’ (Hymes, 2003: 64) is not about claiming to speak however one wants and in total independence from others. Effective expression of one’s views and perceptions, i.e. voice, is essentially a claim of having a place to speak from ‘within the here&-now of specific events’ (Rampton & Holmes, 2018: 72). It is thus also some form of acknowledgment of the frameworks which speakers already find themselves in. From this perspective, the linguistic repertoire emerges as the result of a relational process shaped by the environment encountered as well as our own actions taken in this encounter. When researching lived language experience of this interaction, it is thus important to conceive of language ‘not primarily as a system of symbolic representation, but as an intersubjective bodily gesture to open and to relate oneself to the other, to the world’ (Busch, 2016: 320; cf. Merleau-Ponty, 2012). Finally, the inextricable link between ambiguity and demarcation furthermore has implications for this study which investigates ambiguity in lived language experience articulated by refugees. For in order to identify ambiguity, different meanings have to be identified. On the one hand, this identification is necessary to better understand the meaningfulness of ambiguity as it presents itself to speakers in the given context; on the other hand, it is a form of reducing experience to those meanings identified. To increase visibility of an undefined space, this chapter uses the term tension to emphasize the perspective of experience. It is used when referring to speakers’ articulations of feelings that tell them that ‘something does not quite fit’. This feeling can be experienced with or without having conceptualized an ambiguity, i.e. without having clearly identified the endpoints between which tension exists, or the ‘thing’ that does not quite fit. Ambiguity is used to emphasize an analytical perspective on experience. It can be seen as tension made meaningful and necessarily includes categorization of experience. To illustrate this differentiation, further above this chapter has stated that due to the situation of relocation itself immigrants are confronted with an underlying experience that one’s own linguistic repertoire does not quite fit. The ambiguity identified here is one between the (linguistic) Self and the environment. While this ambiguity may be conceptualized as such by the speakers themselves, in situ experience involves the immediate ‘bodily and emotionally lived experience of language and communication’ (Busch, 2021; cf. Busch, 2017). From the experiential side, ambiguity may hence show itself more in the form of feelings of tension between ‘things’ that do not quite fit.

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Enquiring into Lived Language Experience by Applied Linguistics and Philosophical Practice

The data analyzed in this study were generated through an interdisciplinary and participatory research project. The project was conducted between October and December 2019 and invited both volunteer teachers and refugees to enquire into and philosophize about language. The participants were involved in different forms in a grassroots initiative for which I will use the pseudonym ‘LangLife’. This initiative is based in Graz, Austria, and allowed me to integrate an activity to ‘philosophize with and about language’ in their schedule of language courses. German was set as the main lingua franca; however, the actual sessions were approached with a translanguaging attitude, ‘rooted in the belief that bilinguals and multilinguals select features and co-construct or softassemble their language practices from a variety of relational contexts in ways that fit their communicative needs’ (García, 2014: 95, original emphasis). Eventually, approximately 12 participants engaged in the collaborative enquiry into lived language experience, with four of them participating regularly in the six meetings that were held (each lasting about two hours). The project was approached under a participatory notion of research ‘as a collaborative process that engages researchers and community members in knowledge generation, capacity building and action for social change’ (Wegleitner & Schuchter, 2018: 86). The grassroots setting was considered appropriate to initiate such a process as the participants could articulate their experiences in a setting familiar to them and with speakers they already knew. Additionally, as elaborated on before, grassroots movements are themselves confronted with ambiguity in positioning themselves in the given context of immigration. Moving research to a setting that bridges the private and public, the individual and the communal, the project intended to create ‘spaces where people can connect with the stories of others and where issues of power and (in) justice can be addressed’ (Schuchter, 2020: 120). The participatory approach had implications for both participants and researcher roles. Firstly, by engaging in philosophical enquiry, participants were involved in interpretation of their own experiences, which impacts on data analysis as will be explained further in the next section. Secondly, taking on the role of the moderator in the meetings as a researcher also meant involvement with the participants, their stories, experiences and the practice of collective enquiry itself. To support self-reflection and project evaluation, I kept a reflective research journal and engaged in regular supervision with colleagues throughout the time span of the project. The participants enquired into their own lived language experiences by philosophical dialogue, or rather polylogue, and methods from applied linguistic research. Language diaries (Jonsson, 2013) and non-verbal forms of expression like the language portrait (Busch, 2018) were used to

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prompt the sharing of narratives and encourage enquiry into their meaningfulness for individual participants as well as the whole group. In addition, visuals, doodles and the creation of symbols from plasticine were deployed to allow for a greater range of non-linguistic means of expression. The employment of philosophical group dialogue was inspired by approaches to philosophical practice (for an overview of approaches, see Romizi, 2019), which takes the stance that in everyday life, people are confronted with challenges and problems that often bear out questions of a philosophical kind (Marinoff, 2002; Sautet, 1998). These questions are, however, due to their typically unanswerable nature and one’s own embeddedness in experience, difficult to grasp alone. Thus, collaborative philosophical enquiry is an attempt to better understand and thereby ‘position oneself to human experience and to try finding words which set this experience into perspective, conciliating its inherent ambiguities’ (Lindseth, 2014: 69–70, my translation). As a practice of questioning the status quo and the attempt to capture the underlying meaning of lived phenomena, philosophizing combines with a (socio)linguistic citizenship stance as it acknowledges the inevitability of ambiguity of categories. In the given Table 4.1  Overview of project meetings held, focus topics/questions, prompts and methods, and data generated. Meeting Nr.

1

2

3

4

5

6

Focus topic / question

Which languages do we speak and how do we experience that?

How in our everyday lives do we use our language(s) and where?

How are these experiences meaningful to us?

How are these experiences meaningful to human experience more generally?

How can we express our experiences to each other?

Harvesting and collecting insights in a format to share – brochure

Prompts and methods

Shared group language portrait, language portrait

Flip-charts and places

Language diary; sharing and collecting, experiences orally

Philosophical dialogue

Voicing and sharing experience in spoken written format; storytelling, finding titles, creating symbols with plasticine and paintings

Philosophical dialogue and round-up; brochure creation

Flip-chart papers for four different spaces, filled by participants

Flip-chart protocol made with participants in class

Flip-chart protocol made with participants in class (additions)

Participant narratives and painted/ plastic symbols

Participant narratives and painted/ plastic symbols

Data Group available language portrait

Researcher protocol and reflective journal

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context, it furthermore allows to claim power of definition from forces of the nation state and dominant discourses. In the first meeting, a visual outline drawn on flip-chart paper was used to introduce participants to the intended topical focus points for each meeting and the possible material and prompts that could be used. This outline was then revisited in each meeting to allow participants to change their course of action and put focus on what appears salient to them. Thereby, participants were invited to engage in shaping the course itself, which, for example, resulted in the postponing of a writing activity and an addition of a sixth session to those five which were initially planned. The eventual proceedings are outlined in Table 4.1, showing focus topics, prompts and materials used/generated for each meeting. The data set from the project consists of the generated material, protocols, personal field notes and a research journal. Finally, to make insights gained accessible to the community of LangLife, in the final meetings, a brochure was created, summarizing the process of enquiry and providing narrative and visual accounts of lived language experience as expressed by the participants. This brochure was then distributed at a gathering of the organization. Exploring Ambiguity in Lived Language Experience by Refugees in the Austrian Immigration Context

This section illustrates the meaningfulness of experiences of tension as expressed by speakers involved in the Austrian immigration context by analysis of ambiguity in selected data extracts. Rather than aiming for coverage of data, detailed analysis makes visible ambiguities speakers subject to the Austrian Integration Agreement are confronted with in their daily lives. Where possible, the following four subsections use participants’ quotes to illustrate the ambiguities discussed. Appropriacy for noting down the ambiguities by reference to participants’ utterances results from the participatory approach which encompassed a form of coding according to saliency by participants’ perspectives already within the course of data generation. Upon sharing narratives, the philosophical enquiry encompassed loops of individual and collective reflection upon them and of working out the meanings of experiences to the participants. These meanings were again taken up to make meaning of them as a group by sharing thoughts and related experiences. For example, when experiences were noted down on a flip-chart paper, the keywords used were negotiated in the group. In subsequent sessions, these keywords were then often picked up by participants to reflect upon links between what had been discussed before and the experiences brought to the current session. Those narratives which participants wrote down as stories during the last sessions were also reflected upon in group. Together with the author of the respective narrative, the group found titles that appeared most

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appropriate to them for expressing the underlying meaning of the experience captured by the story. Being a certified competent speaker who is not really speaking ‘ich habe alle zertifikate, aber mein freund auf der baustelle. er spricht wirklich’. (I’ve got all the certificates, but my friend who works on the construction site. He really speaks.) Data Extract 1 Participant: Latif, Meeting Nr. 3, Data type & material: spoken, protocol

These words (Data extract 1) were uttered by Latif in our third meeting, when we enquired into lived language experience by focusing on daily encounters in different interactional spaces relevant to the participants (the four chosen by the group were at home, online, in the German class, and around town). Latif is a man around the age of 30 who left Iraq to seek refuge in Austria in 2015. As emerges from his utterance, Latif, despite having obtained official certification for communicative competence in German up to level B2, expresses the experience of tension between his attested communicative competence and his actual experience when speaking. In describing this tension, he refers to a gap between his use of the German language and his friend’s language use who is working at a construction site and who presumably – unlike Latif – is really speaking. Regarding the limitations in providing an absolute definition of what it means to ‘really’ speak, Latif’s utterance indicates that the confrontation with linguistic diversity and the question of dealing with it can be a source of philosophical questions related to language use. Asking for ambiguities underlying Latif’s observation, the question arises what ‘real’ speaking would consist of for Latif. However, he did not further elaborate on his definition. What can be said, still, is that the comparison with his friend is based upon the assumption that both are confronted with the same structural conditions and the transformative appeal of relocation. Having taken German language courses and tests beyond the required level B1, Latif seems to have responded to this appeal by following the paths of integration as laid out by formal entitlement. Following a relational understanding of agency, Latif’s actions may follow imposed norms, but are still representative for his assuming of agency as he actively confronts the envisaged challenges by ‘responsive (and communicative) intelligence’ (Emirbayer & Mische, 1998: 969). Furthermore, on the acceptance of the promise of integration by language certificates, his friends’ success with ‘really’ speaking challenges his own success with language certificates. This points to the paradox pointed out by Isin and Nielsen (2008: 11), whereby formal entitlement cannot grant inclusion in

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the language of community. Latif seems to see this kind of communal quality in his friends’ language use. Finally, as regards the question of which ambiguities are expressed in Latif’s utterance, it can also be said that it illustrates a real-world experience of the difference between the conceptualization of language as a system of symbolic representation, i.e. a system of notation and means to carry out actions, and language as an intersubjective bodily gesture relating oneself with others and the world. While he has been certified communicative competence up to CEFR level B2, the kind of communicative competence he acquired does not seem to cover the relational dimension of language use. ‘I even have a driving license for forklifts’ – Socioeconomic promises of certificates

In our second meeting, Mubashir, who has a similar background as Latif and is about 34 years old, told the group that he has passed the language tests beyond the required B1 level and noted it down on the rightbottom corner of the flip-chart representing the interactional space of the German language class (see Figure 4.1). While, as described above, Latif expressed experience of mismatch between certified communicative competence and the quality of ‘real’ speaking, Mubashir’s focus in narrative was related to the expression of an urgent need and wish to find a job. He emphasized that he has the necessary qualifications and fulfilled the necessary language certificates for getting a job. Mubashir expressed frustration with going to public institutions and removed his briefcase to show and tell us that he even has the Austrian driving license for forklifts. Mubashir

Figure 4.1  Collaborative flip-chart paper places – German language class, Meeting Nr. 2

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furthermore said that he had tried to start an apprenticeship in Austria but was told that these spots are reserved for younger persons. He went on telling the group that when showing his Austrian certificates at a workplace, people still ask him if he had worked in similar jobs before in Iraq. He answers this with yes but cannot prove it, explaining to us, ‘in Iraq we do not have these certificates’. He added that people are wrong if they believe that refugees come to Austria to get money. Finally, Mubashir pointed out that the German language is so difficult and illustrates this experience by pointing out the use of prepositions: ‘Manche Leute sagen “auf der Arbeit”, andere “in der Arbeit”, “bei der Arbeit” – Wie soll ich jemals wissen was ist richtig?! [Some people say “auf der Arbeit”, others say “in der Arbeit”, “bei der Arbeit” – How should I ever know what is right?!]’. Many in the group agreed and, trying to comfort him, highlighted that in real life, they still get things done, even though they may not use the correct preposition. From this conversation, our enquiry moved on to questions related to differences between written and spoken language. Mubashirs’ elaborations on his frustration and experience of tensions between the fulfilment of set (language) requirements in the professional sector and still not achieving the aim of finding a job, illustrate how daily experiences of success and achievement, center around German language certificates, and with it the central role of CEFR levels. The tension he expresses seems to be related to the expectation that when certificates are obtained and requirements are fulfilled the path to socioeconomic integration into the Austrian job market is opened. He seems to have formed this expectation as he engaged with the structural conditions in Austria, as he explicitly put forward that in Iraq, there would not be need for such certificates to find a job. His learning of having to optimize himself to fit in with the job market may be indicative for the neoliberal stance transcending public and private spheres in modern European countries (cf. Flubacher & Busch, 2022). In response to his new environment, Mubashir assumed agency by taking concrete actions such as engaging with public offices to get information, learning about necessary steps people in Austria have to take in order to get a job, evaluating his position, and identifying what he can do to get a job himself. Mubashir thereby also constitutes himself as a person like any other on the job market. Again, this reminds of Isin and Nielsen’s (2008: 11) definition of acts of citizenship, whereby acts of citizenship may also be cultivated by frameworks in place. ‘Someone here would never write democracy’ Mubashir:

ich schreibe ‘‫[ ’ديمقراطية‬Demokratie] Demokratie, weil es ist so wichtig (I write ‘‫[ ’ديمقراطية‬democracy]’ democracy because it is so important)

Akil:

jemand hier würde es sicher nie schreiben (someone here would probably never write it)

Data Extract 2 Participant: Mubashir, Akil, Meeting Nr. 2, Data type & material: written, protocol

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Figure 4.2  Group language portrait, Meeting Nr. 2

Figure 4.2 shows a photography of the group language portrait on a flip-chart paper. This tool was used from our first meeting onward to introduce ourselves to each other. All participants noted down words that were important to them and explained their choice to the others. Whenever a new participant joined, we referred back to that shared portrait for the purposes of introduction and the new person added their own word(s) and explained their relevance to them. The group portrait was permanently put on display in the room we met. Data Extract 2. shows a sequence of utterances by Mubashir and Akil from the second meeting, when Mubashir joined us for the first time. He wrote down the word ‘‫[ ’ديمق راطية‬democracy] on our group language portrait next to the right hand of the shared body silhouette (Figure 4.2) and said, ‘I write “‫”ديمق راطية‬, “democracy”, because it is so important’. Another participant named Akil added, ‘someone here would probably never write it’. Exploring why, participants agreed that ‘here’, i.e. in Austria, democracy is a given.

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In this sequence, Mubashir and Akil identify a difference as regards the world view between ‘them’, i.e. refugees, and people ‘here’, i.e. local Austrians, which is linked to the question of possibilities for democratic participation. By indicating that ‘Austrians’ do not really recognize the empirical meaningfulness of living in a democracy but that they do, Mubashir and Akil claim entitlement to citizenship of a democratically organized state by having a deeper insight into it. Interpreted as an act of citizenship, they constitute themselves as ‘true citizens’ of democracy. Consciously or not, they thereby also make an ironic comment on another requirement related to Austrian integration tests which, apart from the German language part, also include sections that assess the recognition of democratic values of a European democratically organized state (IntG, 2019: §2, §7). Additionally, as they put emphasis on the relevance of experience for having insight into the meaning of a basic concept of social life, Mubashir and Akil challenge the established distribution of power over defining democracy, and hence also the narrow definition of citizenship. Assuming agency as a speaker to cause misunderstanding Wo ein Wille, da ein Weg | Akil  Als ich Deutsch zu lernen begonnen habe, habe ich so viel Grammatik gelernt und viele Übungen gemacht. Trotzdem konnte ich nicht gut sprechen, aber jetzt versuche ich praktisch zu lernen; zum Beispiel höre ich jeden Tag die Nachrichten auf Deutsch und schaue Filme und TV Sendungen auf Deutsch. Das funktioniert ganz gut und ich lerne immer was Neues. Jetzt aber ganz locker, nicht ganz ohne Stress, aber mit Spaß auch.  Mein großes Problem mit der deutschen Sprache ist, dass wenn ich mit jemandem rede und ich etwas sage, er aber etwas ganz andres versteht als ich meine. Das Missverständnis passiert immer mit mir. (Where there’s a will there’s a way | Akil When I started learning German, I have learned so much grammar and did so many exercises. Still I could not speak well. But now I learn practically. For example, I listen to the news in German and watch movies and TV series in German. That works quite well and I always learn something new. Now with ease, not fully without stress, but also with fun. My big problem with the German language is, that when I talk to someone and when I say something, but they always understand something totally different from what I mean. This misunderstanding always happens with me.) Data Extract 3 Participant: Akil, Meeting Nr. 5–6, Data type & material: written narrative for brochure

Data Extract 3 represents the narrative Akil wrote down for print in the brochure that was distributed at the end of the project among people in

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the grassroots movement LangLife. The process of participants’ selecting a narrative, finding a title, and putting it down in writing spanned across meetings 5 and 6 (see Table 4.1). In the first paragraph of his narrative, Akil describes different stages in his process of German language learning. These stages are contrasted by learning grammar and doing exercises in the early and past phases with a more ‘practical’ approach, as he calls it, in the present. For the present phase, he adds that learning German is still related to some stress, but ‘now’ it is happening with more ease than before and even with ‘fun’. His narrative is an example for how legally imposed urgency in language learning can override potentially positive experiences in a new linguistic environment. As pointed out in reference to Busch (2017) earlier, speakers may see the transformative appeal of relocation as an opportunity to reinvent oneself anew. Having passed through the tests, he now seems to reassume agency over the learning process itself by following his own ‘practical’ approach. The final paragraph in his narrative, however, indicates the experience of tension between exercising one’s agency as a speaking subject and the (absent) success in communication achieved through it. Highlighting that it is ‘My big problem with the German language’ and emphasizing that ‘misunderstanding always happens with me’, Akil indicates that he may be the root cause of misunderstandings. At the same time, Akil’s narrative also indicates that he does not seem to let himself be silenced when using German. Akil’s experience of tension point to a dominant language ideology which has also been problematized in relationship with the CEFR’s conceptualization of communicative competence (cf. Pitzl, 2015; Platzgummer, 2021). Similar to the construal of ambiguity and plurality as private problems, this ideology interprets misunderstandings as a consequence of a lack of language proficiency, rather than as inherent to any communication and matter of responsibility applying to all speakers involved. Discussion of Insights with a Focus on Standardized Competence Levels Defined by the CEFR

The preceding section has provided insight into refugees’ experiences of tension and the ambiguity that characterizes practices of language learning and positioning the Self in the Austrian immigration context. The meaning of both experience and actions showed to be ambiguous as the speakers simultaneously need to attend to ideas and practices of the integration process as defined by the Integration Agreement, and confront the concrete needs and desires of lived reality which are not captured by the structural frameworks. In doing so, as the data revealed, the participants exercise agency as they take both norm following and norm transgressing actions. The extracts discussed therefore illustrate the relational

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understanding of agency as it underlies (socio)linguistic citizenship research. Additionally, what emerged clearly is that it is not just the imposition of a language, i.e. German, on refugees that narrows the spectrum of articulation of speaker voice in the Austrian immigration context. Moreover, the enforcement of disambiguation by centralization and standardization measures enforced by the link between the Integration Law and the CEFR reduces spaces of interaction and educational practices that acknowledge the plurality and ambiguity of lived realities as systemic rather than as private problems. Throughout the sample analyzed, this notion has furthermore shown to play an immensely important role in participants’ lives: Latif and Mubashirs’ experiences discussed above both showed to be closely linked to attested communicative competence by CEFR standards and the need for certification of language skills and other qualifications. The following sections have pointed more to experiences of differences in speaker and citizenship status and established ideas about the success of communication and responsibility over it. The provision of public spaces embracing ambiguity hence appears to be central for the recognition of speakers’ voices in the given context. Albeit the CEFR has been designed out of the recognition of linguistic diversity within Europe and a political agenda of promoting plurilingualism (cf. Council of Europe, 2001: 2), this study confirms earlier criticism raised against it. As McNamara (2011: 506) has pointed out, ‘the cost of unification is the devaluing of the local interpretation of the goals of education’. Despite the rather small sample, the current study reflects the relevance of theses local interpretations to individuals but also to social and economic life (cf. Rampton et al., 2018: 4). It revealed that the same structural conditions confronted evoke different responses in action and interpretation of one’s own situation. Furthermore, different ambiguities assume different degrees of saliency for each individual. While so far this chapter has focused on the threats to speakers’ voices linked with disambiguation and the imposition of pre-defined ideas on speakers, the remainder of this section discusses the content of the CEFR notion of communicative competence itself. Drawing upon the insights gained, the following investigates its meaningfulness for the articulation of tension and the (re)claiming of voice in the given context. As emphasized by the CEFR, the conceptualization of communicative competence follows an ‘action-oriented approach’ (Council of Europe, 2001: 9–15; 2018: 27–29). This means that the descriptors for communicative competence are based on the assumed actions speakers need to be able to take in the target language at the respective level from A1–C2. Even though the CEFR itself emphasizes repeatedly that the descriptor scales need to be adapted according to situation and needs of learners (cf. Council of Europe, 2001: 1, 7; 2018: 42–44), it is noteworthy that the global scale of descriptors (Council of Europe, 2001: 24; see Table 4.2), which also

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underlies assessment of Austrian integration tests, is designed in a way that competencies related to expressing ones’ views and perceptions and hence to the manifesting of voice are only intended for the upper levels. As can be seen in Table 4.2, being able to express ‘experiences and events, dreams, hopes, and ambitions’ is included only from B1 level onward. Linguistic action at A1 level is confined to ‘the satisfaction of needs of a concrete type’ and at A2 level to ‘routine tasks requiring a simple and Table 4.2 Adapted version of CEFR Global Scale with added emphasis in bold (Council of Europe, 2001: 24; see also Council of Europe, 2018: Appendix 1) PROFICIENT USER C2

Can understand with ease virtually everything heard or read. Can summarize information from different spoken and written sources, reconstructing arguments and accounts in a coherent presentation. Can express him/herself spontaneously, very fluently and precisely, differentiating finer shades of meaning even in more complex situations.

C1

Can understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts, and recognize implicit meaning. Can express him/herself fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for expressions. Can use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes. Can produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, showing controlled use of organizational patterns, connectors and cohesive devices.

B2

Can understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of specialization. Can interact with a degree of fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without strain for either party. Can produce clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects and explain a viewpoint on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options.

B1

Can understand the main points of clear standard input on familiar matters regularly encountered in work, school, leisure, etc. Can deal with most situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where the language is spoken. Can produce simple connected text on topics which are familiar or of personal interest. Can describe experiences and events, dreams, hopes and ambitions and briefly give reasons and explanations for opinions and plans.

A2

Can understand sentences and frequently used expressions related to areas of most immediate relevance (e.g. very basic personal and family information, shopping, local geography, employment). Can communicate in simple and routine tasks requiring a simple and direct exchange of information on familiar and routine matters. Can describe in simple terms aspects of his/her background, immediate environment, and matters in areas of immediate need.

A1

Can understand and use familiar everyday expressions and very basic phrases aimed at the satisfaction of needs of a concrete type. Can introduce him/herself and others and can ask and answer questions about personal details such as where he/she lives, people he/she knows and things he/she has. Can interact in a simple way provided the other person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help.

INDEPENDENT USER

BASIC USER

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direct exchange of information on familiar and routine matters’. The competence to ‘explain a viewpoint on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options’, and topics beyond the immediate personal sphere is seen to be relevant at B2 level – a level which is not even demanded by the refugee immigrant.  What needs to be made explicit at this point, is that taking the critique put forward here as a basis for demanding higher levels of communicative competence from immigrants is neither a favorable interpretation nor is it a solution to the problem enforced by the CEFR. Regardless of the level demanded, as long as a standardized idea of the proficient language user plays the prime mover in defining the understanding of what refugees’ (and any other language learners’) (linguistic) needs and desires are, conceptual and interactional space for defining it otherwise will be reduced. Referring back to Latif’s experience of a gap between being a certified communicatively competent speaker and really speaking, the dominance of the action-oriented notion of communicative competence as exemplified by the CEFR and the Austrian Integration Agreement seems to reenforce this gap by neglecting the relational dimension of language, which may just not be possible to grasp in form of standardized descriptors. Pointing to links with the neoliberalization of education and practices as highlighted by Flubacher and Busch (2022), this neglect seems to be related to a more general marketization of human capabilities like language use, as the following quote from the Council of Europe’s website on linguistic integration of adult migrants (Council of Europe, 2021) indicates:  In our daily lives all of us perform some language activities more than others. Most of the communication related to social interaction and the transactions we carry out in shops, banks, etc. are associated with A2; and in most societies the majority of native speakers do not need to perform the tasks specified for production and interaction at the higher CEFR levels. These are important considerations when determining the proficiency level that adult migrants should demonstrate in the language of their host country in order to secure entry, permanent residence or citizenship. [my emphasis]

Apart from issues related to conceptualizing communicative competence against linguistic needs of idealized native speaker speech communities, this quote suggests that the marketization of communicative competence extends beyond the (refugee) language learner/user, as the needs of speakers at the lower levels of the CEFR scale are compared with ‘the majority of native speakers’ who presumably do not need to carry out actions associated with the upper levels of the scale. Considering democratic participation by effective expression of one’s views and perceptions, this implies a political hierarchy of speaking subjects by competency levels (including ‘native speakers’), construing those at the lower levels as

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concerned more with the immediate private, rather than the political spheres of life. Conclusion

The insights gained in this study illustrate how the notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship can serve as a ‘blueprint for a conceptual space within which to think differently – politically and ethically – about ­language and ourselves’ (Stroud, 2018: 18). It was combined with a phenomenological understanding of language and a focus on lived language experience whereby the experience of tension and articulation of ambiguity emerged as central to the amplifying of voice. The analysis of the structural conditions faced by refugees upon seeking permanent residence in Austria, however, showed that the combination of legal frameworks with the dominant CEFR notion of the proficient language user construe ambiguity as a matter of the private rather than the public and political spheres. Thereby, responsibility over dealing with the limitations of notational systems like law and policy, and of meaning-making itself, are shoved off to individual speakers. Additionally, the study suggests that the linear and action-oriented notion of communicative competence by the CEFR potentially re-enforces political hierarchies among speakers and ongoing trends toward neoliberalization in the public spheres. The frameworks in place shift power of definition to top-down management, whereby non-institutional spaces of interaction like the grassroots language classroom are permeated with pre-defined notions of what it means to use language proficiently in the context of Austrian immigration. Thereby bottom-up spaces of interaction lose some of their potential for the recognition of speakers’ voices, needs and desires. Concluding, the insights gained in this chapter encourage Austrian grassroots movements which offer language activities to get involved with the ambiguity in their own position as a space of empowerment and mediation of the hegemonial language at the same time. Engaging in exploration of the meaningfulness of experienced tensions with both volunteer language teachers and refugees alike, as this chapter suggests, can open a space of articulating and making visible the ambiguity and plurality of reality denied by structural frameworks in place. In this project, this space was opened by drawing upon methods from applied linguistics and philosophical dialogue to acknowledge the ambiguity of categorization, assume agency over definition, and allow for a broader spectrum of (linguistic) means of expression to reclaim ones’ voice. Acknowledgments

Writing this chapter would not have been possible without openness of participants to share their thoughts and experiences and the

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cooperation of the grassroots initiative with whom this exploratory project was conducted. Additionally, I want to thank those who have supported this project and the process of writing this chapter by taking on roles as supervisors, inspiring colleagues or personal peer-reviewers: Donata Romizi, Barbara Seidlhofer, Brigitta Busch, Verena Platzgummer, Stefanie Rieger, Werner Klikova, Shamsey Oloko, Patrick Schuchter, Cornelia Bruell and Stefanie Riegler. References Busch, B. (2016) Regaining a place from which to speak and be heard: In search of a response to the ‘violence of voicelessness’. Stellenbosch Papers in Linguistics Plus 49, 317–330. Busch, B. (2017) Expanding the notion of the linguistic repertoire: On the concept of Spracherleben — The lived experience of language. Applied Linguistics 38 (3), 340–358. Busch, B. (2018) The language portrait in multilingualism research: Theoretical and methodological considerations. Working Papers in Urban Language & Literacies 236, 2–13. Busch, B. (2021) The body image: Taking an evaluative stance towards semiotic resources. International Journal of Multilingualism 18 (2), 190–205. Council of Europe (2001) Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Council of Europe (2018) Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment. Companion Volume with new Descriptors. See https://rm.coe.int/cefr-companion-volume-with-new-descriptors-2018/1680787989. Council of Europe (2021) Linguistic Integration of Adult Migrants (LIAM): CEFR, Levels of Proficiency and Profiles. See https://www.coe.int/en/web/lang-migrants/cefr-andprofiles (accessed 11 March 2021). Emirbayer, M. and Mische, A. (1998) What is agency? American Journal of Sociology 103 (4), 962–1023. Flubacher, M.-C. and Busch, B. (2022) Language advocacy in times of securitization and neoliberalization: The network LanguageRights. Language Policy 21, 545–560. See https://doi.org/10.1007/s10993-022-09617-4. García, O. (2014) Multilingualism and language education. In C. Leung and B.V. Street (eds) The Routledge Companion to English Studies (pp. 84–99). London:Routledge. Hymes, D. (2003) Ethnography, Linguistics, Narrative Inequality: Toward an Understanding of Voice. London: Taylor & Francis. IntG (2019) Bundesgesetz zur Integration rechtmäßig in Österreich aufhältiger Personen ohne österreichische Staatsbürgerschaft (Integrationsgesetz) [National legislation for integration of legally entitled persons residing in Austria without Austrian citizenship (Integration Law)]. BGBl. I Nr. 68/2017 (rev. 2019). See https://www.ris.bka.gv.at/ GeltendeFassung.wxe?Abfrage=Bundesnormen&Gesetzesnummer=20009891&Fas sungVom=2019-07-11 (accessed 5 March 2020). Isin, E.F. (2009) Citizenship in flux: The figure of the activist citizen. Subjectivity 29, 367–388. Isin, E.F. and Nielsen, G.M. (2008) Acts of Citizenship. London: Zed Books. Jonsson, C. (2013) Translanguaging and multilingual literacies: Diary-based case studies of adolescents in an international school. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 224, 85–117. Lindseth, A. (2014) Von der methode der philosophischen praxis als dialogischer beratung [About the method of philosophical practice as dialogic counselling]. In D. Staude

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(ed.) Edition Moderne Postmoderne. Methoden Philosophischer Praxis: Ein Handbuch [Edition Modern Postmodernity. Methods of Philosophical Practice: A Handbook] (pp. 67–100). Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag. Marinoff, L. (ed.) (2002) Philosophical Practice. San Diego: Academic Press. McNamara, T. (2011) Managing learning: Authority and language assessment. Language Teaching 44 (4), 500–515. Merleau-Ponty, M. (2012) Phenomenology of Perception (trans. D.A. Landes). Abingdon: Routledge. NAG (2005) Bundesgesetz über die niederlassung und den aufenthalt in Österreich (Niederlassungs- und aufenthaltsgesetz) [National legislation for subsidiary and residence in Austria (Subsidiary and residence law)]. BGBl. I Nr. 100/2005. See https:// www.ris.bka.gv.at/GeltendeFassung.wxe?Abfrage=Bundesnormen&Gesetzesnumm er=20004242&FassungVom=2021-01-09 (accessed 5 March 2021). ÖIF (Österreichischer Integrationsfonds) (2021) Deutsch lernen. See https://www. integrationsfonds.at/sprache/ (accessed 14 January 2021). Pitzl,  M.-L. (2015) Understanding and misunderstanding in the Common European Framework of Reference: What we can learn from research on BELF and intercultural communication. Journal of English as a Lingua Franca 4 (1), 91–124. Platzgummer, V. (2021) Positioning the self. A subject-centred perspective on adolescents’ linguistic repertoires and language ideologies in South Tyrol. PhD thesis, University of Vienna. Rampton, B. and Holmes, S. (2018) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science Education 17 (4), 68–83. Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018) Promoting linguistic citizenship: Issues, problems and possibilities. Working Papers in Urban Language & Literacies 233, 1–29. Romizi, D. (2019) Philosophische praxis: Eine standortbestimmung von Donata Romizi [Philosophical practice: A definition of position by Donata Romizi]. Information Philosophie 4, 84–94. Sautet, M. (1998) Ein Café für Sokrates: Philosophie für Jedermann [A Café for Socrates: Philosophy for Everyone] (2nd edn). Düsseldorf: Artemis und Winkler. Schuchter,  P. (2020) Philosophical dialogue in palliative care and hospice work. International Journal of Care and Caring 4 (1), 117–123. Seligman, A.B. and Weller, R.P. (2012) Rethinking Pluralism. Ritual, Experience, and Ambiguity. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Stroud, C. (2001) African mother-tongue programmes and the politics of language: Linguistic citizenship versus Linguistic Human Rights. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 22 (4), 339–355. Stroud, C. (2008) Bilingualism: Colonialism and post-colonialism. In M. Heller (ed.) Bilingualism: A Social Approach (pp. 25–49). Basingstoke: Palgrave. Stroud,  C. (2018) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Stroud, C. and Heugh, K. (2004) Linguistic human rights and linguistic citizenship. In J. Freeland and D. Patrick (eds) Language Rights and Language Survival (pp. 191–218). Manchester: St. Jerome. Verein Migrationspädagogische Zweitsprachdidaktik (2021) Our concern. See https:// www.mpzweitsprachdidaktik.at/en/about (accessed 5 January 2021). Wegleitner, K. and Schuchter, P. (2018) Caring communities as collective learning process: Findings and lessons learned from a participatory research project in Austria. Annals of Palliative Medicine 7, 84–98.

5 Giving Voice to Mothers from Refugee Backgrounds: Their Agentic Roles in Children’s Learning Melissa Barnes and Katrina Tour

There is significant interest in the role of parents in children’s learning. While parents are encouraged to be actively involved in their children’s learning (Hollingworth et al., 2011), there is limited research exploring how parents, from refugee backgrounds, position themselves as active agents in their child’s learning within their new country. Women from refugee backgrounds, in particular, often remain voiceless in how they engage in their child’s learning due to a lack of linguistic capital and their differing sociocultural, religious and educational backgrounds. Drawing upon Bourdieu’s thinking tools of habitus, field and capital and a (socio)linguistic citizenship approach (Stroud, 2018a), this qualitative case study employed participatory art-based research methods to examine how 24 Afghani mothers, newly arrived in Australia, view their role in supporting their child’s learning. The data were collected through group discussions in Dari and participant-generated multimodal artefacts, captured through photographs. The findings reveal that the participating mothers acknowledged the barriers that made supporting their children’s learning at home difficult, including limited English language skills and/or knowledge of the Australian education system, but actively responded by drawing upon their strengths – including their mother tongue – to mediate opportunities for learning at home for both their children and themselves. It is widely recognised that parents play an important role in supporting their children’s learning by facilitating meaningful learning experiences at home (Barger et al., 2019; Emerson et al., 2012; Hirst et al., 2010; Topor et al., 2010; Tour & Barnes, 2021). While parent involvement can include participation in school events and activities (e.g. school events, 82

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parent-teacher conferences, helping with reading activities, etc.), it can also consist of learning at home (Epstein, 2018) which includes discussions about school and help with homework and other curricular activities. Although parents have been encouraged to take an active role in their children’s learning (Hollingworth et al., 2011), concerns have been raised that some parents become over involved, discouraging their children from taking responsibility for their own learning (Topor et al., 2010), while others disengage as they feel ill-equipped to adequately provide support (Deng & Marlowe, 2013). Despite the importance of parent involvement in supporting children’s learning, there remains a dearth of literature exploring how mothers from refugee backgrounds understand and negotiate their roles in supporting their children’s learning at home. Drawing upon the perspective that mothers from refugee backgrounds contribute unique strengths, values and experiences (Karsli-Calamak, 2018; Timmons & Dworkin, 2020), this chapter explores how 24 Afghani mothers express their voice and agency and participate in their children’s learning through everyday language practices. Refugee Families: Supporting Children’s Learning at Home

In recent years, there has been significant research interest in refugee families’ engagement in children’s education both in and out of school contexts aiming to understand different dimensions of parental involvement. One significant theme identified in the review of the literature is related to the families’ aspirations. Research suggests that refugee families place high value on education in a new country, want their children to be successful in school and see education as central to social mobility. For example, Boit et al. (2020: 689) found that refugee mothers of preschool children in the US ‘unquestionably valued literacy development’ and considered learning to read, write and speak English as top priorities for their young children’s school readiness. Similarly, McBrien (2011) and Karsli-Calamak (2018), exploring the involvement of different cultural groups in their children’s schooling, report that these mothers wanted to see their children successful academically and had high aspirations for their children to graduate from school, enter higher education and pursue prestigious career pathways. The importance of their children’s education for parents was also emphasised in Timmons and Dworkin’s (2020) comprehensive literature review of the research on African families. Interestingly, some studies report that children’s education is so important to refugee mothers, in particular, that they take persistent actions and demonstrate very agentic behaviour to organise better learning experiences and high-quality education for their children in a new country (Durand, 2011; Karsli-Calamak, 2018). However, many of these mothers perceive high-quality learning experiences as

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something that exists outside the home and external from their everyday family practices. Driven by these high aspirations, refugee mothers are ‘trying their best’ (Boit et al., 2020: 689) to support their children’s learning at home. Home learning practices and activities have been a research focus recently due to a significant shift from a deficit perspective on refugee women as ‘uneducated’ and ‘incompetent’ towards the recognition of the value of what mothers already do for their children (Karsli-Calamak, 2018: 45). Research has documented a number of different strategies used by parents at home to support children’s learning. In their study of nine refugee mothers of preschool children, Boit et al. (2020: 687) found that the most utilised strategies were ‘cultural forms of literacy such as storytelling and singing songs’, while some mothers engaged children in early reading and writing (e.g. drawing and alphabet writing). Other parental strategies for learning at home with older children were reported by the parents in Durand’s (2011) research, and these included direct teaching, reading and setting rules regarding the completion of homework. Furthermore, when teaching children about ‘how to get along in the world’ (Durand, 2011: 267), the parents often shared advice, personal knowledge and experiences. Seeking external help as a strategy to help children with homework was documented by Whitmarsh (2011). When a mother from a refugee background could not assist with homework due to language difficulties, she asked her own language teacher to help. Beyond assisting with homework, Deng and Marlowe’s (2013: 423) study found that Sudanese mothers wanted to extend children’s learning at home because they believed that ‘what they learnt at school was not enough’. However, these women wanted additional support, which signals that they could not or did not know how to extend learning at home and relied on external resources and assistance. Therefore, while mothers from refugee backgrounds demonstrated the desire to support their children’s education, they often neglected to realise the power of their own multilingual practices in supporting learning. Indeed, supporting learning at home may represent a significant challenge for mothers from refugee backgrounds. Linguistic abilities and confidence are reported in the literature as the most significant barriers for parental involvement because most refugee parents are in the process of language learning themselves. For example, the mothers in the study by Boit et al. (2020) shared that their levels of English and confidence associated with it hindered the quantity and quality of their reading with children at home. The same barrier is reported in relation to assisting with homework (Deng & Marlowe, 2013; Durand, 2011; Whitmarsh, 2011). While the mothers were committed to help, they reported that they could not always read or understand homework sent home because of their own lack of schooling or inability to read in English. Their low self-esteem can be further affected by how schools and teachers respond to this issue. In

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Whitmarsh’s (2011) research, a teacher’s negative comment added to one of the participants’ feelings of marginalisation and low confidence. Another barrier is a cultural barrier associated with school culture, routines and expectations in the host country. Georgis et al. (2014) found that some participants – Somali families in Canada – were confused about the school’s flexible and student-centred approach because the approaches to learning were different in their country of origin. This issue signals that limited understanding of school practices can also influence the ways in which families from refugee backgrounds support children’s learning at home. Finally, limited access to literacy materials at home and limited access to the public libraries were identified as a significant barrier affecting parental engagement and support (Boit et al., 2020). Coming from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, these families have limited opportunities to buy books. Accessing public libraries is also not possible for many families due to transportation issues (Boit et al., 2020). It is suggested that there are barriers for parents from refugee backgrounds in supporting their children’s learning and/or helping with homework, including language proficiency in the language of their resettlement country, understanding the schooling system and accessing learning resources (Boit et al., 2020; Deng & Marlowe, 2013; Durand, 2011; Whitmarsh, 2011). However, there is also evidence to suggest that some parents – particularly mothers – take an active role in extending opportunities for their children to learn at home by employing strategies such as storytelling, singing songs and engaging in basic reading and writing activities (Boit et al., 2020), as well as sharing their own learning experiences and advice (Durand, 2011). Despite this, there is still limited exploration into how parents use language to mediate learning experiences at home, what social contexts provide rich opportunities for this and how, through this process, they claim their right to express their voice and agency and actively participate to overcome the barriers that prevent them from engaging in their children’s learning. This chapter, therefore, examines how 24 Afghani mothers utilise everyday language practices to participate in their children’s learning at home, while also investigating their perspectives and understanding of their roles in supporting their children’s education. Theorising Linguistic Practices

This paper draws upon Bourdieu’s construct of linguistic capital, alongside Stroud’s conceptualisation of (socio)linguistic citizenship. In understanding linguistic capital, Bourdieu’s thinking tools of habitus, field and capital (more broadly) will be referred to, as these concepts are intertwined and reliant on one another. Therefore, understanding linguistic capital demands the consideration of both the social context, or field, and individuals’ ways of thinking and doing (habitus). While a social field

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elicits the rules of the game and the power relations that govern certain contexts, habitus is the predispositions and practices which often reflect or reproduce dominant social contexts or fields (e.g. home, school, work) where socialisation occurs. According to Bourdieu (1993), linguistic capital is a form of embodied cultural capital or is the possession of knowledge and skills in a language that allows for power within a particular context. For multilingual speakers, what constitutes linguistic capital is dependent on the social context, as different contexts may place a higher value on a particular language or languages. The concept of capital, more broadly, ‘functions as both a weapon and as a stake of struggle which allow its possessors to wield a power, an influence, and then to exist, in the field’ (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992: 98, italics in original text). Therefore, language practices, underpinned by language knowledge and skills are embodied forms of capital that allow language speakers to not only exist within a particular social context but to lay claim to power. Notably, linguistic capital has often been discussed in light of a particular language having power over other languages due to the dominance and power of the language within a particular context, such as in the case of refugees who resettle in English-speaking countries (Shwayli & Barnes, 2018). While Heugh and Stroud (2019) argue that it is a speaker’s access to and employment of multilingual resources which sets them apart from monolingual speakers, the discussions surrounding linguistic capital often focus on powerful monolingual ideals rather than the capital that exists in being able to access and employ a multitude of language resources and practices (Klapwijk & Van der Walt, 2016).  While Bourdieu’s thinking tools provide a lens to examine the existing power structures and the ways in which vulnerable speakers shape and/or are shaped by dominant linguistic fields, some have criticised Bourdieu’s ideas for being too deterministic and others claim that there is scope for agency among social actors (Bouzanis & Kemp, 2020; Dalal, 2016; Matsunaga et al., 2021). Acknowledging both the strengths and limitations of Bourdieu’s thinking tools in understanding linguistic practices of vulnerable speakers, (socio)linguistic citizenship provides a valuable and complementary theoretical lens to interrogate linguistic practices that emphasise participation and agency. (Socio)linguistic citizenship posits that language is the ‘medium whereby citizenship is enacted and performed’ (Stroud, 2009: 217), and it is through a ‘variety of semiotic means’ that non-mainstream and vulnerable speakers ‘express agency, voice and participation in the everyday politics of language’ (Williams & Stroud, 2015: 408). (Socio)linguistic citizenship captures how new actors claim rights and justice within new sites (e.g. fields) (Stroud, 2018a, 2018b), gaining control over political institutions (e.g. schools) by employing linguistic practices to express and give new meanings to the social and political issues that matter most to them (Williams & Stroud, 2015). Vulnerable speakers ‘exercise control over their language for a variety of purposes

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precisely to avoid the othering that comes with linguistic imposition’ (Stroud, 2018a: 7). Therefore, while Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus, field and capital provide important tools to explore the ways in which vulnerable speakers negotiate linguistic fields through the employment of a range of language practices, (socio)linguistic citizenship examines these practices as acts of citizenship that ‘shift the location of agency and voice’ and contribute to ‘transformative remedies’ (Stroud, 2018b: 21). This chapter explores how mothers from refugee backgrounds focus on what they can and do contribute to their children’s learning despite barriers to their participation. The mothers attempt to understand their children’s Australian schooling experience and employ everyday multilingual practices as a way to actively participate. Background and Context

This study, which captured the voices of mothers from refugee backgrounds, on ‘learning at home’ was set within a public primary school in the Australian state of Victoria. The participating school’s student population consisted of 60% of students having a Language Background Other Than English (LBOTE) and the school’s Index of Community SocioEducational Advantage (ACARA, 2020) was below the national average. The research project, The Community for Learning Partnership Program, implemented in 2019, was a collaboration between a large metropolitan university and the primary school described above. The programme attempted to address a problem, which was raised by the English as an Additional Language (EAL) teachers within the school, about how best to support EAL students with limited staff and time allocated for EAL lessons within the school day. As this problem has been identified in previous research in Australian schools (Windle & Miller, 2013), the purpose of the project was to consider ways to support EAL student learning outside the classroom, resulting in: • The design and implementation of a two-term (16-weeks) after-school programme for EAL students that involved students in digital multimodal composing (e.g. students created podcasts and book trailers). The programme was facilitated by four pre-service teachers from the partnering university. • The delivery of two two-hour workshops for parents of EAL students. These workshops aimed to identify how parents currently supported learning at home, as well as learn from one another on how to partner to support the learning needs of these children. The overall aim of The Community for Learning Partnership Program was to promote learning for all participants in order to: (1) extend EAL children’s literacy capabilities and skills through the use of digital literacies; (2) identify strategies that parents can use to support literacy learning

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at home using family resources (e.g. home language); and (3) develop preservice teachers’ capacity to support EAL students’ learning and work with their families. For the purposes of this chapter, however, we will focus only on the workshops and the data generated by the participating parents – who happened to all be mothers. Data Collection

The participants in this study consisted of 24 Afghani mothers who had children participating in the after-school programme. In collecting data, it was important to negate the role of language, in order to capture the mothers’ viewpoints and experiences without the possibility of language acting as a barrier. Also, we wanted to build rapport with these participants given that they had few opportunities to voice their views within a school setting and many were newly arrived within the community. Data were collected during the two workshops using collaborative group discussion (in Dari) in workshop one and participant-made multimodal collages in workshop two. The first workshop with the parents was centred around the group discussion. A printed list of discussion question prompts in both English and Dari (see Appendix A) was provided at each of the five tables in our designated meeting room, along with several large pieces of butcher paper and sticky notes. When the mothers entered the meeting room, they naturally gravitated towards a particular table, as they were not assigned, resulting in four to six mothers at each table. With the help of two of the school’s multicultural teaching aides who spoke Dari, we welcomed the guests, explained the discussion activity, and asked one of the mothers on each table to be the scribe. The multicultural aides and the researchers monitored the table discussions, listening in on conversations and answering any clarification questions. The data collected during this workshop consisted of the handwritten notes on the butcher paper and/or sticky notes attached to the butcher paper, which were then translated into English. These discussions were not audio- or video-recorded, particularly given that this was the first time that these mothers had ever participated in a research project, taking the advice from the multicultural aides that recordings of the discussions might make the mothers less willing to freely contribute to the discussion. The second workshop employed participatory Arts-Based Research (ABR) methods to capture the viewpoints and experiences of mothers from refugee backgrounds as they support their child’s learning at home. There has been increasing interest in ABR, particularly given the opportunities to capture subconscious and untapped emotions that are rarely revealed in traditional qualitative data collection methods, such as interviews and written responses (Leavy, 2015; van der Vaart et al., 2018). Through the process of art-making, the participants’ knowledge,

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experiences and viewpoints are captured and made visible (see ComptonLilly et al., 2019). ABR seeks to understand human experience and actions, while also widening audience participation (Wang et al., 2017). The use of participatory arts-based methods with culturally and linguistically diverse participants neutralises the possibility of language barriers, which can render participants voiceless. In addition, arts-based approaches can provide a sense of autonomy and control to participants as well as instil confidence in articulating their experiences and perspectives in their own creative ways (Darbyshire et al., 2005). We attempted to position parents as knowledgeable and capable actors in their children’s learning. In order to capture their perspectives and experiences, we used collage as an art-making method that would help in extending the collaborative discussions and provide further insight into individual perspectives. Collage has been a popular method used in ABR due to materials being easily accessible and participants generally being willing to participate in collage-making as this method is less intimidating than other art-making methods (Leavy, 2015). The participating mothers were asked to create collaborative collages that represented their opinions, perspectives and experiences in regard to how they support their children’s learning at home. This was explained in both English and Dari. The mothers had access to a range of materials, such as coloured playdough, small pieces of cloth, ribbons, shells, magazines, coloured pencils and markers. Having a range of materials to create their collage allowed the participants to transform these disparate and discrete items into new meanings (Chilton & Scotti, 2014; Leavy, 2015). The participants could use images and text from magazines, design their own 3-D elements from the tactile materials provided and also draw pictures, words and phrases alongside their creations. This allowed for a ‘juxtaposition of words and images, open[ing] up new meanings that would not otherwise be possible’ (Leavy, 2015: 235, italics in original text). Pictures were taken to capture the collages created by the mothers alongside with the participants’ brief explanations of the artifact elements. Data analysis of the written responses from the group discussions, the pictures of the participant-created collages and the researchers field notes involved iterative coding and were first coded separately and then crossreferenced. To identify codes, patterns or regular occurrences within each data set were identified as well as any ‘salient’ or ‘evocative’ data were highlighted (Saldaña, 2016: 4). A final phase of analysis was conducted to identify linguistic practices within the data, using the concepts of linguistic capital (Bourdieu, 1993) and (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2018a, 2018b). Due to the scope of this chapter, only two of the five collaboratively-created collages are presented in this chapter. Nevertheless, they adequately capture the collective ideas and perspectives reflected across all five artifacts. 

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Findings and Discussion

The study’s findings revealed that while the participating mothers from refugee backgrounds felt that they were linguistically and educationally ill-equipped to support their child’s learning at home, they reclaimed power, agency and voice by identifying ways they could reposition themselves to support their child’s learning, namely, through everyday language practices within family activities.  Overcoming concerns about their capacity to help children learn at home

In the discussion groups, a common response recorded on the sticky notes and butcher paper acknowledged, in very frank terms, that many of the participating mothers were unable to help their children with homework but they could still encourage them to extend their learning at home by using their own experiences and discussing learning in Dari. This suggests that while they viewed homework tasks as one part of home learning, they actively found ways to support learning in ways that reflected their personal strengths and capabilities. For example, many of the mothers expressed that they could not assist with homework tasks or their ‘studies’, but they could be actively present, by encouraging their children to engage with their learning at home.  I’m not able to help with my kids’ studies but as a mum I just encourage them. (Discussion Group 1) Sometimes I have the ability to use my limited knowledge to assist my kids with their studies but as the education system is different between Afghanistan and Australia, I can’t. (Discussion Group 1) Just my son sits with me and I’m listening to him and I’m encouraging but I don’t understand what he reads and says. (Discussion Group 3)

While these mothers at first lament their inability or limited knowledge to help, they reclaim power by expressing the value of being present and encouraging their children to learn. This finding reflects Moè et al. (2018) argument that when parents have positive attitudes towards homework tasks and are supportive and encouraging, this scaffolds children’s positive views towards homework and learning more generally. Therefore, the participants’ decision to be actively present and encourage engagement in homework tasks has a valuable impact on children’s learning. Despite these mothers’ realisation of the importance of encouragement, their responses depict how they view their linguistic capital (and cultural capital more broadly) as they recognise the limitations of not having a strong grasp of English and/or the education system. This aligns with the findings of several studies which reveal that refugee parents, and mothers

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more specifically, view their own language proficiency as a barrier in supporting and extending their children’s learning in their resettlement country (Boit et al., 2020; Deng & Marlowe, 2013; Durand, 2011; Karsli-Calamak, 2018; Whitmarsh, 2011). In Discussion Group 5 of this study, the mothers suggested that there should be a school-based English language programme to support them so that they could learn alongside their children. This suggests that these mothers value learning, which will act as an important scaffold and example for their children, but that they also realise the importance of having a strong proficiency in English so that they can extend their support and advocacy for their children’s learning. Their advocacy for their children’s education and their push to gain linguistic capital for the benefit of their children reflect these mothers’ acts of (socio)linguistic citizenship. They seek to employ language practices to establish their rights and the rights of their children to maximise the learning opportunities that can be garnered in their new countries. In addition to being actively present and providing positive encouragement for their children’s learning, many of the mothers sought other ways to support their children, such as drawing upon the knowledge and experience of family members. My oldest son is helping my youngest son. (Discussion Group 1) My husband is always busy at work so not able to help my child with homework. Sometimes I just sit with my kids to listen to their reading. Most of the time, my older son helps [his younger sibling] with reading. (Discussion Group 1) I always encourage the child to do the homework with their dad or brother. (Discussion Group 4)

While these responses are limited in number, it is still notable that support from others appears to be gendered. All three of these responses, which mentioned seeking or gaining help from others, were either about brothers or fathers. Interestingly, no responses from the data discussed older sisters, aunts and so on. Given this study’s small participant group, care is to be taken not to assume that this represents all families from refugee backgrounds, but these responses provide insight as to how these particular mothers viewed their husbands and sons as being capable in providing the required linguistic and educational support for their younger children. In Deng and Marlowe’s (2013: 421) study exploring the experiences of Somali families in New Zealand, the female participants explained that fathers play ‘a pivotal role in modeling and disciplining’ their children. While this finding might suggest that, for some families, fathers might be better positioned to support their children’s academic learning, Durand (2011) found that in the case of Latino mothers, they viewed themselves as important sources of academic information for their children. The different findings across these studies suggest that the perception which family and/or

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community members are considered to be best suited to provide academic support for children may be influenced by cultural dispositions (habitus) and social contexts (fields). The mothers in this study also utilised other resources available to them to extend their children’s learning. The mothers expressed appreciation that their children’s school had books in Dari that the parents could read to their children (Discussion Group 5) and that they accessed the school or community library to find books with their children (Discussion Group 4). This suggests that they valued tangible resources, such as books, that provide opportunities to consolidate linguistic capital in both Dari and English. While other studies have identified the challenges and opportunities of having access to support services and resources such as libraries (Deng & Marlowe, 2013; Karsli-Calamak, 2018), there has been limited discussion on how refugee parents view or employ these resources for the extension of their multilingual practices at home. Identifying and valuing multilingual resources is an act of (socio)linguistic citizenship that positions these mothers as actors who seek resources that grant linguistic power and capital not just in English but also in their home language. Despite mothers expressing that they could not help with homework tasks because they did not have the requisite English language skills, the mothers in this study did not accept that they were incapable but recognised the knowledge and skills they did possess (see also Karsli-Calamak, 2018). They repositioned themselves as important actors in their children’s learning by acknowledging what they could do rather than what they could not. I listen to my daughter reading. Sometimes I’m able to correct her mistakes. I have the ability to help my daughter with basic maths, writing, drawing, and colouring. (Discussion Group 2) Sometimes my son reads in English but I’m going to explain and share my knowledge in Dari. (Discussion Group 3) Sometimes if I don’t understand the meaning of a work, I’m using a dictionary and then I’m helping my son. (Discussion Group 3)

This suggests that these mothers do not accept that they will be linguistically left behind or marginalised due to their lack of English skills. They are not weak and incapable, but they are mothers who choose to take an active role in their children’s learning. They chose to draw upon their own experiences and language while also identifying relevant resources (e.g. dictionaries) that allowed them to provide learning opportunities at home. These findings suggest that while the participating mothers recognised that their limited English language proficiency was a barrier to supporting their children’s learning at home, they rejected the notion that this would deny them the right to extend learning opportunities for their children. Instead, they actively sought ways to extend their children’s learning by

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being actively present, providing support and encouragement, and identifying key resources (family members, libraries, dictionaries and home language practices). These mothers did not position themselves as being inadequate or incapable, but drew upon their strengths and capabilities, including their home language and personal experiences, to support and claim the right to extend their children’s learning opportunities. Supporting Learning Through Family Activities

Participating mothers claimed power and the right for their children to extend their learning at home by linking opportunities for learning with everyday family practices. In the mothers’ multimodal collages, they represented their opinions, perspectives and experiences in regard to how they support their children’s learning at home, highlighting the opportunities that exist within everyday practices. In addition to the collages, the mothers provided brief oral explanations of what they created, which were documented in the form of field notes for the subsequent analysis. These multimodal artefacts (Figures 5.1 and 5.2) and the mothers’ accompanying explanations suggest that they felt they contributed to children’s learning in a number of different social contexts and in their family’s everyday practices. The drawing of a female with a caption ‘happy face’ in Figure 5.2 suggests that they positioned themselves as playing an important and positive role in their children’s learning at home. Both photographs capture elements representing literacy and numeracy in the form of playdough letters (Figures 5.1 and 5.2), the word ‘book’ (Figure 5.1) and written numbers (Figure 5.1). This suggests that supporting children’s development of basic literacy and numeracy skills was important for the participating mothers. One way in which they supported learning was through creating time and space for homework. The written text in Figure 5.2 states: ‘Our kids doing her homework after school then will go swimming …’. This comment suggests that the

Figure 5.1  Participants’ collage 1

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Figure 5.2  Participants’ collage 2

mothers took their children’s homework seriously and, to ensure its completion, organised family routines in a way that prioritised homework. Beyond the routines regarding the completion of homework and ­literacy/numeracy focus, the participating mothers engaged children in learning through interactions in different social contexts and associated everyday family practices. All collages created in this study had multiple elements representing food and family meals. For example, Figure 5.1 captures traditional Afghan naan bread, Afghan biscuits and icy poles (i.e. an Australian ice confection on a stick), while Figure 5.2 has representations of Afghan kebabs, icy poles and lollipops. Furthermore, Figure 5.1 has two elements representing family meals: a drawing of a table with two playdough figures and a playdough table set up for a meal. The mothers were very excited to talk about these elements and shared their love for cooking and eating together as a family. They also shared that interactions with children, including discussions about school learning, were

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always central to these activities. This suggests that cooking and family meals were, perhaps, their favourite social practices and these mothers felt very confident, safe and empowered in these contexts to initiate, support and extend conversations with children, which offered opportunities for learning through the use of social language. The mothers viewed preparing and providing food and family meals as an opportunity for learning, particularly language learning. When the researchers talked with the mothers during this session, the mothers explained how they discussed the English words for different foods with their children and they practiced mathematics when the children helped measure quantities of ingredients. As construed in their responses about helping solidify basic skills of younger children, the mothers enjoyed sharing their cultural stories and foods with their children and utilising these opportunities to learn basic literacy and numeracy skills. The mothers emphasised the value of learning alongside the children as they wanted to know the English words and phrases for the everyday practices that held such meaning for them. Therefore, these mothers claimed the right, in their new social fields, to make meaningful links between cultural foods and practices that they loved and opportunities to learn. In addition to food and cultural practices, another aspect captured in the collages was the role of sport and play activities in learning. Figure 5.1 has an image illustrating Australian football, and Figure 5.2 has three images capturing swimming activities. The written text in Figure 5.2 that we referred to above also mentions swimming. The participating mothers shared that taking children to after-school/weekend extracurricular activities, such as sport, was another typical family activity that they engaged in. Very often, in these families, it was the mothers’ responsibility to take children to the classes, competitions and events. They reported that these experiences helped them develop an understanding of specific sports and learn the rules of the games or competitions, which they could later discuss with their children to help them consolidate their own learning of the game or activity. In addition to organised sport activities, the mothers’ collages depicted play and/or outdoor activities as an everyday practice where they supported their children’s learning. Figure 5.1 captures several images that were used by the participants to represent play activities for both boys and girls. The picture depicts different toys and outdoor playground equipment representing different forms of play. Figure 5.2 has a playdough figure with a ball sitting on the grass surrounded by a fence – a setting resembling a typical Australian backyard which is often used by children for outdoor play. The participating mothers explained that they took an active role and played with children or simply supervised their play, negotiating this everyday practice through interacting with their children about their play activities. This reveals their growing awareness of the links between play and learning (Burriss & Tsao, 2002) and how they can provide spaces and opportunities for this learning to occur (Tour & Barnes, 2021).

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The mothers’ engagement in both sport and play activities reveals their understanding of what constitutes learning, as well as how they see these everyday practices as an opportunity for multilingual interactions with their children. The mothers viewed sport and play activities as opportunities for learning, for not only their children but themselves, as they learned the cultural practices associated with these activities and engaged in multilingual practices with their children to consolidate their understanding. The mothers’ acts of participation allowed them to have voice and agency in these particular areas of learning that they might or might not have been previously familiar with but that they actively tried to understand so that they could learn alongside their children. Therefore, these mothers did not watch passively but viewed these everyday activities as viable spaces to interact with their children and claim their rights to participate in, engage with and learn from these activities. In sum, this study found that the participating mothers acknowledged the barriers involved in supporting their children, such as their own English language proficiency and an understanding of Australian schooling, social and cultural practices. Yet, they chose to draw upon their strengths and employed everyday language practices, such as active listening and multilingual interactions, within their everyday family activities. They claimed their right to participate in their children’s education and make their voices heard in their new social fields. This repositions these mothers from being voiceless and powerless to active citizens who identify ways in which they can participate and contribute in a way they feel most comfortable. Implications for Further Research and Practice

This study reveals two key findings which contribute to and expand on the existing literature by providing evidence that mothers from refugee backgrounds actively express their agency and voice through participating in their children’s learning. First, the participating mothers expressed their awareness of the barriers that exist in supporting their children’s learning at home, yet they drew upon a range of resources, including family members, school library, dictionaries and home language practices to overcome these barriers. Second, the study found that the mothers desired to learn alongside their children and they placed value in multilingual interactions associated with everyday activities and Australia’s cultural practices. This finding makes an important contribution, extending on previous research that mothers from refugee backgrounds want to actively support their children’s learning (Boit et al., 2020; Deng & Marlowe, 2013), as it identifies three domains in which to engage mothers from refugee backgrounds and encourage learning opportunities at home. The three domains of everyday life in families from refugee backgrounds – food, sport and play – represent topics and spaces generated by the

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participating mothers in which they felt confident and able to initiate and support learning. Therefore, schools and teachers can utilise these domains as a way to bridge home and school learning, inviting and encouraging parents to employ multilingual practices at home that extend and build upon school learning topics within these domains. A key area for further research is to explore how these three domains can be operationalised within home-school partnerships, given the expressed need to identify appropriate engagement strategies with parents from refugee backgrounds (Timmons & Dworkin, 2020). There is also a need to encourage and provide opportunities for parents to engage in multilingual interactions and discussions with their children and provide opportunities to forge a mutually beneficial partnership between parents and schools (Tour & Barnes, 2021). Families from refugee backgrounds have unique social and cultural expectations and values (Tadesse et al., 2009), and these need to be considered when creating meaningful school– home partnerships that allow parents to claim their right to be actively involved in their children’s education in a way that highlights their strengths and values. While this study attempted to explore how multilingual language practices allowed the participating mothers to express agency and voice and gain control within the political institutions of school, this study is limited to one particular group (Afghani mothers) and one primary school in Australia. Additionally, data generated in this research provided important insights, but it was limited due to the ethical constraints that always shape research with vulnerable participants from refugee backgrounds. Future research is required to extend these findings, capturing, in real time, the ways in which parents engage in multilingual practices to support children’s learning at home. This study revealed that mothers from refugee backgrounds not only acknowledged the barriers that made supporting their children’s learning at home difficult but actively responded by drawing upon their strengths – including their mother tongue – to mediate opportunities for learning at home for both their children and themselves. While mothers from refugee backgrounds have been historically positioned as voiceless, vulnerable and/or incompetent (Karsli-Calamak, 2018), the participants in this research actively claimed their rights to citizenship, harnessing and building linguistic capital within their social field through everyday multilingual practices. Employing Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus, field and capital and a (socio)linguistic citizenship approach (Stroud, 2018a) allowed the researchers to interrogate how the possession of language knowledge and skills had the potential to either act as a barrier or as an act of citizenship. While English, a language of power in this particular context, on one hand, could act as a barrier to mother’s participation in their children’s learning, this paper identifies how the participating mothers’ use of

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multilingual language practices allowed them to actively support and engage with their children’s learning. Therefore, despite barriers to their participation in their children’s learning, they acknowledged how they can and do contribute, recognising their rights to participation within the context of their children’s schooling. Appendix A: Discussion Prompts

In your groups, you will discuss these questions with one another and share your experiences. Have one person in your group to write your personal experiences on the sticky notes provided. (1) Has your child (children) come home and asked for help with homework? What was the homework task? What did you do? How did you feel? (2) What do you feel about reading to your child (children)? Do you read to them in your home language or do you tell them stories that you remember by heart? Can you give examples of what you read or stories that you share? (3) What types of questions do you ask your child when you want to learn about their school day? (4) What do you try to support and encourage your child’s language skills? Both in your home language and English? (5) What are the challenges you face as a parent of a child in primary school? (6) What would you like to know or learn about to best support your child (children)’s learning? References Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA] (2020) My school. See https://www.myschool.edu.au/ (accessed 23 June 2021). Barger, M.M., Kim, E.M., Kuncel, N.R. and Pomerantz, E.M. (2019) The relation between parents’ involvement in children’s schooling and children’s adjustment: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin 145 (9), 855–890. Boit, R.J., Barnes, A.C., Conlin, D. and Hestenes, L.L. (2020) Voices of refugee mothers: Navigating the complexities of supporting their preschool children’s literacy development. Early Childhood Education Journal 48 (6), 683–691. Bourdieu, P. (1993) The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. New York: Columbia University Press. Bourdieu, P. and Wacquant, L. (1992) An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Bouzanis, C. and Kemp, S. (2020) The two stories of the habitus/structure relation and the riddle of reflexivity: A meta-theoretical reappraisal. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour 50, 64–83. Burriss, K. and Tsao, L. (2002) Review of research: How much do we know about the importance of play in child development? Childhood Education 78 (4), 230–233. Chilton, G. and Scotti, V. (2014) Snipping, gluing, writing: The properties of collage as an arts-based research practice in art therapy. Art Therapy 31 (4), 163–171.

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Compton-Lilly, C., Kim, J., Quast, E., Tran, S. and Shedrow, S. (2019) What we must learn from children in immigrant families. The Reading Teacher 73 (2), 135–140. Dalal, J. (2016) Pierre Bourdieu: The sociologist of education. Contemporary Education Dialogue 13 (2), 231–250. Darbyshire, P., MacDougall, C. and Schiller, W. (2005) Multiple methods in qualitative research with children: More insight or just more? Qualitative Research 5 (4), 417–436. Deng, S.A. and Marlowe, J.M. (2013) Refugee resettlement and parenting in a different context. Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies 11 (4), 416–430. Durand, T.M. (2011) Latina mothers’ cultural beliefs about their children, parental roles, and education: Implications for effective and empowering home-school partnerships. The Urban Review 43 (2), 255–278. Emerson, L., Fear, J., Fox, S. and Sanders, E. (2012) Parental Engagement in Learning and Schooling: Lessons from Research. A Report by the Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth (ARACY) for the Family-School and Community Partnerships Bureau. Canberra: Australian Research Alliance for Children & Youth for the Family-School and Community Partnerships Bureau. Epstein, J.L. (2018) School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Preparing Educators and Improving Schools. New York: Routledge. Georgis, R., Gokiert, R., Ford, M. and Ali, M. (2014) Creating inclusive parent engagement practices: Lessons learned from a school community collaborative supporting newcomer refugee families. Multicultural Education 21 (3/4), 23–27.  Heugh, K. and Stroud, C. (2019) Diversities, affinities and diasporas: A southern lens and methodology for understanding multilingualism. Current Issues in Language Planning 20 (1), 1–15. Hirst, K., Hannon, P. and Nutbrown, C. (2010) Effects of a preschool bilingual family literacy programme. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy 10 (2), 183–208.  Hollingworth, S., Mansaray, A., Allen, K. and Rose, A. (2011) Parents’ perspectives on technology and children’s learning in the home: Social class and the role of habitus. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning 27 (4), 347–360. Karsli-Calamak, E. (2018) Syrian mothers producing counterstories in co-constructed school spaces: Rethinking the role of schools in engaging refugee families. European Education 50 (1), 42–57.  Klapwijk, N. and Van der Walt, C. (2016) English-plus multilingualism as the new linguistic capital? Implications of university students’ attitudes towards languages of instruction in a multilingual environment. Journal of Language, Identity & Education 15 (2), 67–82. Leavy, P. (2015) Method Meets Art: Arts-Based Research Practice (2nd edn). New York: The Guilford Press. Matsunaga, K., Barnes, M.M. and Saito, E. (2021) Agency and hysteresis encounters: Understanding the international education experiences of Japanese students in Australian universities. Cambridge Journal of Education. See https://doi.org/10.108 0/0305764X.2021.1926927. McBrien, J.L. (2011) The importance of context: Vietnamese, Somali, and Iranian refugee mothers discuss their resettled lives and involvement in their children’s schools. Compare 41 (1), 75–90. Moè, A., Katz, I. and Alesi, M. (2018) Scaffolding for motivation by parents, and child homework motivations and emotions: Effects of a training programme. British Journal of Educational Psychology 88, 323–344. Saldaña, J. (2016) The Coding Manual for Qualitative Researchers. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. Shwayli, S. and Barnes, M. (2018) Reconstructing identities in Australia: Iraqi Muslim women’s pursuit of cultural, social and economic capital.  Women’s Studies International Forum 71, 95–102. 

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Stroud, C. (2009) A postliberal critique of language rights: Toward a politics of language for a linguistics of contact. In J. Petrovic (ed.) International Perspectives on Bilingual Education: Policy, Practice and Controversy (pp. 191–218). Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. Stroud, C. (2018a) Introduction. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 1–14). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Stroud, C. (2018b) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Tadesse, S., Hoot, J. and Watson-Thompson, O. (2009) Exploring the special needs of African refugee children in US schools. Childhood Education 85 (6), 352–356. Timmons, J. and Dworkin, J. (2020) A literature review of family engagement with African immigrant and refugee families. Journal of Human Sciences and Extension 8 (2), 186–200.  Topor, D., Kean, S., Shelton, T. and Calkins, S. (2010) Parent involvement and student academic performance: A multiple mediational analysis. Journal of Preventive & Intervention Community 38 (3), 183–197. Tour, E. and Barnes, M. (2021) Engaging English language learners in digital multimodal composing: Pre-service teachers’ perspectives and experiences.  Language and Education 36 (3), 243–258. See https://doi.org/10.1080/09500782.2021.1912083. van der Vaart, G., van Hoven, B. and Huigan, P. (2018) Creative and arts-based research methods in academic research. Forum: Qualitative Social Research 19 (2), 1–19.  Wang, Q., Coemans, S., Siegesmund, R. and Hannes, K. (2017) Arts-based methods in socially engaged research practice: A classification framework. Art/Research International 2 (2), 7–39. Whitmarsh, J. (2011) Othered voices: Asylum-seeking mothers and early years education. European Early Childhood Education Research Journal 19 (4), 535–551. Williams, Q. and Stroud, C. (2015) Linguistic citizenship: Language and politics in postnational modernities. Journal of Language and Politics 14 (3), 406–430. Windle, J.A. and Miller, J.M. (2013) Marginal integration. In L. Bartlett and A. GhaffarKucher (eds) Refugees, Immigrants, and Education in the Global South: Lives in Motion (pp. 196–210). Milton Park: Routledge.

6 Reclaiming Voice through Family Language Policies: Parental (Socio)linguistic Citizenship in CastilianSpanish-Dominated Multilingual Settings Anik Nandi, Maite Garcia-Ruiz and Ibon Manterola

Drawing on Stroud’s (2018) analytical framework of (socio)linguistic ­citizenship, this chapter investigates the complex association between ­governmental language policies and how they are interpreted, implemented and/or negotiated by various social actors (e.g. parents, children), revealing ideological spaces for the use or non-use of minority languages in multilingual societies. This will be studied in relation to urban landscapes of two Castilian-Spanish-dominated geopolitical settings of Spain: Galicia and the Basque Autonomous Community, where a collective of pro-minority language parents have made a conscious decision to bring up their children in either Galician or Basque. Using multiple qualitative research methods, including observations, interviews and focus groups, we demonstrate how these parents become policy intermediaries at home and in the exterior by monitoring their children’s language development through favourable literacy atmosphere in the minority language, developing prestige for the minority language through continuous encouragement, selecting an d promoting companion ship with minority-language-speaking peers of their children. Moreover, we argue that the parents’ under-the-radar participation in the policy discourse may appear extremely intermittent and ad hoc, but their individual actions, when galvanised into collective mobilisations such as setting up minority-language-medium schools (­historically in the BAC and more recently in Galicia), can lead to bottom-up language policies. 101

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Introduction

The preservation of cultural and linguistic diversity in today’s world is a major concern to scientists, governments, policymakers, community stakeholders, and advocates of linguistic human rights. National language policy that is implemented by the government is perceived as official legislation designed to influence people’s linguistic lived experiences (Stroud, 2009). In addition to top-down policies, the family’s language decisions towards minority languages and cultures, for instance, are vital as they offer important insights into the dynamics of identity formation and language maintenance in threatened language communities. The home-use of a minority language fosters its intergenerational transmission while simultaneously family plays a significant role in the reproduction and transference of exogenous social structures, ideologies and discourses. This is largely because parents provide their children with material, human, social and cultural capital whose transmissions create ‘inequalities in children’s educational and occupational attainment’ (Tzanakis, 2011: 76). This is especially pertinent to the choice, application and use of language in the home domain. Considering language policy as a multi-layered mechanism ranging from government sectors to education, home and community, the primary intention of this study will be to analyse the complex association between governmental policies towards minority languages and how these policies are interpreted, appropriated, practiced and/or negotiated by grassroots-level agents (e.g. parents, caregivers and children) opening up ideological spaces for the use or non-use of minority languages (cf. Stroud, 2001: 353). Based on observation, in-depth fieldwork interviews and focus groups, this will be studied in relation to two CastilianSpanish-dominated urban landscapes within Spain: Santiago de Compostela (Galicia) and a municipality from the Greater Bilbao area (the Basque Autonomous Community, hence, BAC), where a collective of pro-minority language parents have made a conscious decision to bring up their children in either Galician or Basque. Drawing on the analytical framework of (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2018; Rampton et al., 2018), this chapter delves into how the individual as well as collective efforts of these parents act as policy intermediaries influencing their children’s language development. This chapter commences with a discussion that situates family as an integral part of the language policy regime. Building the notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship, it will underscore the role of parental agency in framing bottom-up family language policies. This is followed by a brief outline of the sociolinguistic situation of each context, including its topdown language policies and their immediate impact on the sociolinguistic evolution of Basque and Galician. The next section offers an account of the research methodology and, finally, it culminates with a thematic analysis of the data.

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Family as a Language Policy Regime: Power, Agency and (Socio)linguistic Citizenship

Whereas language policy research has received considerable academic attention over the past number of years, much of the focus has been on policy as a structured top-down (governmental) phenomenon. However, grassroots policies (e.g. family language policy) and the role of the actors within this discourse, such as parents, caregivers and children, remain largely understudied. Having emerged as an independent field only in the past decade, Family Language Policy (hence, FLP) quickly became an important domain in minority language research taking account of the ‘explicit and overt decisions parents make about language use and language learning as well as implicit processes that legitimise certain language and literacy practices over others in the home’ (Fogle, 2013: 83). Since the parents are individual entities, they may also differ in their ‘impact beliefs’, meaning the level to which parents find themselves as competent to exercise their power and ‘responsible for shaping their children’s language’ (King et al., 2008: 910). Although traditionally the field of language transmission was seen as unidirectional (i.e. parents to children), more recent studies (see King, 2016; Wilson, 2020) suggest that children are also apt, resourceful and active agents of language socialisation. While socialising, they develop their own agency and start contributing to the reproduction of the public sphere inside the family domain (Nandi, in press). For instance, in some language revitalisation contexts where there is a strong presence of the minority language in education (e.g. Basque, Irish), children brought the minority language home from school, and thereby played a key role in reversing the shift (see Kasares, 2017; McGee, 2018). Language policies, whether top-down or inside the home, include three interrelated, albeit independent, factors: language ideologies, language management and language practices (Spolsky, 2004). The ideologies component within FLP includes beliefs, attitudes, and norms that describe the value of a language. Language revival attempts, whether governmental or bottom-up, always already involve the advancement of a new ideology or ideologies about the value and use of a minoritised language in the face of more dominant, conventionalised ideologies that endorse the hegemonic language(s) in a society (Nandi & Devasundaram, 2017). Language ideologies are manifested through language practices. In the family context, individual parents can often be seen to transmit their ideologies through their ‘language choices in interaction and hence socialize their children into this ideology’ (Lanza, 2007: 61). Language planning or ‘management’, on the other hand, is defined as conscious and explicit efforts made by actors who maintain or intend to exert control over the subjects in a specific context to modify their language behaviour (Spolsky, 2019). Therefore, a family’s language management refers to the choices and attempts that parents and other adult family members make

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to maintain a language. However, the distinction between language management and practice inside the home domain, as Curdt-Christiansen (2014: 38) argues, ‘is somewhat blurred’. This is because the parents in the FLP environment often adopt the role of custodians and tend to control children’s everyday language conducts. This chapter conceives and locates the agentive role of parents as in situ language managers as one form of (socio)linguistic citizenship, a concept that will be elucidated further in the following paragraphs. Citizenship, in its simplest form, can be understood as an individual’s connection with the state (Spotti, 2011). Since today’s postmodern societies are increasingly polycentric and put ‘high demands on register development for those who live and act in them’ (Blommaert, 2013: 195), the notion of ‘citizenship’ should not be seen as mere claims to recognition or a membership (Isin, 2008). It is rather linked to agency, a ‘socioculturally mediated capacity to act’ (Ahearn, 2001: 132). Since language is at the epicentre of citizenship struggles (Stroud, 2007), (socio)linguistic citizenship is defined as ‘acts of language, frequently and of necessity, performed outside of the institutional status quo, that engage with voices on the margins to create conditions for a transformative agency’ (Stroud & Kerfoot, 2020: 10). Therefore, it concerns speakers as agents for claiming their linguistic rights rather than having the state as the main agent (Deumert, 2018). In the context of macro-level language policies, the state is considered responsible for developing and implementing them into the public domain using various ideological state apparatuses (Althusser, 1971) such as education, mass media and religion. Although these dispositions are not ideally under the state’s control, they are often used to perpetuate topdown ideologies on civil society (see Rampton et al., 2018: 73). The family as a micro social unit is not beyond these macro societal structures. Consequently, it can be argued that an FLP essentially involves the inner dimensions of ideological conditioning of individual family members and the external influence of state-level policies on them (Nandi, 2017a). Previous research on the intersection between governmental and micro level language policies further underscores that the formulation of an autonomous language agenda in the face of disillusionment with supervening state policy implementation is frequently enacted at the grassroots level, particularly within the family (see Curdt-Christiansen & Lanza, 2018; Nandi et al., 2022). As such, parents from the interiority of their private sphere can use their individual apprehension and interpretation of the top-down policy to raise public awareness, in order to contest the dominant ideologies (Nandi, 2018). Sometimes individual families’ discourses of (socio)linguistic citizenship may adopt a larger social role in minority language revitalisation contexts, as occurred in the Basque Country during the Franco regime where parents created privately funded Basque-medium schools, the socalled ikastolak, as a response to the top-down anti-Basque policies (see

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Urla, 2012). A similar situation, although not identical, is taking place in the Galician urban terrain. In Galicia, as a reaction to the present top-down policy of the Galician government that has been seen to shrink the space for Galician in the public education curriculum, many likeminded parents have formed cooperatives to fund Galician-medium immersion schools. These activist parents took on this effort with an intention of extending their pro-Galician FLP to the education system, as public schools were becoming a space for de-Galicianisation during the early ages. Their bottom-up contestation through alternative discourses of power further underscores the aforementioned claim of a knowledge/power nexus (see also Mbembe, 2016; Stroud & Kerfoot, 2013). In the absence of access to the ‘instruments of power’ mentioned earlier, we shall now inspect the alternative pragmatic modes in form of (socio)linguistic citizenship through which pro-Galician/Basque parents bridge inner and outer spatial and social spheres, so as to create new conversations around the language revitalisation on the ground. The Urban Sociolinguistic Settings of Basque and Galician

In the Spanish state sociolinguistic scenario, Franco’s dictatorship (1936–1975) made the use of Castilian obligatory as the sole language for administration, education and media which marked an era of repression and discrimination for its minority languages including Galician and Basque. During this period, the use of these languages was mostly restricted to the home domain and informal conversations. The Basque territories posed a resistance to Franco’s hegemonic policy towards the community’s indigenous language and culture. In the early 1960s, the urban territories of the region witnessed the establishment of Basquemedium schools, the so-called ikastolak. These schools were often maintained by a collective of language activists including teachers, parents and members of local communities, many of which were driven by a strong nationalist sentiment towards Basque. The creation and expansion of ikastolak constitutes a fundamental collective phenomenon of the Basque society in the past 60 years (Euskaltzaindia, 2011). This bottom-up mobilisation not only contributed to establishing networks among pro-Basque activists, but the ‘movement of ikastolak’ and ‘the ikastolak conscience’ were also extended to the Basque geopolitical region (Fernandez, 1994). Overall, the expansion of ikastolak needs to be placed in the general environment against the Francoist regime and its sociolinguistic, cultural and political discrimination (Urla, 1993). After Franco’s demise, the new Constitution was written in 1978, leading to a new legal framework for its regional languages. This new constitutional right conferred diverse degrees of co-officiality to Galician and Basque alongside Castilian-Spanish in their respective Autonomous Communities. Consequently, provisions were made for the inclusion of

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these languages in key institutional contexts including education and other formal domains from which they had been previously excluded. The 1982 Law for the Normalization of the Use of Basque and the 1983 Law defining the presence and role of Basque and Spanish in compulsory education marked a foundation for pro-Basque governmental policies. Basque and Spanish became compulsory subjects, and parents had the right to choose the language of instruction: only Spanish (model A), both Basque and Spanish (model B), and only Basque (model D). The increasing social prestige of Basque became especially visible in the educational context, where many parents, teachers and school principals supported model D (Zalbide, 1998). The evolution of the models clearly reflects the impact of all those educational language policy efforts (Manterola, 2019): the choice of model A has decreased from 65% in the 1980s to 5% nowadays, whereas enrolment in model D has increased from 20% to 75% in the same period. One of the most positive impacts of this evolution has been the increase of potential Basque speakers among children and young generations. For instance, 25% among the age group of 16–24 knew Basque in 1991, whereas in 2016, the percentage was 71.4 (Basque Government, 2019). It is estimated that in the past 25 years, 300,000 people from Spanish-speaking homes have learnt Basque in compulsory education and adult education (Consejo Asesor del Euskera, 2016). However, other sociolinguistic trends are not so positive: concerning language transmission, the percentage of the population for whom Basque is (one of) the language(s) acquired at home remains approximately 23% between 1991 and 2016 (Sistema de Indicadores del Euskera, 2021). Referring to the use of Basque at home, the percentage has increased just 1.7 points between 1991 and 2016 (17.3% and 19%, respectively). Overall, the increase of potential Basque speakers has not turned into a significant increase in the use of the language in everyday social interactions. This complex evolution picture has led both governmental actors as well as pro-Basque social advocates to describe the current period of language policy in terms of ‘active crisis’ and ‘crossroads’ (Amonarriz & Martinez de Lagos, 2017; Irizar, 2017). As Irizar (2017: 12) puts it, keeping the business as usual will not result in the growth lived before, but we are actively looking for new ways to improve the situation. In the Galician situation, the interaction between social and symbolic capital reveals itself in the superior status afforded to Castilian, widely perceived to retain a greater degree of symbolic capital. Gradual migration to urban areas since the mid-60s from poverty-ridden rural areas, where Galician was the main language has destabilised the demographic base of Galician. This facilitated a clear linguistic division in urban Galicia between a numerically small but socially dominant Castilian-speaking elite and a statistically large but socially marginalised Galician-speaking population relocating from rural areas (Nandi,

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2019). Moreover, the strong centralist-nationalist propaganda of the Francoist regime considered the use of Galician as something unpatriotic, rustic and often treated it as a ‘dialect’ of Castilian that aggravated the pressure on Galician speakers of the time to switch to Castilian (O’Rourke, 2011). These linguistic lived-experiences had a negative impact on the Galician-speaking population especially from the urban/ semi-urban areas, as many of them formed a pro-Castilian FLP and stopped speaking altogether their first language to the children. Top-down language policy for Galician revolves around what is referred to as Lei de Normalización Lingüística (Law of Linguistic Normalisation) of 1983. Over the almost past four decades, institutional language policy discourses in Galicia focus mainly on medium of instruction in the school system supporting a progressive incorporation of Galician in the school curricula in form of bilingual programmes to achieve the goal of a ‘balanced bilingualism’ (Monteagudo, 2012). However, the policymakers of the conservative centralist party, which had been in the government almost successively during the first two decades of language policy in Galicia (1982–2004), took very little interest in implementing the policy initiatives on the ground. They were more interested in not upsetting certain Castilian-speaking urban middleclass elites in the Galician society (Nandi, 2017b). The same conservative government introduced further changes to the educational language policy in 2010 through a new decree, O Decreto de Plurilingüismo (The Decree of Plurilingualism, henceforth DdP). There is a contradictory as well as a deceptive element in this new policy. Although it allows the continuation of Galician in primary and secondary school curricula with Castilian, it ensures that the medium of instruction to be that of the children’s home language. Since Castilian remains the most widely spoken language in urban Galicia, a majority of Galician children tend to be brought up speaking Castilian by Castilian-speaking parents. Therefore, with the application of the decree, Castilian automatically becomes the medium of instruction in the urban schools. Ultimately, this present policy towards language in education further constricts the access to Galician among urban preprimary and primary school students. It is also important to note that ever since this educational policy was put into practice, language shift in the urban regions has consistently gained momentum (Monteagudo et al., 2019). Discontent with such top-down practices has in many ways rattled the mood of a pro-Galician urban-demographic who have initiated several grassroots-level mobilisations involving the creation of Galician-medium immersion school following the Basque ikastola model. This profile refers to a group of highly dedicated individuals comprising parents who are committed to the cause of Galician language revival bottom-up. In the remainder of our chapter, we will look at how these parents coming from two very sociohistorically different

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policy contexts engage in this reflective process. The following section offers a methodological outline of this research. Methodology

Our study adopts a qualitative ethnographic research design for data collection. Consequently, the primary data for this study were gathered from (i) field notes and observations from the research sites, (ii) in-depth semi-structured interviews with individual parents and (iii) focus-group discussions. In BAC, the data were collected from a Spanish-dominant municipality of the Greater Bilbao area with favourable policies towards the Basque language. Parents from one ikastola were selected for this study due to the historical value of these schools in the Basque language revitalisation process. The intention was also to understand parental interests in encouraging the use of Basque outside the school context. In Galicia, the fieldwork was conducted in Santiago, the capital city. It represents an interesting research site because of the area’s sociolinguistic profile that includes both monolingual and bilingual speakers of Castilian and Galician. The parents who took part in this study are mostly public sector employees; therefore, they often use Galician at work due to the legal stipulation. The intention was to investigate the family language management of this educated middle-class sector of the population. The target research samples of this study are Spanish nationals and parents from urban/semi-urban backgrounds between the age group of 30–50 years old, from various occupations. Notably, in bilingual settings of Galicia and BAC, the upper age range of the sample ensures the inclusion of parents who have experienced the education system’s transition from Franco’s regime to the current system of autonomous communities. It is also worth mentioning that this chapter has derived from a larger body of two doctoral studies. In Galicia, the data were drawn from 18 families through two focus group discussions with couples and 18 semi-structured interviews with individual parents between 2013 and 2015 (Nandi, 2017a). The data from BAC were collected between 2018 and 2020 from 19 families through a questionnaire, two focus groups, and 17 in-depth interviews (Garcia-Ruiz, in progress). The questionnaire included closed and open questions which were used to identify the different family profiles of the ikastola. This chapter uses interview data from five families in each context. The interviewees were informed that we sought to document their perception as caregivers while raising their children in either Basque or Galician. Interviews in Galicia, whether individual or in group, were conducted through the medium of Galician. In BAC, although most individual interviews were in Basque, both focus groups were conducted in Castilian as there were participants who did not speak Basque. Fictitious names have been used to protect the real identity of the respondents. While searching the prominent themes, we were particularly interested in understanding how these parents perceived their agentive role as language planners on

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the ground and what collective narrative of (socio)linguistic citizenship they were constructing (if any) as policy intermediaries. In what follows, we present excerpts which highlight these themes. Parental (Socio)linguistic Citizenship through Bottom-up Discourses

This section offers an overview of language management strategies from pro-Galician/Basque parents and demonstrates how their individual language management and practices, when galvanised into collective mobilisations, can impact language behaviour on the ground: Reclaiming voice: Questioning the conventionalisation of Castilian

In the Galician sociolinguistic situation, the parents interviewed were overtly critical of the medium of instruction policy in compulsory education and underlined the apparent lack of provision for Galician and the government’s intention to promote it. They unanimously agreed that there was inadequate support for Galician in mainstream schooling and that the application of DdP was not leading to proficiency in the minority language: Lara: Si. A primeira lingua ten que ser o galego na escola e despois, evidentemente estudar tamén castelán, como outras linguas. Virgilio: Eu tamén coincido. Galego e inglés, castelán, así por: ese orden porque o castelán e algo que están aprendendo de maneira natural. Elena: Eu creo que tamén (…) a realidade é que moitos dos nenos que saen do sistema educativo non teñen un galego fluído, quere dicir que porque e a escolarización non lles dá ó mellor, suficiente ferramenta pra poder facelo. [In Galician]

Lara: Yes. The first language in school has to be Galician and then, obviously children will study Castilian like other languages. Virgilio: I also concur. Galician and English, then Castilian in this order because Castilian is something that they will learn in a natural way… Elena: I believe the same (…) the reality is that many children who study in this education system don’t have a fluency in Galician because the school does not offer them the best supporting tool to do that. [Authors’ translation]

The above discussion indicates the parental awareness of the Galician sociolinguistic scene. Virgilio’s observation that ‘Castilian is something that they [the children] will learn naturally’ reiterates the potency of Castilian’s practical and ideological dominance in contemporary Galicia which is further reinforced through top-down pro-Castilian policies over the past decades. If the knowledge of Castilian is imbued with symbolic capital, this knowledge becomes susceptible to the discourses and dictates of power. This intricate knowledge/power relationship plays out in the domains of both school and home, where teachers and parents under the custodianship

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of the state could become arbiters of the use of either Galician or Castilian or both. As such, these parents are in favour of an increased level of Galician or an exclusively Galician-centred education where Spanish and English would be taught only as subjects. Whereas most of the parents are unequivocal about their language choices in education, Elena, a mother from Santiago, questions the top-down goal of ‘balanced bilingualism’. As mentioned earlier, governmental policies in Galicia set out to ensure bilingual competence in both Galician and Castilian at the end of compulsory education. However, in practice, as Elena underscores, many children who study in the public education system do not achieve fluency in Galician after finishing their compulsory education, emphasising the space between policy rhetoric and its implementation on the ground (cf. Stroud, 2001: 340).  The following extract from the Basque context also relates to educational language policies. It should be considered that from the 1990s onwards, English has been taught as a subject in lots of infant and primary schools. Besides, many schools have set up Content and Language Integrated Learning programmes where a limited number of subjects such as Science or History are taught through the medium of English (Cenoz, 2009). Despite the general trilingual framework, there are some schools that emphasise further on English and give more school-hours to the language. It is in this context where parents in the extract below refer to children’s trilingual competence and to the debate whether Basque, Spanish and English all need to be used as languages of instruction. Fernanda: yo tengo compañeros de trabajo que mandan a colegios de esos trilingües porque a ellos les importa el euskara bastante poco, les importa más el inglés (…) El castellano porque es el castellano, porque es omnipresente. (…) Que no saben inglés y euskera (...). Garazi: ¿y salen trilingües? Ekiñe: ¿qué van a salir trilingües? Salen monolingües de castellano. Fernanda: saben algo de euskera y algo de inglés. Ekiñe: no, euskera tampoco saben, me parece vergonzoso. [In Spanish]

Fernanda: some of my co-workers send their kids to those trilingual schools, because they are not concerned about Basque, they care more about English (...) Spanish because it is Spanish, it is omnipresent. (...) They don’t know English nor Basque (...). Garazi: And are they trilingual? Ekiñe: no way. They are Spanish monolinguals. Fernanda: they know some Basque and some English. Ekiñe: no, they do not know Basque either, it is shameful. [Authors’ translation]

In this extract, Fernanda criticises the parents who take their children to Basque–Spanish–English trilingual schools. According to her, these parents are more interested in their children’s acquisition of English rather than Basque. A key aspect of the Basque revitalisation process in the BAC has been the generalised choice of model D by non-Basque-speaking parents, which reflects that parents have overall positive attitudes towards the learning of Basque by their children (Amorrortu et al., 2009). However, Fernanda’s

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appraisal of the policy can be interpreted as a voice reclaiming a stronger position for Basque in parents’ ideology towards multilingualism. The extract also refers to the issue of trilingual competence, which is strongly put under critical scanner by these ikastola parents. These mothers reject the idea that a trilingual school promotes a balanced linguistic competence in all three languages and argue that the students only reach a good command of Castilian. Overall, parents from both contexts consciously exert their agency to reclaim their voice by interrogating the lower status of Galician and Basque as opposed to the privileged status of Castilian in the educational contexts of Galicia and the BAC, respectively. (Socio)linguistic citizenship through bottom-up language management

Since there are currently no public schools offering immersion programmes in Galician, a pro-Galician urban demographic including parents are involved in a bottom-up discourse of resistance that melds their individual (socio)linguistic citizenship with broader collective mobilisations. To cater for the needs of parents who opt for a Galician-only educational model, various cooperatives have been formed to fund Galician-medium schools. For instance, parents from the focus group conducted in Santiago had enrolled their children in two Galician-medium pre-schools functioning as non-profit associations: Escola Infantil Raiola (Raiola Kindergarten School) and Escolas de Ensino Galego Semente (Semente Galician Education Schools, henceforth Semente). Among the five families studied in this paper, four took their children to Semente and one family attended Raiola. While Raiola has been offering Galician as a medium of instruction for the past two decades, Semente started only in 2011 as a response to DdP. Raquel, a mother who is one of the founding members of the school and also the president of the parents’ association at the time of research, underscores the importance of immersion programmes in Galician: Raquel: É moi necesario en Galicia. Porque temos a garantía de que aos cativos se lle vai a dar un ensino integramente en galego. Eso non pasa en ningún sitio, nin escolas privadas, nin concertadas, nin públicas. Todo o contrario, o que adoita pasar é que os nenos e nenas entran galegofalantes en infantil, y ós tres anos saen falando só en español (...) Se no sistema público nós puidéramos atopar o que temos nesta escola, Semente non sería necesaria. [In Galician]

Raquel: It is necessary for Galicia. Because we have the guarantee that children will be taught entirely in Galician. It doesn’t happen anywhere, neither in private schools, nor charter schools, nor public schools. On the contrary, what usually happens is that Galicianspeaking children start kindergarten, and at the age of three they end up speaking only Castilian (...) If the public education system could offer what we have in this school, Semente would not be necessary. [Authors’ translation]

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While discussing the reasons behind creating the Semente model, Raquel emphasises how state-driven kindergartens have transformed into contexts for de-galicianisation for children from Galician-speaking homes during early years. Her observation concurs with the macro level statistical evidence for language shift towards Castilian among children and young adolescents (see Seminario de Sociolingüística, 2017), indicating that the pendulum of ‘elite power’ is swaying towards Castilian in the exterior space. Therefore, in the face of disillusionment with supervening state policy implementation, parents such as Raquel as grassroots-level citizens, from the interiority of their private sphere, use their individual apprehension and interpretation of this shift to raise public awareness, in order to contest the domination of Castilian. Currently, there are more than 100 members in the Parents’ Association of Semente (Galicia Confidencial, 2020). During fieldwork, several visits were made to Semente, and it was noted that the classrooms were filled with literacy materials in Galician involving storybooks for different age groups, lyrics of traditional Galician songs, and other audio-visual materials. Interested families can borrow these resources to create a Galician-centred literacy environment at home. This illustrates how Galician is being promoted at Semente. In the BAC, while public schools and other non-public schools than ikastolak endorse Basque through different language policy models, a majority of parents interviewed in this study commonly agreed on the significance of ikastolak in the teaching/learning and promotion of Basque. Fermin, a father, underlines the importance of these programmes: Fermin: (…) Zer nahi duzu zure umeak euskaraz ikastea edo publikoak aurrera eramatea? Nire esperientzia herri honetan, eta ez dut esango ikastola denik onena. Ni mucho menos. Baina aukeratzekotan, ba aukeratu genuen ikastola batez ere euskaragatik. Anaia saiatu zan publikora eramaten eta bera publikoaren aldekoa da, baina hirugarren urtean atera zituen eta eraman zituen ikastolara, eta batez ere hizkuntzagatik. Ez zuten ondo ikasten (...) publikoan, euskara ez da sustatu ikastoletan bezala. [In Basque]

Fermin: (…) If you want your child to learn Basque or to promote public education, in my experience, I will not say that ikastola is the best, but having to choose, we chose ikastola for Basque. My brother tried to send his children to a public school, and he is in favour of public education, but he brought them to ikastola in the third year, mainly due to the language. They didn’t learn it well (…) but in the public, Basque has not been promoted the same way as in ikastolak. [Authors’ translation]

Fermin considers that the public education system does not promote Basque the same way as ikastolak do. To defend his statement, Fermin draws on his brother’s experience who is apparently ‘in favour of public

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education’ and sent ‘his children to a public school’. However, his brother had to enrol the children in an ikastola as the Basque level they were reaching in the public system was not the one he desired. As Fermin underlines, ‘they didn’t learn it [Basque] well’. The above extracts explain how Semente and Ikastola schools have transformed into a pivotal source of language maintenance for some urban parents addressing the grassrootslevel vacuum in the form of the government’s failure to supply adequate and accessible learning space in Galician or Basque in the public system. Such larger cohesions formed by like-minded parents straddling the school, social and home spheres to challenge the supremacy of Castilian, can be interpreted as one form of collective (socio)linguistic citizenship (cf. Stroud & Heugh, 2004). Parental bottom-up language management and negotiation on the ground

In Santiago, Bea, another mother, states that, as parents, they are aware of the hegemony of Castilian in the Galician society. Therefore, to prevent language shift during the initial years of their children, they formed a pro-Galician parents’ WhatsApp group entitled Tribo (literally, the Tribe) that wants their children to be educated and socialised in Galician. Three families interviewed from the Semente Parents Association also belong to this collective:  Bea: Entón se ti tes o grupo [de amigos] de fóra habitualmente si cho falara castelán, o máis habitual supoño que será que muden de lingua. Pero nós a verdá é que fixemos así o grupo de amizades de Susi é galego. I como na escola tamén lle falan galego e tamén hai moitos nenos que falan galego na escola (...) por ahora, onde máis notou o cambio de idioma foi nas vacaciós cando iamos á praia ou así dábanse conta. Ó millor ibamos con algún amigo i entre eles falaban galego pero dábanse conta que os nenos todos do entorno estaban falando en castelán. [In Galician]

Bea: Therefore, if you have a group [of friends] outside that normally communicate in Castilian, most usual, as I think would be that they will shift from Galician. But we made a group [in WhatsApp], for Susi [their daughter] and her friends to socialise in Galician. And the medium of instruction in school is also Galician and there are many Galician speaking kids in school (...) for now, where she noticed the difference in language was during vacation when we visited the beach. We went with one of her friends and they spoke Galician among them but they started realising that other children were speaking in Castilian on the beach. [Authors’ translation] 

Started as a WhatsApp messenger group in July 2013, Tribo now includes more than 40 families who meet very often to socialise and converse in

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Galician (Nandi, 2017a). Parents interested in joining the collective generally contact the group members through WhatsApp to organise or participate in various extracurricular activities around Santiago that involve their children’s interaction in Galician. The above language management strategy where Bea and like-minded parents take up the role of policy intermediaries and attempt to create communication space and conditions for their children to use Galician uninterruptedly can be considered as another stylised form of collective (socio)linguistic citizenship. However, it still has to be determined whether these parents can effectively restore the process of intergenerational transmission of Galician by monitoring their children’s contexts of socialisation. Bea’s concern for this is evident in her observation that her daughter ‘started realising that other children were speaking in Castilian on the beach’. Although parents often intervene with an intention to determine children’s linguistic practices, their assumptions may fail dramatically as children reach adolescence (Schwartz, 2020). The reason may be manifold, including a clash over cultural beliefs and norms with individual parents (Nandi, in press), the role of peers in early adolescence (Revis, 2016), and symbolic dominance of a majority language outside the home (Li, 2018) among others. These scenarios may transform the home domain into a complex context of agnostic negotiation of conflicting ideologies among different family members. Akin to urban Galicia, the Greater Bilbao area in the BAC is also predominantly Castilian-speaking. Janire and her partner, who speak only Basque at home, moved from a Basque-dominant area in Gipuzkoa. Even though there is some top-down support from the local government to promote the use of Basque, Castilian remains the primary language for socialisation among children. As such, these pro-Basque parents, like those in Galicia, also created a group of friends to develop a more Basquedominant environment for their children while growing up: Janire: (...) Guk egin genuen talde euskalduntxo bat eta azkenean zu batzen bazara, ba umeak ere. (Nire herrian) izango balitzateke, ba nik nire koadrila daukat eta nire koadrilarekin ibiliko nintzateke, baina klaro guk hemen inor ez genuen ezagutzen. (...) Bai, gu ere batu gara euskaldun jendearekin. [In Basque]

Janire: We created a Basque group, and if you start meeting, children too. If it was in my hometown, I would have my group of friends, but here, we didn’t know anyone, so we gathered with Basque-speaking people. [Authors’ translation]

The above scenario further underscores the parental (socio)linguistic citizenship through selecting peers for their children that, as discussed before, can be considered as a strategy of bottom-up resistance towards the conventionalisation of Castilian in urban terrains. Despite favourable

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institutional support for Basque for the past few decades, as discussed previously, opportunities to use the language in the public domain remain restricted. In urban milieu, the use of Basque outside the home or educational context (including ikastolak) is sometimes seen as breaking long established social norms which denotes the potency of Castilian’s practical and ideological dominance in the urban milieu (Goirigolzarri et al., 2019). This gives rise to contexts of negotiation on the ground among Basque-speaking families and users of Castilian as it is happening in the following situation where a Castilian-speaking granny complains about a father–daughter communication in Basque: Haritz: (...) behin hemen egon ginen bazkaltzen eta zegoen nire emaztearen ama, eta ni alabarekin hitz egiten euskaraz. Eta esan zion ‘jo, es que no entiendo lo que decís’ esan zigun amamak, eta esan zion nire alabak ‘jo, y para que me mandáis a ikastola?’ (...) Ni superpozik erantzunarekin. [In Basque]

Haritz: (…) once we were having lunch with my mother-in-law, and I was speaking in Basque with my daughter. The grandma told her ‘I don’t understand what you say’ and my daughter replied ‘then, why did you send me to ikastola?’. (…) I was extremely happy with  that answer. [Authors’ translation]

Even though Haritz’s partner does not have enough competence to speak in Basque, the couple decided to send their daughter to an ikastola. In addition, Haritz speaks only Basque to his daughter, while his partner speaks Castilian following a ‘one parent one language’ FLP. The above extract highlights how the Castilian-dominated exterior represented through the grandmother intends to control a parent–daughter conversation and the girl drawing on her own agency exerts a discourse of resistance while reclaiming her right to use Basque in accordance with the FLP decided by her parents. She made it clear that the purpose of studying in an ikastola is not only to learn or improve Basque but to practice the minority language in all the possible contexts. This active proliferation of Basque in the face of a Castilian-dominated exterior made Haritz feel proud of their daughter and their Basque-centred FLP. The parental commitments and strategies for the revitalisation of Basque or Galician, as represented through above excerpts, can be interpreted as bubbles of linguistic resistance towards the hegemonic control of Castilian.  Conclusion

The case examples discussed above demonstrate that Castilian continues to dominate the Galician sociolinguistic landscape exerting control over the institutional language policies. Simultaneously, due to Galician’s greater visibility and its increased proliferation in education and media over the past decades, the levels of literacy and linguistic competence in

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Galician also received an impetus that gave way to a generation of parents such as Bea, Elena, Raquel and Virgilio who are influenced by a strong ideological attachment with Galician. Both the Castilian master narrative and its power over the Galician government policies are being challenged by this demographic. A careful analysis of the profiles discussed with regard to Galicia further reveals that symbolic capital, evident in the privileging of Castilian as the primary language of communication in the urban domains, is to some degree offset by this collective from the micro level. Their actions have destabilised the normalisation and legitimisation of the dominant discourse through different counter-hegemonic strategies of (socio)linguistic citizenship. These measures include language management in the family, interaction with like-minded parents using technological interfaces, developing co-operative mobilisations and monitoring the children’s language socialisation contexts outside the school space. In the Galician sociolinguistic situation, where the existence of traditional speakers weakens incessantly due to language shift, these parents, by creating alternative bottom-up language policies, can occupy a significant role in language revitalisation processes from the ground. Unlike Galician, the case of Basque is a good example of the positive impact of introducing a minority language in the education system with the aim of language revitalisation. This grassroot and governmental educational policy resulted in an increase of potential Basque speakers due to the high number of parents choosing Basque-medium schools when enrolling their children. These children are potential speakers as they are able to communicate effectively in Basque, but being proficient in a language does not necessarily lead to its use. Forty years of intensive proBasque educational policy could not challenge sufficiently the supremacy of Castilian and most urban contexts including the research site chosen for this chapter remain Castilian-dominated in most spheres whether public or private. The ikastola parents of this study are aware of this sociolingual imbalance and have created pro-Basque FLPs to legitimise the presence and use of the language at school (i.e. Fermin’s case), at home (i.e. when Haritz’s daughter speaks Basque to her grandmother), and with networks of friends and peers (i.e. Janire in their choice of Basquespeaking peers for her daughters). While challenging the hegemonic discourse of Castilian, these parents also question the increasing demand of English in the educational context. They rather argue for a trilingual model that develops with the minority language in its axis. Otherwise, as Garazi, Ekiñe and Fernanda underscore, the top-down goal of trilingualism will remain unachievable. All these parents made a choice in favour of an ikastola with the thought of it being the best choice for the learning, use and promotion of Basque. The actions of these parents even go beyond the precincts of home and ikastolak as Janire applies her agency to govern her daughters’ language practices by selecting peers only from Basquespeaking homes.

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This chapter set out to analyse family language dynamics through the lenses of (socio)linguistic citizenship in the BAC and Galicia where a group of pro-minority language parents decided to raise their children in either Basque or Galician. Based on their opinions and claimed linguistic practices, we have argued that each progenitor exercises their own agency to interpret, appropriate and implement institutional policies or on some occasions, develop discourses of resistance. The individual practices of these parents, as this study demonstrates, when galvanised into collective mobilisations (in the form of Ikastolak and Semente), can influence their immediate society’s language conduct (cf. Stroud, 2001: 351). Above all, (socio)linguistic citizenship concentrates on the diversity of practices that people use to get themselves heard (Rampton et  al., 2018), while it is equally necessary to construct a voice worth hearing (Hymes, 1996: 64). Developing a voice worth listening to is time consuming and often calls for some sort of institutional support. In essence, the dilemmas that these parents must negotiate are between the realities of social pressure, linguistic ideologies in the exterior, and educational policies on the one hand and the desire for cultural loyalty and linguistic intergenerational transmission on the other. Acknowledgements

Anik Nandi’s work is supported through a Juan de la Cierva Incorporation Grant (Ref. IJC2020-043318-I) funded by MCIN/ AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by European Union NextGenerationEU/ PRTR, the University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU (JDCI20/21) and the Basque Government (IT1627-22). Maite Garcia-Ruiz and Ibon Manterola’s work is supported by the Basque Government under Grant IT1627-22, developed by the ELEBILAB  research group (University of the Basque Country). References Ahearn, L. (2001) Language and agency. Annual Review of Anthropology 20, 109–137. Althusser, L. (1971) Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays. New York: Monthly Review Press.  Amonarriz, K. and Martinez de Lagos, I. (2017) Bidegurutzetik ateratzeko palankak. Bat Soziolinguistika Aldizkaria 103 (2), 27–38. Amorrortu, E., Ortega, A., Idiazabal, I. and Barreña, A. (2009) Actitudes y prejuicios de los castellanohablantes hacia el euskera. Vitoria-Gasteiz: Eusko Jaurlaritzaren Argitalpen Zerbitzu Nagusia. Basque Government (2019) Sixth Sociolinguistic Survey 2016. Vitoria-Gasteiz: Leitzaran Grafikak. Blommaert, J. (2013) Citizenship, language, and superdiversity: Towards complexity. Journal of Language, Identity & Education 12 (3), 193–196. Cenoz, J. (2009) Towards Multilingual Education: Basque Educational Research from an International Perspective. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

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Consejo Asesor del Euskera (2016) ¿Y a partir de ahora, qué? La sostenibilidad del desarrollo del Euskera o ‘piedra que rueda no cría musgo’. Vitoria-Gasteiz: Servicio de Publicaciones el Gobierno Vasco. https://www.irekia.euskadi.eus/uploads/attachments/8059/Eta_hemendik_aurrera_zer_GAZT_2016-05-03_ANE_JGB_(2).pdf. Curdt-Christiansen, X.L. (2014) Family language policy: Is learning Chinese at odds with learning English?. In X.L. Curdt-Christiansen and A. Hancock (eds) Learning Chinese in Diasporic Communities (pp. 35–55). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Curdt-Christiansen, X.L. and Lanza, E. (2018) Language management in multilingual families: Efforts, measures and challenges. Multilingua 37 (2), 123–130.  Deumert, A. (2018) Commentary: On participation and resistance. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 289–299). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.  Euskaltzaindia (2011) El movimiento de las Ikastolas. Un pueblo en marcha. El modelo Ikastola 1960–2010. Bilbao: Euskaltzaindia.  Fernandez, I. (1994) Oroimenaren hitza: Ikastolen historia, 1960–1975. Bilbo: Udako Euskal Unibertsitatea. Fogle, L.W. (2013) Parental ethnotheories and family language policy in transnational adoptive families. Language Policy 12 (1), 83–102. Galicia Confidencial (2020) ‘A escola Semente xa pode comezar a reforma do seu novo edificio en Compostela grazas ao “crowdfunding”’. Galicia Confidencial, 24 July. http:// www.galiciaconfidencial.com/noticia/133916-escola-semente-pode-comezar-reformanovo-edificio-compostela-grazas-crowdfunding. Garcia-Ruiz, M. (in progress) Familiako hizkuntza politika eleaniztuna testuinguru erdaldun batean. PhD thesis, University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU). Goirigolzarri, J., Amorrortu, E. and Ortega, A. (2019) Activación lingüística de jóvenes neohablantes de euskera en la universidad. In F. Ramallo, E. Amorrortu and M. Puigdevall (eds) Neohablantes de Lenguas Minorizadas en el Estado Español (pp. 23–45). Madrid: Iberoamericana Verbuert. Hymes, D. (1996) Ethnography, Linguistics, Narrative Inequality: Toward an Understanding of Voice. London: Taylor & Francis. Irizar, M. (2017) Euskara biziberritzeko ibilbidea: Azterketa kritikoa. In J. Goirigolzarri, X. Landabidea and I. Manterola (eds) Euskararen Biziberritzea: Marko, Diskurtso eta Praktika Berriak Birpentsatzen (pp.11–23). Bilbo: UEU. Isin, E.F. (2008) Theorizing acts of citizenship. In E.F. Isin and G.M. Nielsen (eds) Acts of Citizenship (pp. 15–43). London: Palgrave Macmillan. Kasares, P. (2017) La transmisión intergeneracional desde la socialización lingüística: El caso vasco. Treballs de Sociolingüística Catalana 27, 133–147. King, K.A. (2016) Language policy, multilingual encounters, and transnational families. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 37 (7), 726–733.  King, K.A., Fogle, L. and Logan-Terry, A. (2008) Family language policy. Language and Linguistics Compass 2 (5), 907–922. Lanza, E. (2007) Multilingualism and the family. In P. Auer and Li Wei (eds) Handbook of Multilingualism and Multilingual Communication (pp. 45–66). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Li, W. (2018) Community languages in late modernity. In J.W. Tollefson and M. PérezMilans (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Language Policy and Planning (pp. 591–609). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Manterola, I. (2019) A study of recipes written by Basque L2 immersion students: Any evidence for language revitalization? In N. Yiğitoğlu and M. Reichelt (eds) L2 Writing Beyond English (pp. 117–134). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Mbembe, A. (2016) Decolonizing the university: New directions. Arts and Humanities in Higher Education 15 (1), 29–45. McGee, P. (2018) Endangered languages: The case of Irish Gaelic. Training, Language and Culture 2 (4), 26–38. 

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Monteagudo, H. (2012) Política lingüística en Galicia: Apuntes para un nuevo balance. In G. Kremnitz, P. Cichon and B. Czernilofsky-Basalka (eds) Quo vadis, Romania? (pp. 21–39). Wien: Institut für Romanistik, Universität Wien. Monteagudo, H., Loredo, X., Nandi, A. and Salgado, X. (2019) A importancia dos novos contextos urbanos e periurbanos en Galicia na transmisión lingüística interxeracional da lingua galega. In M. Barrieras and C. Ferrerós (eds) Transmissions. Estudis sobre la Transmissió Lingüística (pp. 11–26). Barcelona: EUMO. Nandi, A. (2017a) Language Policies on the Ground: Parental Language Management in Urban Galician Homes. PhD thesis, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh. https:// www.ros.hw.ac.uk/handle/10399/3360. Nandi, A. (2017b) Language policies and linguistic culture in Galicia. Labor Histórico 3 (2), 28–45.  Nandi, A. (2018) Parents as stakeholders: Language management in urban Galician homes. Multilingua 37 (2), 201–223.  Nandi, A. (2019) Política lingüística familiar. O papel dos proxenitores pro-galego na transmisión interxeracional. Estudos da Lingüística Galega 11, 77–101.  Nandi, A. (in press) Micropolíticas lingüísticas familiares de resistencia. Estrategias parentales para la transmisión intergeneracional del gallego. Revista Española de Lingüística Aplicada/Spanish Journal of Applied Linguistics.  Nandi, A. and Devasundaram, A.I. (2017) Contesting the conventionalising of Castilian: The role of Galician parents as counter-elites. In F. Lauchlan and M.C. ParafitaCouto (eds) Bilingualism and Minority Languages in Europe: Current Trends and Developments (pp. 12–33). Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Nandi, A., Manterola, I., Reyna-Muniain, F. and Kasares, P. (2022) Effective family language policies and intergenerational transmission of minority languages: Parental language governance in indigenous and diasporic contexts. In M. Hornsby and W. Mcleod (eds) Transmitting Minority Languages. Palgrave Studies in Minority Languages and Communities (pp. 305–329). London: Palgrave Macmillan.  O’Rourke, B. (2011) Galician and Irish in the European Context: Attitudes towards Weak and Strong Minority Languages. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science Education 17 (4), 68–83.  Revis, M. (2016) A Bourdieusian perspective on child agency in family language policy. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 22 (2), 177–191. Schwartz, M. (2020) Strategies and practices of home language maintenance. In A.C. Schalley and S.A. Eisenchlas (eds) Handbook of Home Language Maintenance and Development (pp. 194–217). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Seminario de Sociolingüística, Real Academia Galega (2017) Lingua e Sociedade en Galicia: Resumo de Resultados 1992–2016. A Coruña: Real Academia Galega. Sistema de Indicadores del Euskera (2021) Familia, educación y enseñanza del euskera a personas adultas. https://www.euskadi.eus/web01-apeusadi/es/eusadierazle/listaV1. apl?idioma=c&tema=3 (accessed 4 March 2021). Spolsky, B. (2004) Language Policy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Spolsky, B. (2019) A modified and enriched theory of language policy (and management). Language Policy 18, 323–338.  Spotti, M. (2011) Ideologies of success for superdiverse citizens: The Dutch testing regime for integration and the online private sector. Diversities 13 (2), 38–52.  Stroud, C. (2001) African mother-tongue programmes and the politics of language: Linguistic citizenship versus linguistic human rights. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 22 (4), 339–355. Stroud, C. (2007) Bilingualism: Colonialism and postcolonialism. In M. Heller (ed.) Bilingualism: A Social Approach (pp. 25–49). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.  Stroud, C. (2009) A postliberal critique of language rights: Toward a politics of language for a linguistics of contact. In J.E. Petrovic (ed.) International Perspectives on

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Bilingual Education: Policy, Practice, and Controversy (pp. 191–218). Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.  Stroud, C. (2018) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud, and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.  Stroud, C. and Heugh, K. (2004) Linguistic human rights and linguistic citizenship. In D. Patrick and J. Freeland (eds) Language Rights and Language Survival: A Sociolinguistic Exploration (pp. 191–218). Manchester: St Jerome.  Stroud, C. and Kerfoot, C. (2013) Towards rethinking multilingualism and language policy for academic literacies. Linguistics and Education 24 (4), 396–405.  Stroud, C. and Kerfoot, C. (2020) Decolonising higher education: Multilingualism, linguistic citizenship and epistemic justice. Working Papers in Urban Language & Literacies 265, 1–21.  Tzanakis, M. (2011) Bourdieu’s social reproduction thesis and the role of cultural capital in educational attainment: A critical review of key empirical studies. Educate 11 (1), 76–90. Urla, J. (1993) Cultural politics in an age of statistics: Numbers, nations, and the making of Basque identity. American Ethnologist 20 (4), 818–843. Urla, J. (2012) Reclaiming Basque: Language, Nation, and Cultural Activism. Reno, NV: University of Nevada Press. Wilson, S. (2020) Family Language Policy: Children’s Perspectives. Cham: Springer. Zalbide, M. (1998) Normalización lingüística y escolaridad: Un informe desde la sala de máquinas. Revista Internacional de Estudios Vascos 43 (2), 355–424.

Part 3 Building Communities of Voicing

7 (Socio)linguistic Citizenship in Rural Tanzania: A Perspective from the Capability Approach Danny Foster

In Tanzania, rural, indigenous language communities attain the lowest outcomes in education. Language of instruction (LoI) is a factor, but indigenous languages are proscribed from classrooms. Research shows that mother tongue-based multilingual education can improve the situation; however, there is little interest from the government to pursue it. And with a lack of information, support and voice, indigenous language communities are poorly positioned to drive change. A study conducted among parents from a rural, minoritised language community – the Malila – elicited perspectives on language-in-education to examine their support and rejection of specific languages of instruction (Foster, 2021). Using critical discourse analysis (Fairclough, 2003) and the capability approach (Sen, 1999), it was possible to reveal deeply held ideologies and consider them against parents’ valued linguistic capabilities. The study affirms and elaborates a proposal by Rubagumya et al. (2011) which suggests well-being in Tanzania is linked to language repertoires. Three distinct capability sets can be connected to indigenous, national and global languages. This chapter reports on that study with special attention given to the interplay between (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2018) and the capability approach. The two frameworks are presented as complementary in their views of equality, transformation, and agency. I argue that the capability approach informs (socio)linguistic citizenship in at least two ways: first, it works to characterise specific (socio)linguistic ‘citizenships’, and second, it underscores the need to address the effect of adaptive preferences on agency. Introduction

From 2013 to 2017, an average of only 63.7% of Tanzanian students passed the Primary School Leaving Examination (Ndibalema, 2019). Various 123

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reports reveal the lowest performance comes from rural communities (Government of the United Republic of Tanzania & UNICEF, 2018; Ministry of Education and Vocational Training, 2013; The United Republic of Tanzania, 2014) where language of instruction (LoI) is a factor for children who predominantly use indigenous languages in the home. Since Tanzania’s independence in 1967, education policies have stipulated that only Swahili and English be used for classroom instruction (Ministry of Education and Culture, 1995; Ministry of Education and Vocational Training, 2014) – a striking position considering that the country boasts a rich diversity of 117 indigenous language communities (Eberhard et al., 2021). Over the past two decades, international development organisations have notably increased their support of mother tongue education (MTE) as part of a mother tongue-based multilingual education (MLE) strategy for improving access to and quality of education, e.g. DFID (Department for International Development, 2010), UNESCO (Medel-An˜onuevo, 2013), UNICEF (Craissati et al., 2007), USAID (Pflepsen et al., 2015), and the World Bank (World Bank, 2011). Educational authorities in Tanzania, however, have shown little interest in pursuing such an approach, but, to be fair, there is almost no pressure from the wider population to do so. This is notwithstanding the fact that language development work has been carried out in numerous indigenous communities which now boast established orthographies, grammars and basic literacy materials. These efforts, however, have produced few, if any, benefits for education. The success or failure of MLE programmes can depend largely on parents (Malone, 2018); but in general, there is a lack of research that engages them more deeply on this issue (i.e. going beyond surveys and questionnaires), especially among minoritised language communities in rural, lowincome contexts. This chapter discusses an in-depth, qualitative study conducted among the Malila language community in Tanzania’s Mbeya region (see Foster, 2021). It engaged 91 parents in interviews and focus groups to examine ideological beliefs about language and language learning that give rise to their support and rejection of specific primary school LoIs. Examining parents’ LoI preferences through a perspective of (socio)linguistic citizenship provides important insight into how minoritised, indigenous language communities in rural, low-income contexts approach language-in-education. The study revealed parents look to schools to provide their children with language skills that will give them access to new social spaces where opportunities and agency freedoms are substantially improved vis-à-vis those available locally. By learning Swahili and English, children can move out (and up) from a local citizenship into national and supranational ones. The question of whether or not they retain their indigenous identity in this process has been triaged by parents against the prospect of not achieving well-being resulting in a perspective that views indigenous language and culture loss as collateral damage.

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A Methodology for Studying Language-in-Education Ideologies

To identify and critically evaluate the ideological belief systems that bear on parents’ support and rejection of specific LoIs, I adopted a critical realist position as outlined by Bhaskar (2008). This ontological posture not only requires a combination of criticality and social justice, but it harmonises them through its defence of a stratified reality. The empirical (what is perceived) is distinguished from the actual (what happens irrespective of perception), which has causal mechanisms in the real (what is). This perspective supports four key assumptions with which I approached parents’ talk about language-in-education: first, parents have beliefs which can vary in accuracy; second, different beliefs have the potential to give rise to different conditions; third, value judgements can be made about beliefs and the conditions they provoke based on how accurate they are; and fourth, where inaccurate beliefs exist, they should be supplanted with beliefs that are more accurate. The extent to which a given reasoning about the actual and the real is accurate is measured by its resulting social benefit – the greater the benefit, the more accurate the reasoning. To operationalise the critical and social justice aspects of critical realism, it became instrumental to further adopt approaches within those domains that were suited to the research. For the critical work, Fairclough’s (2003, 2009) dialectical relational approach to Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) provided both an epistemological framework and the methods to work out from parents’ talk, the ideological beliefs that were informing their support and rejection of specific languages in discrete moments of the research. For social justice, the Capability Approach (CA) provided a framework that measures equality in the space of capabilities or more simply put, the kinds of real opportunities that are available to people (see Nussbaum, 2011; Sen, 1999; see also Chapter 8 by Eilidh McEwan in this volume). CDA and the CA, on their own, are very broad frameworks that can be applied in various ways, some more or less relevant, to the research. In deciding what texts to analyse, I found it helpful to constrain the work of CDA by applying it within the scope of Family Language Policy (FLP) (Curdt-Christiansen, 2018; King & Fogle, 2017; Luykx, 2003; Schiffman, 1996; Smith-Christmas, 2016). And to better appreciate the role of language within the CA as it relates to social justice, the findings were interpreted through the lens of (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2018). By extending the notion of citizenship from status (i.e. membership in the nation-state) to action (i.e. the kinds of things that citizens can be and do), it links peoples’ linguistic repertoires to their capability sets. I discuss this further later. Methods

Language development efforts among the Malila between 2009 and 2016 supported the establishment of Malila literacy programmes for

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preschool-aged children in four villages. These operate as nursery schools, and as such are not subject to restrictions on indigenous languages, but attract preschool-aged children who do not have access to preschools. Nursery schools operate under the oversight of the Ministry of Health, Community Development, Gender, Seniors and Children. They are intended for children up to age 4. Preschools (ages 5–6), primary, secondary and tertiary education fall under the Ministry of Education, Science, Technology and Vocational Training. Conducting the research among these four villages and two others where Swahili-medium preschools were operating made it possible to sample parents who had exposed their children to both Malila and Swahili instruction. Data were collected from 65 parents representing 37 households through semi-structured interviews that lasted approximately one hour. They responded to open questions about their views on language, language learning, and learning. Also, to elicit a list of valued linguistic capabilities, focus group discussions were held in all six villages, with a total of 63 parents representing 48 households. Many parents, who participated in the interviews, also participated in the focus groups. I conducted the interviews in Swahili, a ‘second’ language for both myself and the participants. All of the responses were transcribed from interview recordings, cleaned up for spelling consistency, and entered into qualitative data analysis software. Systematic approaches were used to select three kinds of parental talk about language-in-education: strategies for indexing languages; language learning motivations and processes; and LoI preferences for a specific child enrolled in early primary school. Parents’ responses underwent CDA and were compared across interviews to identify salient discourses and draw out an FLP consistent with community beliefs. The focus groups were conducted in Swahili and Malila with help from a local facilitator. A list of valued linguistic capabilities was compiled in each group and aggregated with the previous group’s responses. Positional and ethical considerations

I sought to position myself in the study as an ‘international friend’ who was concerned with the impact of LoI practices on the overall quality of primary school education in the Malila community. Having spent nine years doing remote fieldwork while living among 19 indigenous communities in Tanzania seemed to earn me both acceptance and trust despite my inescapable position as an ‘outsider’ – a position that, nonetheless, lends itself well to more ‘etic’ kinds of observations (Tinker & Armstrong, 2008: 54). Recorded verbal consent was obtained from all of the participants and each one received a letter with information about the study including instructions to withdraw. Parents’ anonymity has been protected, and all

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examples presented below are attributed to pseudonyms. Although any research has the potential to be sensitive (Corbin & Morse, 2003), some research clearly has the potential to cause more harm than others (Lee & Renzetti, 1990). Being that Tanzanians freely and often vigorously debate LoI in various forums and media across Tanzanian public spheres without concern for repercussions, the measures used to protect parents in the study were selected as appropriate to its level of risk. In the next three sections, I (i) discuss how a perspective of (socio)linguistic citizenship through the CA informs the nature of specific kinds of ‘citizenships’; (ii) share key voices that represent Malila parents’ ideological beliefs about the languages that matter most to them; and (iii) affirm and elaborate a proposal by Rubagumya et al. (2011) that describes the Tanzanian citizenship experience in three tiers based on individual language repertoires. Language in the Capability Approach

As a framework for evaluating social arrangements, the CA asks what real opportunities are available to people and what freedoms they have to be and do the things they reasonably value (Nussbaum, 2011; Sen, 1995, 2009). The real opportunities available to a given person is understood as their ‘capability set’ and what they choose to actually be and do from the capabilities available to them is understood as their ‘functionings’ (Sen, 1999: 75). The space of capabilities establishes the connection (or disconnection) between the space of resources (e.g. income, land, skills, books, etc.) and the space of utility (i.e. the level of satisfaction or happiness people experience from the capabilities and functionings they have realised). By assessing equality in the space of capabilities, it is possible to demonstrate why multiple individuals (or societies) with access to similar resources (e.g. income) may still be unequally positioned. To evaluate social arrangements within the CA, a relevant list of capabilities must be identified (Biggeri et al., 2006; Hart, 2009; Nussbaum, 2011; Robeyns, 2003); however, any process to that end must involve the individuals for whom evaluation is taking place (Sen, 2005). Identifying peoples’ valued capabilities is connected to their well-being freedoms. Involving them in that process is connected to their agency freedoms. These two types of freedoms are deeply interrelated but importantly distinguished for the way in which agency can impact well-being (Sen, 1985).1 Conversion Factors and Adaptive Preferences

Two important aspects of the CA for this discussion are its recognition of individual (i) conversion factors and (ii) adaptive preferences. Conversion factors impact the kinds of capabilities people can create with the resources available to them. They may be personal (e.g. intelligence, sex, health),

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social (e.g. cultural norms, classes, government policies), or environmental (e.g. geography, climate, urban/rural) (Robeyns, 2005; Walker, 2006). Sen (1995: xi), describing the CA’s individualistic commitment to social justice, stresses that, ‘human diversity is no secondary complication (to be ignored, or to be introduced ‘later on’); it is a fundamental aspect of our interest in equality’. This further underscores the importance of dialogue with communities when establishing their valued capabilities. Elster (1982) describes adaptive preference formation as the practice, whereby people lower their preferences to accommodate their limitations (i.e. ‘sour grapes’). He challenged utilitarian welfare metrics by asking, ‘Why should individual want satisfaction be the criterion of justice and social choice when individual wants themselves may be shaped by a process that preempts the choice?’ (Elster, 1982: 219). Sen (1999: 63) describes adaptive preferences as the result of a situation where deprived people tend to come to terms with their deprivation because of the sheer necessity of survival, and they may, as a result, lack the courage to demand any radical change, and may even adjust their desires and expectations to what they unambitiously see as feasible. But I would argue that adaptive preferences pose a problem in the CA for the way in which they are at odds (as a confounding factor) with Sen’s commitment to people’s agency and the central role communities should play in establishing their own valued capabilities. Working with a community to establish their valued capabilities, then, becomes a delicate task that with poor facilitation, could result in communities being caught between existing agendas from the ‘top’ (e.g. educational authorities) and competing agendas from the ‘side’ (e.g. non-governmental organisations). (Socio)linguistic Citizenship and Capability Sets

Not surprisingly, language emerges in the CA primarily as a capability related to literacy. Sen (2003: 22) describes illiteracy and innumeracy as ‘forms of insecurity in themselves’; and, Nussbaum (2011) stresses the importance of literacy for its broader intrinsic benefits to critical thinking and imagination. But neither Sen nor Nussbaum are explicit about the nature of literacy with regards to specific languages. If language is only linked to capabilities, parents in minoritised language communities are justified in prioritising literacy in foreign languages for their children considering the difference in potential to realise certain valued capabilities in their own languages. Here, the CA can benefit from an account of language in (socio)linguistic citizenship that views it more practically as ‘a political and economic site of struggle’ (Stroud & Heugh, 2004: 209). From a CA perspective, (socio)linguistic citizenship notably emphasises and expands the role of language as a conversion factor. It recognises the far-reaching influence an individual’s linguistic repertoire can have on their sociopolitical freedom to access capabilities and therefore,

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functionings, and ultimately, their sense of well-being. (Socio)linguistic citizenship introduces an important question for the CA, viz. what can people be and do in a given politically defined context when they can only use specific languages? The CA is well-suited to answer this question and paired with CDA; they can reveal social structures, discourses and ideologies that sustain inequality for socially excluded linguistic communities. This is precisely what was done in this study for the languages Malila parents indicated were most important to them: Malila, Swahili and English. In what follows, I discuss how the kinds of capabilities parents attached to each language affirmed a proposal by Rubagumya et al. (2011) that Tanzanians fall into one of three citizenship tiers based on their ability to use one or a combination of Tanzania’s indigenous, national (Swahili), or official (English) languages. This understanding of ‘citizenship’ as a way of acting within the nation-state rather than simply being one of its members lies at the heart of the (socio)linguistic citizenship paradigm which is offered as a remedy for the [failed] paradigm of linguistic rights. The key difference is voice. Citizenship and rights have historically been practices that are conceived at the top and enacted in a downward direction through power imbalances. (Socio)linguistic citizenship, however, is conceived at the bottom and enacted upwards through governing structures that empower communities by listening and providing support. One way to appreciate the difference between citizenship as a status versus citizenship as a way of acting is to consider what might be their respective opposites: foreigners versus subjects, with ‘subjects’ here used to denote Middle Ages citizenry in a pre-Magna Carta Libertatum era. Findings: Malila Parents’ Talk About Important Languages

In this section, I give examples from parents’ responses in the study which expose deeply held ideologies that attach different capabilities to Malila, Swahili, and English. I argue that parents’ discursive practices both reflect and sustain unequal citizenships in Tanzania and when considered through the CA, it becomes possible to characterise the differences across citizenships. Admittedly, this could only be done ideologically since the study relied on textual data, whereas actual practices would need to be studied through ethnographic approaches. Understanding ideologies, however, is crucial in appreciating the knowledge parents rely on to formulate their preferences. Interview responses presented below were chosen for the ideological beliefs they reveal about Malila, Swahili and English as it relates to (i) how they are learned, (ii) the role they play in identity formation and (iii) what, if any, links exist between them and upward mobility. They were also chosen for being highly representative of what were widely expressed views in the research. 2

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Malila

Malila was presented almost exclusively by parents as a language that children are ‘born with’ (kuzaliwa nayo), ‘encounter’ (kukuta), ‘inherit’ (kurithi), or are ‘raised in’ (kukulia). Few parents described it as a language that was learned (kujifunza) and those who did combined it with one of the verbs above. For Junior, this pervasive discourse disqualified Malila as an LoI for his children: (1) Shida moja ambayo sasa inaweza ikawepo kwa changamoto ya kwamba labda kimalila kiwepo katika ufundishaji, shida moja inayoweza kujitokeza ni kwamba ile lugha haina haja ya mtoto kujifunza. Tayari mtoto amezaliwa, amekulia katika lugha hiyo mpaka anakuja darasani, mpaka anakuja anaingia darasani tayari, hiyo lugha, anayo. ‘One issue that can arise as a challenge that maybe Malila should be used for teaching, one problem that can come up is that a child has no need to learn [Malila]. Already a child is born and raised in that very language right up until they come to school, up until they come and enter into the classroom and they already have that language.’

Junior’s response also reveals a widely adopted conflation of LoI with language teaching which effectively rejects opportunities to teach valuable language skills in the mother tongue – skills that are not only easier to teach and learn in a familiar language but are also transferable (i.e. more available) to other languages. The struggle that some parents have with Malila’s educational value, however, should not be interpreted as a lack of cultural value. Consider Kassim’s commitment to the role Malila plays in his daughter’s identity: (2) Kiswahili ni kitu cha umuhimu kati ya lugha hizi tatu lakini kama ningechagua, ningeona kwamba huyu mwanangu ajue kabisa kwamba alitoka katika kabila lipi. Kumbe, ajue na kimalila, asili ya huku! ‘Swahili is an important thing among these three languages but if I could choose, then I would ensure that this child of mine knows completely what tribe she comes from. Seriously, she really should know Malila, the origins of this place!’

Kassim’s hedging, however, through the use of conditional tenses (e.g. if... then) demonstrates his acceptance that his daughter will ultimately be responsible for her personal language maintenance as he expects her to leave the region in pursuit of better opportunities. The next two examples highlight this perceived lack of mobility connected to Malila: (3) Kimalila ni cha wachache ... yaani tuseme cha sehemu hii hii ya Umalila tu. Lakini nikitoka hapa, nikienda Kyela huko, nikiongea kimalila hawanielewi. Ni cha kwetu hapahapa.

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‘Malila is for a few people ... let’s say it’s just for this Malila place right here. But if I leave here, if I go there to Kyela3 and I speak Malila, they won’t understand me. [Malila] is just for our place right here.’ (4) Ndicho kinachosaidia ukienda ugenini ... Sasa Kimalila kitanipeleka wapi? ... Sisi tunalilia kilicho na faida kwa wageni wenzetu ... sasa nikienda huko nitapotea hivi hivi sijui kitu. Nakutana na wewe hunielewi. Ndivyo ilivyo ndivyo shule zetu zilivyojengwa. Tunalilia kiingereza tunashindwa ... kimalila huendi kokote! ‘[English] is what helps when you are in a foreign place ... Now where would Malila get me? ... We are crying for what has been profitable for our friends [in Mbeya]4 ... now if I go [abroad] I’ll just get lost because I don’t know a thing. I’d meet up with you and you couldn’t understand me. That’s the way our schools have been built. We cry out for English, but we’re defeated ... [with] Malila you don’t go anywhere!’

In example (3), Godfrey firmly anchors the Malila language in the Malila region and extends that connection to the Malila people in a way that discursively confines them there. In example (4), Zahra expresses her frustration with the local school system’s failure to teach children English and she explains the negative impact this has on mobility. Swahili

Swahili is routinely presented as a language that was introduced to the community through government schools. It can be ‘picked up’ informally outside of the classroom but is best learned through formal teaching and its use as LoI. Primary schools have been colonised by Swahili since Tanzania’s independence to the exclusion of all other languages with the exception that English was permitted in 1995 (Ministry of Education and Culture, 1995). Musa describes this as a problem for children whose parents fail to adequately prepare them for primary school by introducing Swahili at home: (5) Wakija huku wanaanza kushindwa kuelewana na walimu kwa sababu kule nyumbani wametoka na nini? Na kimalila kitupu! Ndio maana inatakiwa kutoka nyumbani ajue sana hasa Kiswahili. Kusudi anapokuja huku akikutana na mwalimu ambaye ametoka Sumbawanga – sijui wapi na wapi – aanze kuongea kiswahili kilichonyoka. ‘When they come [to school] they start out failing to communicate with the teacher because back home they’ve left with what? With nothing but Malila! This is why it’s necessary that from home they know Swahili well. The purpose is so that when they come to school and meet up with a teacher who’s from Sumbawanga – I don’t know wherever – they should start out speaking good Swahili.’

Musa’s concern is further driven by the ongoing practice of languagebased punishment (see Hurwitz & Kambel, 2020) which is exacerbated by

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the practice of transferring teachers who cannot speak Malila into local schools. Blommaert (2013: 41) describes the role of Swahili in Tanzania as being ‘strongly idealised, even mythologised’ for its early success in facilitating the spread of Tanzania’s founding party’s socialist ideals; allowing for the widest possible democratic participation making decisions; and uniquely identifying its speakers as Tanzanian. This latter point is significant to Tanzanians who see themselves as having a unique, shared language that does not privilege a particular ethnic group. Prosper highlights this unifying aspect of Swahili and, for purposes here, introduces the hierarchical ordering of languages in Tanzania: (6) Kiswahili, umuhimu wake ni kwa sababu ni lugha ya taifa. Halafu tunaelewana na watu wengi sana ndio maanake kiswahili kinakuwa cha muhimu zaidi kuliko [Malila]. ‘Swahili’s importance is because it’s the language of the nation. Furthermore we can understand so many people and that is indeed the reason Swahili is more important than [Malila].’

Ahadi also demonstrates this ranking of Swahili over Malila, but she further idealises its social reach for mobility through hyperbole as well as by contrasting it with Malila’s confinement to the Malila people and region: (7) Kimalila ni lugha yetu, lugha yetu Wamalila. Kiswahili ni lugha ya Taifa. Ina maana ni lugha ya Taifa, popote utakapokutana na wengine, una uwezo wa kuongea nao. Lakini lugha yetu ya hapa hapa. Ni ya hapa hapa tu. Tunaongea sisi kwa sisi, sio na watu wengine. ‘Malila is our language, our language for the Malila people. Swahili is the national language. Being the national language, it means that wherever you meet up with others you have the ability to speak with them. But our language from right here is just for right here. We speak [it] among ourselves, not with other people.’

Both Ahadi and Prosper index Swahili as lugha ya taifa ‘language of the nation’ or ‘national language’ – a highly politicised and pervasively used label for Swahili that accredits it with bringing unity and stability to a nation in ways that obscure otherwise deep divisions along ethnic, religious, political and socioeconomic lines. English

Learning English is a process that, in discourse, parents ascribe completely to formal schooling. It cannot be ‘picked up’ outside of the classroom. But there has been a growing sense of dissatisfaction with the educational programme in Tanzania to deliver quality education in English. In 2015, the government responded with an unprecedented solution,

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announcing that Swahili would replace English as the LoI in secondary school (Ministry of Education and Vocational Training, 2014). However, this policy has yet to be implemented due to low public acceptance. Some resistance can be attributed to parents who have adopted a discourse of distrust, alleging the new policy is a strategy to protect a small but powerful elite who want to limit access to English. But like Boniface, many parents across the country prefer an approach opposite to this new policy and have adopted an earlier-the-better discourse when it comes to learning English: (8) Ndio kilichotuangusha wengi. Sasa tungekuwa tumeanza na kiingereza hicho, wengi masomo tungekuwa tumefaulu. Sasa kule utakuta umeenda unasoma shule ya msingi, unajua lugha mbili tu, Kimalila na Kiswahili. ‘[English] has caused many of us to fall down. But had we started with English, many of us would have passed our studies. [In secondary school] you’ll discover that [after] having gone to primary school you’ve just come to know two languages: Malila and Swahili.’

Boniface’s position is frustrating for many reasons but two stand out. First, it rejects a precedent-setting decision by the government for MTE, and second, it both recognises and dismisses the fact that the current programme of assessment fails children by testing their English proficiency but not their knowledge (see Rea-Dickins and Yu [2013] for an incisive discussion of research on this issue in Zanzibar). Despite the challenges many have faced in Tanzania trying to access education through English, it remains one of the strongest valued linguistic capabilities, even among people who might have little opportunity to use it. Like the vast majority of parents in the research, Emmanuel is a farmer with a primary school education, but he desires an identity that includes the confidence of knowing English: (9) Ninachokipendea kiingereza ni kwamba ninachotaka ni mawasiliano na watu wa namna zote, cha kwanza. Lakini pili, inaweza ikanipa fursa ya kwenda mahala kokote, nikiwa najiamini kwamba nina lugha ya kufanya mawasiliano kwa mazingira ninayoenda. ‘[First,] what I like about English is that what I am wanting is communication with people of every kind. But second, it is able to give me opportunity to go to any place at all while believing in myself that I have a language of communication for wherever I go.’

In the same way, parents idealised Swahili’s national social reach in discourse, parents also idealised English’s international social reach. It was repeatedly construed as the language of upward mobility and success. Boniface, the same father who sought to supplant Swahili with English as LoI in primary school in example (8) above, describes the importance of English for schooling and ultimately life:

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(10) Kama unasoma, masomo mengi huwa yanakuja kwa kiingereza. Mpaka ukifuatilie ndio unaweza kufaulu na kwenda ngazi nyingine. Bila hicho umefeli unakaa nyumbani tu. ‘If you’re studying, many subjects typically come in English. Once you grasp it, you can indeed succeed and go to the next level. Without it you’ve failed and you’re just staying at home.’

Discourses of mobility connected to English were consistently construed through a semiotic strategy that deploys conditionals. Parents would set up a situation where someone knows or learns English and then present a consequence where capabilities have been expanded. Conversely, like Boniface in example (10), tragic consequences are presented as the outcome of not knowing English. Notice in this example, the tragic consequence is staying in the Malila region. This ‘if... then...’ formula obscures the possibility that learning English is not a guarantee of access but rather supports the idea’s existence in social reality as a social law or principle. Language and Social Hierarchies in Tanzania

The discourses upheld in Malila parents’ responses reflect and sustain a hierarchical ordering of Malila, Swahili and English. It has a profound impact on their preferences for specific language practices, especially LoI. This ordering is not unique to the Malila community, and its impact is increasingly gaining attention from FLP researchers (Curdt-Christiansen, 2018). Rubagumya et al. (2011) insightfully proposed that Tanzanians have established a three-tiered citizenship delineated by people’s linguistic identities and language repertoires. The first group, described as ‘global citizens’, represents Tanzania’s elite for their ability to use English, Swahili and possibly (but not necessarily) an indigenous language. Global citizens are a small portion of the population, but their competence in English and Swahili affords them the greatest opportunities for educational, geographical, communicative, social and economic mobility. The second group, ‘Tanzanian citizens’, represents the largest portion of the population. They can function competently in Swahili and most likely one or more indigenous languages, but they lack proficiency in English. Tanzanian citizens tend to live in urban/semi-urban contexts, and they can participate nationally in a variety of domains. However, their mobility is significantly diminished by their lack of English since they are unable to participate successfully in domains dominated by English (e.g. secondary schools, universities, some corporate sectors, the international community, etc.). The third group, those described as ‘semi-citizens’, is only able to function in indigenous languages and would require assistance to participate in domains where Swahili and English are used (e.g. elections, hospitals, courts, schools, etc.). Their languages are proscribed in formal

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education, national media outlets and all government services. The mobility of semi-citizens is extremely limited to the opportunities available in what are typically remote, rural communities where people live as subsistence farmers. Semi-citizens represent the largest, economically underprivileged portion of Tanzania’s population. The groups of people who populate the tiers and the opportunities they can or cannot access comprise a sociolinguistic world that aligns well with what parents collectively construed in the study as they talked about Malila, Swahili and English and the language learning goals they have for their children. The Capabilities of a Three-Tiered Citizenship

For Rubagumya et al., the tiers are social realities – the symptoms of a broken social system and the failure to implement linguistic rights, whereas in the context of this study, the tiers discursively reflect and sustain an ideological belief system that impacts parents’ preferences about language-in-education. To demonstrate the connections Malila parents have established between different languages and different capability sets, I offer the model in Figure 7.1. The centre represents the point at which someone in the Malila community begins their life. They physically emerge in Umalila ‘the Malila region’ where, by default, they have access to certain capabilities that I describe as (i) identity-based, (ii) educational, (iii) geosocial5 and (iv) linguistic. Important to the model is the idea that as one moves outward from the centre, their capabilities become more robust (e.g. one’s physical mobility opportunities can progress from walking to air travel). The concentric rings contain unique capability sets, and the lines dividing them represent the perceived limits of one’s capabilities, or what I refer to as a person’s capability horizon. They divide the three tiers and must be traversed if one wishes to expand their capabilities beyond the current tier – a task, which I argue below, parents have assigned to schools. I now discuss each of the four capability sets as they differ across the tiers. Identity-based capabilities

Identity-based capabilities, represented along the ‘nine o’clock’ position in the model, have to do with how one construes themselves politically as citizens and the opportunities that different ‘citzenships’ are believed to engender. ‘Citizenship’ here captures the degree of belonging and participation one feels capable of within specific geopolitical contexts. It addresses the extent to which a person sees themselves as an insider or an outsider within a given social space. And from a CDA perspective (see Fairclough, 2009), it also addresses the extent to which one has opportunity to affect social structures (established systems

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Figure 7.1.  Malila capability tiers

responsible for the highest level of constraints on peoples’ behaviour) and social practices (ways in which social structures are renegotiated in specific social domains) as agents within a given locale (e.g. through either acquiescence or disruption). This view of citizenship is consistent with Stroud’s (2018) formulation of citizenship as ‘the practices whereby new actors, seeking recognition in the public space in order to determine a new course of events, shift the location of agency and voice’ (2018: 21, emphasis in original). The inner tier provides capabilities for people to see themselves as Mmalila ‘a Malila person’. I prefer the Swahili term parents used as this is an important concept. Neither indigenous communities nor their languages have official recognition in the state but the social practice of ethnic groups to name themselves and the places they occupy is ubiquitous in Tanzania. An individual who identifies as Mmalila and is accepted by the Malila community as Mmalila would be afforded a high level of agency to participate in (or reject) social structures that are owned by the Malila community. Malila ‘citizenship’, then, is defined and sustained

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locally; however, it does have standing beyond the immediate community since other ethnic communities recognise and follow the same practice of defining themselves. Furthermore, maintaining links to one’s ethnic ‘roots’ is an important part of social life, even for global citizens in Tanzania. The middle tier is the space where people identify with the nationstate: the United Republic of Tanzania. Citizenship in this tier comes with opportunities to vote in federal elections, participate in politics, secure government jobs, and competently access government services such as health care, education, justice and administration. But I would argue from parents’ discursive practices that agency at this level of citizenship is limited. Many see themselves as the recipients of decisions handed down to them as was evidenced in a discursive strategy of defending social practices with the policies that bore them (e.g. statements such as ‘One must teach in Swahili because it is the national language’) or resisting one policy change because of its impact on another (e.g. statements such as ‘Children cannot be instructed in Malila because they won’t be able to write their exams in Swahili’). The outer tier is an extension of the middle tier in that it captures more robust versions of similar identity capabilities. For example, it could be the difference between political participation at the village level versus district, regional or national levels. The outer tier also captures capabilities that further develop one’s sense of global citizenship and international identity. For example, these might involve accessing foreign jobs or studying abroad, but it could also just be a sense of feeling cosmopolitan. Parents did not speak directly to agency in this tier; however, many construed their children as having the greatest amount of freedom to be and do anything they want if they were proficient in English. Educational capabilities

Educational capabilities describe various opportunities for learning. In Figure 7.1, they are represented along the ‘twelve o’clock’ position. The kind of learning available to semi-citizens in the inner tier is viewed as more traditional and less formal. It may, for example, take place at home or in the community. There is no established curriculum or recognition by the state for this learning. Nonetheless, knowledge, skills and attitudes acquired in this tier are important for participation in the local context, especially for securing jobs in the trades (e.g. carpentry, tailoring, welding, small engine repair, etc.). There is no designated LoI for learning at this level; however, parents reported that Malila dominates informal education at home and in the community. At the middle tier, formal educational capabilities are largely comprised of those afforded through Tanzania’s Ministry of Education, Science, Technology and Vocational Training, more specifically, the full

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programme of primary school. At the time of the research, there were no English-medium primary schools in the Malila region; therefore, all children in local primary schools were receiving instruction in Swahili. Other educational capabilities are available to Tanzanian citizens through trade schools, religious institutions, open learning programmes, ­non-governmental organisations, etc. These normally require the completion of primary school. Secondary and post-secondary educational capabilities lie in the outer tier as part of a global/international citizenship. They are provided by both the state and private institutions but also include opportunities to travel and study abroad. These capabilities are dependent on educational functionings from the middle tier. Educational capabilities are unique in that while they are associated with a given tier, they initially become available in the tier below them (e.g. primary and secondary schools are respectively accessible to the inner and middle tiers). Therefore, I have preferred the term ‘outposts’ to describe the gateway function of schools in Tanzania. They give citizens from one tier an experience that is both from and in the next tier – an important movement beyond one’s capability horizon. As outposts, schools should reflect the tier they represent, not the tier in which they become accessible. I would argue that LoI plays a central role in establishing this reflection. Geosocial capabilities

Geosocial capabilities, represented along the ‘three o’clock’ position of Figure 7.1, describe the physical places where individuals can go or take up residence in terms of who they can successfully communicate with. For the Malila community, the value of travel opportunities beyond the Malilaspeaking region depends largely on the ability to communicate effectively with others who do not speak Malila. It should be noted that geosocial capabilities are implicitly but deeply connected to economic capabilities and their expansion. Moving about and increasing one’s interpersonal networks is almost taken synonymously with economic mobility. At the inner tier, semi-citizens have opportunities to move and communicate inside the Malila language community’s geographical borders. In the model, this is represented by Umalila ‘the Malila region’, a term interviewees regularly used to index the part of Tanzania inhabited by those who identify ethnically as Malila and who speak the Malila language. This practice is consistent throughout the country as ethnic groups are well aware of their territorial boundaries. It is particularly interesting since historically, there has been no official recognition of indigenous ethnic groups or the lands where they reside. At the middle tier, Tanzanian citizens have opportunities to leave Umalila and travel anywhere in Tanzania and various parts of East Africa.

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These opportunities, however, are limited to places where Swahili can be used to interact with others and participate in their societies. Opportunities to travel beyond Tanzania and participate in societies where Swahili is not spoken lie within the outer tier for global citizens. These opportunities are available only to those who have adequate competency in English. Linguistic capabilities

Linguistic capabilities are represented along the ‘six o’clock’ position in the model. These include opportunities to learn, understand, read, write and speak different languages. The inner, middle and outer tiers afford these capabilities related to the Malila, Swahili and English languages, respectively. Within each tier, the specific identity-based, educational, geosocial and linguistic capabilities in those sets are mutually inclusive. The linguistic capabilities are unique, however, since parents construed them as compulsory for the others. For example, the identity-based, educational, or geosocial capabilities associated with Tanzanian citizens are only available to those competent in Swahili. In this sense, Swahili acquisition becomes a highly valued capability already at the inner tier but quickly begins to function as an important conversion factor in the middle tier. (Socio)linguistic citizenship captures this central role of language in determining what opportunities are available to people with different linguistic repertoires. Valued Language Capabilities and Adaptive Preferences

Turning back to the matter of adaptive preferences, caution must be heeded by anyone investigating LoI preferences among socially excluded language communities in multilingual contexts. Overly simplistic research methods that ignore the complex, ideological ways in which parents approach the issue in these contexts – especially those that present parents with binary choices involving English – will all but guarantee findings that support English-medium instruction (e.g. Ambroz & Mushi, 2015). When asked about one of their children enrolled in early primary, just over half of parents (52%) in the study stated a preference for Malila instruction. However, exploring this further revealed that they had embraced a discourse of scaffolding, whereby they viewed Malila instruction primarily as a strategy for helping children learn Swahili faster. Parents who were unsupportive of Malila instruction had embraced discourses of displacement (using Malila would offset valuable exposure to Swahili) and isolation (if children only learn Malila in school they will be cut off from the rest of Tanzania and the world). Parents on both ‘sides’, then, had the same goals of expediting Swahili acquisition for their

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children. If these discourses are as entrenched as the study suggests they are, then expecting parents to unquestioningly embrace MLE is not only overly ambitious but reflects a disregard for their deeply held beliefs. And efforts that do not align with parents’ beliefs are unlikely to succeed. Ball (2010), advocating for MLE in a literature review prepared for UNESCO 10 years into the Dakar Framework for Action (see UNESCO, 2000: 47), reflects, ‘we have witnessed the demise of programs that promote ideals and methods that are not congruent with parents’ understanding of how children learn, what children need to learn, and their own roles in promoting learning’. A concern related to this, however, is the support and education needed to help parents in identifying and establishing their valued linguistic capabilities. The focus group discussions conducted in the study offered no such support. This was intentional for three reasons. First, it would be challenging in Tanzania’s current policy context as engaging all of the necessary stakeholders would not be possible. Second, if such a list could be developed, there are ethical concerns with doing it solely for the sake of research with no intent to implement it developmentally. But third, providing space for parents to independently develop the list provided valuable insight into their adaptive preferences. It revealed conditioning by the three-tiered citizenship and the need to move children outward and upward through each tier. Another way of stating this is that in order for the capabilities parents identified to be realised, there would be no changes needed at the level of Tanzania’s social structures. Conclusion

(Socio)linguistic citizenship importantly recognises that inequalities exist because of language. The CA importantly recognises that different people with access to the same resources may not be able to be and do the same things. The former informs the latter by elevating the role of language as a substantial conversion factor with far-reaching effects on people’s opportunity and agency freedoms. The latter informs the former by revealing the specific nature of inequality linked to language. By integrating (socio)linguistic citizenship with the CA to study the connections between parents’ beliefs about language and their LoI preferences, it has been possible to describe three different kinds of citizenships in Tanzania. They differ vastly in terms of what people can be and do as it relates to their identities, education and upward mobility. In both theoretical perspectives, the solution to the problem they address is to promote the voice and agency of those marginalised. Stroud (2018) insists that ‘if we are to engage seriously with the lives of others, an imperative is reconceptualizing language in ways that can promote a diversity of voice and contribute to a mutuality and reciprocity of engagement across difference’ (2018: 17–18, emphasis in original).

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And for Sen (2005), he rejects the idea of developing a canonical list of capabilities due, in part, to his ‘disinclination to accept any substantive diminution of the domain of public reasoning’ (2005: 157), even if, ‘some of the basic capabilities ... will no doubt figure in every list of relevant capabilities in every society’ (2005: 159). The conversation, then, is a part of the solution. For Gervas and many other Tanzanian parents, however, this is not the case. He laments the future of Malila language and culture for his daughter: (11) Sasa hivi ukiangalia kwenye masekondari unakuta masomo yote lugha ya kufundishia ni kiingereza. Sasa hii tunaona jamii inakokwenda, itapotoshwa kwasababu lugha asilia inapotea kabisa. Huyu mtoto atakapoenda kule atasahau kabisa lugha asilia. Kitu ambacho sasa kizazi kinachokuja kitapotea. Kitapotea kabisa. Hasa tunashindwa wapi tupelekee, wapi mawazo yetu tuyapitie kwa sababu tunakuwa hatuna namna. Hatuna mahali wapi mawazo yetu wanaweza wakachukua. Basi sasa tunasikia kwenye vyombo vya habari tunakuwa hatuna namna, hatuna uwezo kwamba mawazo yetu tungeyapeleka. ‘Right now, if you look at secondary schools you’ll find all the subjects are being taught in English. We see where the community is headed and [Malila] will be lost because the indigenous language is completely going. When [my daughter] goes to [secondary school], she will completely forget the indigenous language. It will be lost completely for the next generation. It will be lost completely. Ultimately, we are at a loss as to where to send our ideas because we don’t have a mechanism. We don’t have a place where they can take our ideas. So, we hear the news outlets and there’s nothing we can do, we don’t have the ability to send our thoughts.’

But I also caution that where people hold inaccurate beliefs about the world, especially because of their hegemonic position, their voices may be shaped by processes of adaptive preference formation. For example, I disagree with parents who argue that Malila has little value for their children’s education on the grounds that examinations are only given in Swahili. Therefore, great care must be taken to ensure indigenous communities have a rich resource base from which to formulate their ­language-in-education preferences. Greyson, a father in the study and the oldest participant, failed the Primary School Leaving Examination. He was one of only a few parents who saw that social structures could be reimagined in different ways. He also seemed to have an appreciation for the existence of different kinds of citizenships that follow from language. Being that this volume is committed to the power of voices from communities like the Malila and that they

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lack a forum in which to be heard, it seems fitting that this chapter include Greyson’s personal reflections on the matter of LoI and citizenship: (12) Wangekuwa wanafundisha kimalila shuleni ningekuwa mwalimu. Sasa wakanifundisha lugha ambayo sijakulia. Wakanifundisha kiswahili ndio maana nikafeli. Wangenifundisha kimalila ningekuwa mwalimu saa hizi. Tungeanza kimalila moja kwa moja halafu watoe mtihani wa kimalila, ningefaulu. Ningekuwa mwalimu. Sasa wakatufundisha kiingereza, kiswahili, ambayo sio lugha yetu. Ndio maana niko kijijini nalima. Nimeingia lugha ambayo sio husika ya kuzaliwa. Ningefundishwa ile ya kuzaliwa nayo, ningefaulu. ‘Had they taught Malila in school I would have been a teacher. But they taught me in a language that I wasn’t raised in. They taught me Swahili and that’s the reason I failed. Had they taught me Malila I would be a teacher now. If we had started right away in Malila and then they gave the examination in Malila, I would have passed. I would have been a teacher. But they taught us English, Swahili, which aren’t our languages. That’s the reason I’m here in the village farming. I went into a language that wasn’t the one I was born in. Had I been taught in the one I was born with, I would have succeeded.’

A troubling outcome of (socio)linguistic citizenship in Tanzania is the way in which it upholds linguistic hierarchies in discourse. This not only obscures empty promises of upward mobility that cannot be fulfilled by simply learning Swahili or English, but it also results in a widely held ‘common sense’ that indigenous languages are inadequate for formal education. In doing so, one of the greatest educational resources for rural, indigenous communities – their languages – are relegated to cultural artefacts. Development efforts for language and education among minoritised, indigenous language communities must be firmly grounded in democratic processes. The Malila feel they have little or no voice as it relates to ­language-in-education and as passive recipients of decisions made in government, they are abandoned to independently pursue their language goals through inadequate social structures. What precisely comprises ‘adequate social structures’ is a subject for further research, but negative rights or passive support is inadequate. Work needs to be done to establish real opportunities to achieve individual well-being for members of the Malila community who choose to pursue a Malila way of life as they so define it. Note (1) See Robeyns (2005) for a more thorough introduction to the CA than is possible here. (2) Translations are presented more literally to preserve key words and grammatical structures that were important for analysis in the source language. (3) Kyela is located just to the south of Ilembo on the northern tip of lake Malawi within the Nyakyusa language community.

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(4) Mbeya town is the closest urban centre to the Malila region. (5) I have previously described these as ‘geographical’ capabilities but prefer the term ‘geosocial’ for the way it captures a main purpose of physical movement viz. connecting with others.

References Ambroz, A. and Mushi, E. (2015) The key to life? Citizen’s views on education. Twaweza, July. See https://twaweza.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Education-FINAL-EN. pdf (accessed 18 September 2021). Ball, J. (2010) Enhancing Learning of Children from Diverse Language Backgrounds: Mother Tongue-Based Bilingual or Multilingual Education in Early Childhood and Early Primary School Years. Victoria, BC: Early Childhood Development Intercultural Partnerships, University of Victoria. Bhaskar, R. (2008) A Realist Theory of Science. New York: Routledge. Biggeri, M., Libanora, R., Mariani, S. and Menchini, L. (2006) Children conceptualizing their capabilities: Results of a survey conducted during the First Children’s World Congress on Child Labour. Journal of Human Development 7 (1), 59–83. Blommaert, J. (2013) State Ideology and Language in Tanzania (2nd edn). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Corbin, J. and Morse, J.M. (2003) The unstructured interactive interview: Issues of reciprocity and risks when dealing with sensitive topics. Qualitative Inquiry 9 (3), 335–354. Craissati, D., Clark, M. and Lansdown, G. (2007) A Human Rights-Based Approach to Education For All. New York: United Nations Children’s Fund. Curdt-Christiansen, X.L. (2018) Family language policy. In J.W. Tollefson and M. PérezMilans (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Language Policy and Planning (pp. 420–441). Oxford: Oxford University Press.  Department for International Development (2010) Learning for All: DFID’s Education Strategy 2010–2015. Glasgow: Department for International Development. Eberhard, D.M., Simons, G.F. and Fennig, C.D. (eds) (2021) Ethnologue: Languages of the World. See http://www.ethnologue.com (accessed 11 October 2021). Elster, J. (1982) Sour grapes – Utilitarianism and the genesis of wants. In A. Sen and B. Williams (eds) Utilitarianism and Beyond (pp. 219–238). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  Fairclough, N. (2003) Analysing Discourse: Textual Analysis for Social Research. London: Routledge. Fairclough, N. (2009) A dialectical-relational approach to Critical Discourse Analysis in social research. In R. Wodak and M. Meyer (eds) Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis (pp. 162–200). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.  Foster, D. (2021) Language of instruction in rural tanzania: A critical analysis of parents’ discursive practices and valued linguistic capabilities. PhD thesis, University of Bristol. Government of the United Republic of Tanzania and UNICEF (2018) Education Budget Brief 2018: Tanzania. See https://www.unicef.org/tanzania/reports/education-budget-brief-2018 (accessed 21 August 2021). Hart, C.S. (2009) Quo vadis? The capability space and new directions for the philosophy of educational research. Studies in Philosophy and Education 28 (5), 391–402. Hurwitz, D.R. and Kambel, E.-R. (2020) Redressing language-based exclusion and punishment in education and the language friendly school initiative. Global Campus Human Rights Journal 4 (1), 5–24. King, K.A. and Fogle, L.W. (2017) Family language policy. In T. McCarty and S. May (eds) Language Policy and Political Issues in Education (pp. 315–327). Cham: Springer.

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Lee, R.M. and Renzetti, C.M. (1990) The problems of researching sensitive topics: An overview and introduction. The American Behavioral Scientist 33 (5), 510–528. Luykx, A. (2003) Weaving languages together: Family language policy and gender socialization in bilingual Aymara households. In R. Bayley and S.R.Schecter (eds) Language Socialization in Bilingual and Multilingual Societies (pp. 25–43). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Malone, S. (2018) MTB MLE Resource Kit: Including the Excluded: Promoting Multilingual Education (2nd edn). Paris: UNESCO. See https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ ark:/48223/pf0000246278 (accessed 20 October 2020). Medel-An˜onuevo, C. (ed.) (2013) 2nd Global Report on Adult Learning and Education: Rethinking Literacy. Hamburg: UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning. Ministry of Education and Culture (1995) Education and Training Policy. Dar es Salaam: Government of Tanzania. Ministry of Education and Vocational Training (2013) Basic Education Statistics in Tanzania (BEST) 2008–2012. Dar es Salaam: Government of Tanzania. Ministry of Education and Vocational Training (2014) Sera ya Elimu na Mafunzo. Dar es Salaam: United Republic of Tanzania. Ndibalema, P. (2019) Making sense of basic education statistics in Tanzania: Emerging issues and implications for future practice. International Journal of Elementary Education 8 (1), 26–37. Nussbaum, M. (2011) Creating Capabilities. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Pflepsen, A. with Benson, C., Chabbott, C. and van Ginkel, A. (2015) Planning for Language Use in Education: Best Practices and Practical Steps to Improve Learning Outcomes. Washington, DC: RTI International for USAID. Rea-Dickins, P. and Yu, G. (2013) English medium instruction and examining in Zanzibar: Ambition, pipe dreams and realities. In C. Benson and K. Kosonen (eds) Language Issues in Comparative Education: Inclusive Teaching and Learning in NonDominant Languages and Cultures (pp. 189–206). Rotterdam: Sense Publishers. Robeyns, I. (2003) Sen’s capability approach and gender inequality: Selecting relevant capabilities. Feminist Economics 9 (2–3), 61–92. Robeyns, I. (2005) The capability approach: A theoretical survey. Journal of Human Development 6 (1), 93–117. Rubagumya, C.M., Afitska, O., Clegg, J. and Kiliku, P. (2011) A three-tier citizenship: Can the state in Tanzania guarantee linguistic human rights? International Journal of Educational Development 31 (1), 78–85. Schiffman, H. (1996) Linguistic Culture and Language Policy. London: Routledge. Sen, A. (1985) Well-being, agency and freedom: The Dewey lectures 1984. The Journal of Philosophy 82 (4), 169. Sen, A. (1995) Inequality Reexamined. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sen, A. (1999) Development as Freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sen, A. (2003) Reflections on literacy. In N. Aksornkool (ed.) Literacy as Freedom: A UNESCO Round Table (pp. 32–47). Paris: UNESCO. Sen, A. (2005) Human rights and capabilities. Journal of Human Development 6 (2), 151–166. Sen, A. (2009) The Idea of Justice. Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Smith-Christmas, C. (2016) Family Language Policy: Maintaining an Endangered Language in the Home. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Stroud, C. (2018) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. 

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Stroud, C. and Heugh, K. (2004) Language rights and linguistic citizenship. In J. Freeland and D. Patrick (eds) Language Rights and Language Survival: Sociolinguistic and Sociocultural Perspectives (pp. 191–218). Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing.  The United Republic of Tanzania (2014) Pre-Primary, Primary and Secondary Education Statistics in Brief 2013. Dodoma: Prime Minister’s Office, Regional Administration and Local Government. Tinker, C. and Armstrong, N. (2008) From the outside looking in: How an awareness of difference can benefit the qualitative research process. The Qualitative Report 13 (1), 53–60. UNESCO (2000) The Dakar Framework for Action. Education for All: Meeting our Collective Commitments (2000). World Forum on Education (Dakar, Senegal, 26 April 2000). Paris: UNESCO. Walker, M. (2006) Towards a capability-based theory of social justice for education ­policy-making. Journal of Education Policy 21 (2), 163–185. World Bank (2011) Learning for All: Investing in People’s Knowledge and Skills to Promote Development. Washington, DC: The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, The World Bank.

8 Deaf Capabilities in the Global South: Reflections on Sign Languages and Emancipation Using the Capabilities Approach Eilidh McEwan

In Global South contexts, deaf people can face challenges accessing an adequate quality of life (Earth, 2013). Challenges stem from linguistic deprivation and lack of sign language. Inaccessible education, healthcare and civic participation can further compound deaf individuals’ capabilities to achieve well-being (Sen, 2001). This chapter explores capabilities, defined as the ability to achieve valued beings and doings, for deaf participants (Narayan, 2005; Samman & Santos, 2009). Links were drawn between participants’ capability sets, conversion factors which enable or prevent the capability from being realised and capability achievement (Nussbaum, 2007). Often, the realisation of capabilities is central to agency enactment, here defined as ‘being able to achieve desired goals’ (Sen, 2001). The research methods include questionnaires that were distributed to five development organisations, alongside two focus groups with participants within a wider cross-national multiliteracies project. Sign language use in an educational setting enhanced the spaces in which deaf individuals could pursue goals, thus tackling hegemonic structures. In line with the goals of (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2001), capacity-building approaches that strive to increase participant agency could bring positive outcomes for participants and further allow participants to achieve social justice (Emery, 2009; Skelton & Valentine, 2007; Stroud & Kerfoot, 2020). Introduction

This chapter will set forth where deaf people across a range of ­capacity-building projects taking place in the Global South were able to 146

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speak out and advocate for their rights as a consequence of being involved in a project intervention. The empowerment of deaf people was achieved through increasing their capabilities, known as ‘the ability to pursue valued beings and doings’ (Sen, 2001). Other definitions by Sen (2001: 289) suggest that capabilities are the ‘freedom to advance whatever goals and values a person has reason to advance’. As individuals whose first languages are sign languages, many deaf people experience attendant power asymmetries. These are often a consequence of inequalities that stem from the hegemony of the national language in plurilingual societies, and the dominance of spoken languages versus signed languages. In this chapter, I argue that enhancing deaf individuals’ capability of using their voice involves the amplification of deaf peoples’ ability to speak on issues that affect them, ideally in their own sign languages; voice can also be enhanced through the provision of space for deaf people to meet and network with other deaf people on issues that affect them, thus providing an area for informed debate; support for deaf individuals to build up skills and experiences to act as representatives; and accessibility support for deaf people to access education, training or local civic events. Some steps that would allow full participation and informed debate by deaf communities involve a threepart approach: firstly, tackling linguistic deprivation through the provision of sign language; secondly, increasing the organisational capacities of deaf organisations to allow for greater representation of deaf people, covering various regions of a country; and thirdly, the transfer of desirable skills, for instance, training deaf people to teach English. Through access to English language education and the acquisition of other new skills through involvement in development projects, deaf participants’ ability to demonstrate agency and to achieve capabilities was enhanced in some cases. Agency has been defined as the ‘freedom to advance whatever goals and values a person has reason to advance’ (Sen, 2009: 289) and is viewed as a central plank in human development approaches. In turn, capabilities at both the individual and collective level operate in tandem with agency to empower individuals. Arguably, empowerment at the individual and collective levels has significant transformative potential and can contribute much in addition to other development instruments. Initially, the background of the study is established, where the deaf community, the Global South and the capabilities approach are defined. Subsequently, the influence of (socio)linguistic citizenship and individual and collective capabilities in relation to agency and voice is explored. Next, the methods are set out and the findings of the study explained. Some findings examine the link between participants’ opportunities to take part in international development projects and the prospects this created for their capabilities realisation in many valued areas, for instance, learning the national sign language, or speaking out on issues that affected individuals and the deaf community in these countries as a whole.

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Background

Deaf communities and sign languages have always existed in some shape or form, comprising minority language communities dotted throughout the world. Today, some deaf people use a sign language as their first language, with ‘cultural and linguistic transmission’ taking place from deaf parents to deaf children, or at deaf schools (Swisher, 1989: 239–240). ‘Shared sign communities’ (Kusters, 2014: 140; Nyst, 2012) are one exception to the norm, where both hearing and deaf members utilise sign language due to the large concentration of deaf people (Zeshan, 2010; Zeshan & De Vos, 2012). Sign village communities have included Martha’s Vineyard, where the sign language died out in 1952 (Kusters, 2010); a village in Ghana called Adamorobe (Kusters, 2014; see also Chapter 1 by Mary Edward in this volume); and inhabitants of Chicán in Mexico’s Yucatán state (Shuman, 1980). What does it mean, therefore, to talk about deaf ‘communities’? Deaf communities whose first languages are sign languages often view themselves as a linguistic minority community (Lane, 1992), or can comprise a geographical diaspora, defined by Ayres (2004: 3) as ‘a cultural group that is dispersed or scattered’. Historically, Deaf with a capital ‘D’ has been used since the 1970s to denote visually-oriented communities whose first language is a sign language, or a linguistic, social and cultural minority group, while deaf has conventionally referred to the audiological status of hearing loss (Johnson et al., 1994). A conscious choice to utilise ‘d’ to represent a spectrum of deaf people has been selected for several reasons. Firstly, across a range of Global South contexts, deaf identities have emerged in loci distinct from the American and British deaf communities where the terms D/deaf originated (Leigh et al., 1998). Secondly, emerging views in deaf studies propose a ‘bicultural dialogue’ model, where deafness instead exists on a spectrum (McIlroy & Storbeck, 2011: 496). Thirdly, Deaf communities are an imagined social world, but also continually re-created through both the choices of individuals and institutional processes. The Global South is defined as developing countries where there are inequalities in resource distribution (Girvan, 2007). Different cultural attitudes and societal understandings of deafness and sign languages shared among Global South actors contribute to novel, indigenous development approaches. Connell (2007) argues sociology is founded on the principle of difference, with power balanced between an imperial centre and a p ­ eriphery. Today, ‘one cannot decolonise without prioritising and supporting Southern voices, demands, epistemologies and practices … [particularly] Subaltern Southern voices’ (Gretch, 2015: 18; Islam, 2012). (Socio)linguistic Citizenship and the Capabilities Approach

(Socio)linguistic citizenship is centred on citizens’ access to diverse linguistic resources, the increase of both their democratic participation

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and of their voice, and on the political worth of an understanding of ­sociolinguistics. Within the capabilities approach, voice is defined as an individuals’ ability to speak out on issues that affect them in their daily lives at a local, community or national level, where voice refers to the ­‘ability and space to express this, whether this is at domestic, community or national level’ (Samman & Santos, 2009: 19). Similarly, in the (socio)linguistic citizenship approach, voice has been defined both as ‘an individual’s communicative power and effectiveness within the here-andnow of specific events’ (Rampton et al., 2018: 72). When the voice of deaf individuals or communities is considered, the modality of communication is particularly important. For deaf people, being able to discuss and express themselves in their first language, particularly if this is a sign language as is the case throughout these case studies, is a critical component of ‘voice’ for deaf people. Being able to speak about issues that affect them in community events often requires a sign language interpreter. If this is not commonly used, as is the case in many Global South contexts where development organisations work, either because they lack the resources or are far from cities where many interpreters reside, the provision of remote interpreting should be introduced to benefit deaf attendees. Scholars Cooper and Cripps (2015) in their examination of the role of university Deaf Studies programmes in raising awareness point to a definition of civic engagement as ‘acting upon a heightened sense of responsibility to one’s communities. This includes a wide range of activities, including developing civic sensitivity, participation in building civil society, and benefiting the common good’ (Cooper & Cripps, 2015: 3). The role of qualified sign language interpreters also has a pivotal role on Deaf civic participation. A study by Shaw emphasises the importance of training sign language interpreters through ‘an interactive approach to interpreting that is respectful and cognizant of various worldviews and lived realities of participants’ (Shaw, 2014: 1). Shaw points out that although issues of oppression and power differentials between hearing and Deaf communities are often pointed out in interpreter training programmes, there remains a lack of a clear route to action for sign language interpreters to support broader Deaf community causes beyond employment in the interpreter profession. The (Socio)linguistic Citizenship model includes nonstandard, nontraditional linguistic practices, for instance sign language literacies would fall under novel linguistic practices. Drawing on the notions of Stroud (2001: 353) of ‘language as a political and economic site of struggle’, forms of emancipatory politics based on language allow individuals to improve their quality of life at both the domestic and community levels, through daily practices and activities, and at the regional and national level through collective actions and policy changes. This parallels the capabilities approach in its assessment of individuals abilities to achieve valued doings and beings. Nussbaum (2000: 12) argues that Sen’s idea of

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capability indicates ‘a space within which comparisons of quality of life’ (or standards of living) are made and suggests within this framework asking what people feel they are actually able to do and actually able to be, as opposed to what opportunities they prefer to have or the resources they have access to, is a more apt instrument through which the causes and consequences of social inequality are best understood (Nussbaum, 2000: 12; see Chapter 7 by Danny Foster on the beliefs of parents with an indigenous rural minority language and the capabilities approach). Nussbaum’s framework goes further in that it delineates a list of 10 core capabilities that societies should aim to make available for all of their citizens (Nussbaum, 2003). Individual and collective choices occur in an ongoing interaction with the dominant structures of surrounding societies. Giddens suggested that structures were ‘rules and resources, which actors produce and reproduce through their practices’ (Leydesdorff, 2010: 2139), where dialogues and interactions are reproduced over time and in different spatial contexts (Giddens, 1989: 88). Many Deaf populations in the project contexts face shortages in their basket of primary goods, which means their abilities to access basic necessities such as access to healthcare, to an affordable home, to safety and security to move freely, to employment, literacy, to education and to language. Shortage in these primary goods means that their quality of life falls below the minimum bar required for well-being (Sen, 2001). Given human diversity, an index of primary goods does not give similar freedoms for all as ‘different people need different amounts and different kinds of goods to reach the same levels of well-being or advantage’ (Robeyns, 2003: 10). The capabilities approach assesses empowerment taking place in practice, and it can be amended to local contexts in the home (micro) and at community levels (meso). The next section explores the collective assets of deaf communities including organisation, representation and voice. Distinctions between individual and collective agency mean ‘group processes, activities and intentionality’ can be facilitated by development projects that provide a space for deaf communities to gather and act as a collective (Sabiescu, 2011: 1). Two central conditions differentiate collective capabilities from individual ones. Firstly, the ‘process of collective action’ and secondly, that ‘the collective at large – and not just a single individual – can benefit from these newly generated capabilities’ (Ibrahim, 2006: 398). Skelton and Valentine (2003: 122) have pointed out that deaf communities have to counter ‘geographies of discrimination’ within the hearing world but also within other broad movements, such as the disability movement – who might be campaigning for inclusive education, for example, and be unaware of the specific needs of deaf or blind learners – and in order to be active politically must utilise ‘myriad spaces of contestation and resistance’ (2003: 122). They also highlight the important distinctions between political identity and political action as joint components of political participation. Both these concepts

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have clear parallels to voice and representation within the capability approach – however, the capability approach considers both the domestic (micro) and community (meso) spheres. Rampton et al. (2018) proposed that voice can constitute the input of individuals as linguistic minorities to a broader discourse. The ways these contributions affect other arenas, or wider networks, in this case, deaf community networks and circles of influence, are what he terms as ‘transcontextual and multi-scalar frameworks’ that can be applied to explore bottom-up and top-down processes; to consensual or conflicting relationships in specific or broad proceedings, and to political developments. Methods

For the first stage of the project, questionnaires were sent out to development organisations. This paper draws on five of these as detailed below in Table 8.1, which were drawn from a wider sample in another study by the researcher. These questionnaires were sent in written English to the project leads, most of whom were hearing. The respondents were given the option to reply in either written English or in British Sign Language. When project leads were deaf and opted to respond in BSL, I conducted the interviews via Skype. Data were collected from two focus groups with Indian participants. Fieldwork took place at two schools in India in January 2019, where the researcher worked with deaf participants whose first languages were Indian Sign Language, many of whom had poor or limited knowledge of English. Consequently, one colleague acted as a facilitator for the focus group interview questions and used the written English questions alongside communications in BSL (British Sign Language) as a guide for signing the questions to participants in IS (International Sign). The use of a local Table 8.1.  Overview on development projects Project

Project Site

Project Aims

Method

Code

1

Vanuatu

A situational analysis of the deaf community

Questionnaire

R1

2

Timor-Leste

Provided capacity-building training for deaf people

Questionnaire

R2

3

Mexico

Establishing a Mexican Sign Language dictionary

Questionnaire

R3

4

Malawi

Building the capacity of Malawi National Association of the Deaf

Questionnaire

R4

5

Vietnam

Raising awareness of UN CRPD rights among deaf people and communities in Vietnam

Questionnaire

R5

6

India, Uganda and Ghana

Peer-to-Peer Deaf Multiliteracies Project (P2PDM) which aims to raise literacy outcomes

Focus groups (FG1, FG2)

R6

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facilitator to conduct interviews allowed the participants to share their experiences and insights more freely, in their first language, than they would have with an outside researcher or sign language interpreter. In the questionnaire, project leaders were asked to identify which dimension of agency they believed the project work encouraged participants to utilise most: internal dialogue, voice, resources or impact. Similarities between categories utilised for assessing agency in terms of collective assets and capabilities as defined by Samman and Santos (2009), and Narayan (2005), and the assets and capabilities for individuals where agency acts as a component within the wider capabilities approach framework in terms of analysing the degrees of freedom they have in their daily lives. The capabilities were defined as follows: Internal dialogue – ability to have thoughts, emotions, self-perception. Voice – ability and space to express this, whether this is at domestic, community or national level. Resources – This can be material or can be intangible like development of knowledge and skills. Impact – Ability to make changes in the home, in the community and at a national level. (Samman & Santos, 2009: 19)

The perceived ability of project beneficiaries to pursue valued goals, to speak out on behalf of their communities, act as representatives and to make positive changes after participating in the development project all overlap with the (socio)linguistic citizenship approach, which focuses on the emancipation of linguistic minority groups, and their participation in democratic processes. Findings

This section examines how the use of voice enhanced participants’ capabilities drawing on examples from five development projects and the statements of focus group participants in the Peer-to-Peer Deaf Multiliteracies project. Participant responses suggested that in two projects, the individual capability of voice was only affected somewhat by the development intervention. However, for the majority of the sample, participants’ capabilities to speak out were affected strongly within five projects as a consequence of their involvement. Pacific Island Nations projects

In the Vanuatu project (P1), a remote Pacific island nation, the phenomenon of language deprivation among deaf individuals was widespread, with poor educational access. The republic of Vanuatu is classified as one of the

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world’s least developed countries by the UN (UNICEF & Republic of Vanuatu, 2014). The Vanuatu 2009 census reported only 13% of the population have a disability, of whom 7323 people have ‘hearing complications’, with minimal difference in gender distribution (UNICEF & Republic of Vanuatu, 2014). Alongside the island of Timor-Leste (P2), Vanuatu is a Pacific island nation and listed among the Small Island Developing States, all of which face similar challenges, such as small but growing populations, limited resources, remoteness, excessive dependence on international trade, and susceptibility to natural disasters (United Nations, n.d.). As discussed in earlier sections, the enhancement of an individual’s capabilities in voice is closely connected to the extent of project participation. In the Vanuatu project, the project leader (R1), who was hearing, was contracted to do a situational analysis; however, deaf people from Vanuatu were not involved in the design of the project. This is a common pattern throughout international development initiatives, as the logistics of involving local deaf people in project design can be time-consuming and costly due to the language barrier or booking sign language interpreters within project timescales. In Vanuatu, ‘children with disabilities are significantly less likely to attend school than their non-disabled peers ... among 10 to 19-year olds, the gap in primary school attainment is more than 53 percentage points’ (UNICEF, 2014). Although there are no direct statistics for deaf populations, due to the nature of the island archipelago, and scattered rural populations, it can be inferred that many deaf children do not obtain accessible schooling. Although deaf people did participate as interviewees in the Vanuatu project, the lead commented putting local deaf people in leadership roles was ‘hard as the majority had limited languages to communicate’ (R1). It is apparent in this project that participants were disenfranchised by a lack of access to sign language. However, linguistic deprivation among deaf people in resource-poor contexts does not automatically preclude individuals from recognising their deaf political identity, or indeed from being politically active in their communities, though it does make it more challenging and less likely that deaf individuals can access the tools to campaign effectively. The statement demonstrates the impact of linguistic deprivation experienced by deaf people in this locality, which is a limiting social conversion factor for the realisation of other capabilities. R1 commented ‘ultimately hearing people are running the show’ and ‘deaf people will not be able to be change-makers individually until they have language, to my great dismay’ (R1). The reference to language here is to both sign language and a local spoken language. Referring back to the idea, ‘the poor and marginalised … tend not to have access to sympathetic knowledge … nor resources, nor infrastructures, nor the full range of capabilities that would help their grassroots activities flourish’, it is evident projects working with deaf people must seek to address the acquisition of sign languages in these contexts.

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Conversion factors in the Vanuatu project site were constraining for deaf participants in terms of agency. Limiting social conversion factors became apparent, such as participants lacking access to sign language, to deaf peers and educational resources. Partially as a consequence of language deprivation, it appears deaf participants had limited opportunities to use their voice to lobby on issues. However, the Vanuatu project allowed deaf individuals to connect with others, to learn sign language and to share stories. In terms of collective voice and agency, the international development project is fostering a space in which deaf individuals and as a group can contest hearing community hegemonies. However, at this stage, the fostering of individual and collective deaf voice in Vanuatu has limitations because many of the community have not had the opportunity to attend school or acquire language or literacy. Although they can campaign on issues, it will take time to build a sustainable Deaf community and the platform to campaign for accessible education. In the longer term, the development project could have important ramifications if the deaf community continue to use their voice and gather as a collective to transform their access to education. The Timor-Leste project (P2) was led by the same development organisation as in Vanuatu; yet, in this project, deaf volunteers were delegated more responsibilities for leading training programmes, or were c­ o-working to develop training curricula over a lengthy timescale. Participants in Timor-Leste demonstrated individual capabilities in the use of voice, as they provided essential feedback and guidance to the project lead on their opinions on how to improve the usefulness of the training programmes. For instance, in terms of future planning in the Timor-Leste project (P2), the project lead aimed for ‘deaf people to take on board the training and then [be] able to independently do these things on their own’, with these skills including hosting meetings, and facilitating training for other deaf people in the community, and consultation on official agenda meetings and emails. The respondent stated the Timor-Leste project ‘encouraged the deaf community to be leaders and advocates so they can actively make an impact on hearing people and on legislation and policies’ (R2). By ‘building up their capacity to advocate individually and for the community’ on a range of issues such as establishing a deaf association, improving training for sign language interpreters and the recognition of sign language, it can be reasoned that participants’ self-confidence improved after these interventions. In relation to the use of voice, participants were perceived to have demonstrated higher levels of empowerment and agency than they had before the development initiative began. Local organisations on the island and a Deaf School took account of what project participants were telling them, which could enact changes in deaf education, and availability of sign language resources in the longer term. However, this is also indicative of the limitations of voice – even if deaf individuals or as a collective

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campaign for fully accessible education or more training to increase their skills as trainers and facilitators, what was referred to earlier in the paper as ‘geographies of discrimination’ still remain. For instance, even with an enhanced skillset, and further experience working in project management, deaf people might still face difficulties in finding employment after the international development project has ended. Or there might be challenges associated with making themselves and their opinions clearly understood in a legislative and policymaking environment that is dominated by hearing people who still retain stereotyped views of people who communicate through sign language. Civic Mexico project: Creating a sign language dictionary

To contrast, a project in Mexico (P3) was almost entirely deaf-led and initiated from the grassroots, which gave local people the chance to build skills and experience. In this project, the documentation of Mexican Sign Language was a key aim, and it can be observed that access to sign language is particularly associated with capabilities in voice. The respondent referred to deaf participants’ use of voice, and participants’ growing autonomy as a result of the Mexico project interventions. In Mexico City, a deaf person led a government project to establish the Mexican Sign Language dictionary (R3). The project lead ‘started to invite many deaf friends who are leaders [within the local Deaf community] to form a circle of deaf professors’, and from lengthy discussions with them, plans for a national sign language dictionary began to form in an organic manner (R3). The project lead then drew on local volunteers from a range of neighbourhoods where ‘we get together in about two months just about two hundred people from all municipalities in Mexico City’ (R3). Deaf participants with differing levels of formal career and educational experience were encouraged to participate. As well as volunteers being encouraged to realise intrinsic agency in their abilities to communicate with peers (social), increasing their individual capabilities through increased self-confidence (psychological), it is clear that the Mexico project encouraged greater levels of deaf participation in the social sphere at the micro level in their homes and neighbourhoods, and at the meso level in their communities. Participants had opportunities to realise their collective capabilities of representation, with large numbers of deaf individuals from various regions of the city taking part as the expansion of a sign language dictionary created a sign language resource which could be utilised by the Deaf and hearing communities. The online dictionary was a tool that was used to raise awareness of Mexican Sign Language and deaf culture more broadly across the country. The platform was widely accessible to both Deaf citizens and the hearing mainstream population as it was posted online. In another sample, the project lead commented ‘for the deaf

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community it is very important to empower individuals, and if more deaf people learn about language, they can participate more’ (R3). R3 suggested ‘if non-deaf people learn more about the deaf community, they will be interested to get closer and learn even more’ (R3). As a result of deaf leadership throughout the project, it can be observed the Mexico project had significant levels of local deaf participation, as local communities became invested in the project. The decision to use local deaf citizens throughout the project strengthened the voice of these individuals, and of the Mexican Deaf community as a whole, as they spoke out on their opinions and actively contributed to the government-level project. However, it must be noted that although deaf participants were able to use voice very powerfully and effectively in this project through the creation of a sign language dictionary, there were some limitations. For instance, the creation of an online language learning resource without training deaf educators to teach sign language; without creating a sign language qualification to be taught in schools; or without providing a central budget for sign language interpreters greatly decreases the exposure of local communities to the Deaf community, and vice versa, thus diminishing the ability to participate equally in local political and civic life. Building a deaf association in Malawi

Similarly, a project in Malawi (P4) was run by a deaf association in collaboration with international partners. In Malawi, prior to 2008, studies have demonstrated deaf and hearing-impaired people felt they were excluded from many facets of society, among them political processes such as voting, because the literature has shown, ‘there is a need for disability policy awareness-raising activities among both civil society and government in Malawi’ (Wazakili et al., 2011: 23) and deaf people in particular lacked access to civic education (Munthali, 2011: 24). Malawi now has four special schools for the deaf, which are privately run, require budgeting and fees, and can accept only a small proportion of the total deaf population (Braathen & Loeb, 2011). However, the Malawi government has been trying to mainstream disability issues across all sectors of development in order to meet the UN Sustainable Development Goals (MSDPWD, 2006). The stated aims of the Malawi project (P4) to ‘mobilise the Deaf to form branches/Deaf clubs in all regions’ and to ‘train the deaf how to participate and have influence in their association’ were achieved over the project’s five years and enhanced access to deaf associations and leadership across many local communities (R4). R4 reported increased participation had subsequently led to positive outcomes where ‘Deaf people of Malawi are active human rights advocates at local and national level’ (R4). The efforts of the development intervention enhanced participants’ realisation of their capabilities of representation and voice in local deaf associations, which then resulted in individuals who felt able to advocate

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for their communities and act as representatives at higher levels in the domain of the social sphere at the regional and national level. The Finnish Association of the Deaf (FAD) was the collaboration partner of the Malawian National Association of the Deaf (MANAD) working in-country, which aimed to support ‘work done by the Deaf themselves for the benefit of the Deaf’ (R4). R4 stated initially in 2008 that ‘MANAD was practically in a dormant state without any staff and office premises and […] 3–4 branches equally inactive […] membership of the organisation was unofficially assessed as just above 1.000’ (R4). The comment suggests low levels of awareness about deaf rights, sign language and few opportunities for advocacy, representation or campaigning on the part of deaf organisations. However, R4 reported ‘project proposals were always designed based on the needs MANAD members and other Deaf people highlighted’ (R4). Through a combination of interviews with deaf people from the country and a situational analysis of two FAD experts, a strategic planning paper was produced jointly between the two organisations, and plans set out to initiate development efforts in the country. Yearly field trips, with frequent updates via webcam meetings and regular reports written by project leads, tracked the progress of the FAD project. While senior project staff in MANAD and in FAD retained responsibility for tasks including project management, project administration, the implementation of annual plans and provision of technical or material assistance, some other tasks were delegated. These other tasks included providing and receiving peer-to-peer training, the implementation and supervision of project tasks, and doing advocacy and information work were conducted by junior deaf staff. After the project had started, deaf people throughout the country gradually began organising local branches. Now MANAD has representations in all 28 districts of Malawi with over 5700 registered members of the organisation. Project participants realised their collective capabilities of organisation through the successful establishment of deaf branches, and increased representation of the Malawi deaf community. The growth of MANAD as an organisation with many local branches highlights that deaf participants throughout the country have successfully addressed the ‘collective action problem’, necessary to overcome in order to work in a group, created ‘consensus’ and established individuals as ‘leaders or followers’ (Samman & Santos, 2009: 8). The collective action problem can best be described as being unable to carry out positive action on behalf of a cause due to a lack of collective support. Barriers to collective support can be caused by a lack of cooperation, by differing worldviews and by structural inequities. For deaf individuals and communities in Malawi, the collective action problem was partially caused by, and exacerbated through, a lack of access to Malawian Sign Language. For instance, R4 stated in Malawi, ‘the most burning issue is the lack of research and documentation of Malawi Sign Language which hinders further progress in most crucial

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fields of the deaf development work (e.g. recognition of Malawi Sign Language, service provision/quality sign language interpreter training, quality bilingual education)’ and ‘the lack of recognition, acceptance and use of sign language in all areas of life is the major barrier that prevents deaf people from enjoying full human rights’ (R4). The development project has had a pivotal role in promoting (socio)linguistic citizenship of deaf citizens across Malawi, as the project encouraged deaf individuals to learn sign language, allowed them to act as community representatives through MANAD branches and to start campaigning and talking with officials at the municipal and government level about the importance of sign language in education. Raising awareness of sign language and accessibility rights in Vietnam

The Vietnam project (5) specifically targeted individual capabilities such as resources by providing access to knowledge about the UN CRPD directives. In turn, this knowledge enabled deaf individuals to realise their collective capabilities of voice, organisation and representation, as deaf individuals voiced their opinions of, and gave presentations on, the impact of the development project to government departments and officials in Vietnam. Moreover, many participants had grown up with hearing families and appeared to have limited knowledge of signed languages due to marginalisation. However, the project used local languages and Vietnamese sign languages as opposed to foreign sign languages. Specifically, ‘deaf and hearing trainees socialised in Vietnamese signed languages and family mentorship practices and family interactions used only natural signed and spoken Vietnamese languages’, which, in turn, ‘reinforced mutual trust and reliance on each other’s specialised areas of knowledge and expertise’ (R5). The introduction of sign languages enhanced project participants’ access to their individual social capabilities, as they were able to communicate in an accessible medium, and their local language was elevated in status within the community. The use of natural signed languages had a positive impact on participants’ opportunities to enhance their self-confidence, increase self-determination and increase their perception of their own abilities. In the case of deaf signers and organisations working within deaf development, the provision of access to language is one of the most significant ways to begin addressing the marginalisation of this group and giving individuals the tools to mitigate poverty or other limitations on their daily freedoms. The peer-to-peer deaf multiliteracies project

Indian participants from the wider P2PDM project (Project 6) discussed their experiences of teaching and learning English as a second

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language. In Project 6, deaf staff from each project country (India, Uganda and Ghana) were hired as research assistants (RAs) and as Peer Tutors (PTs), in order to carry out some of the project work. The following section focuses on the experiences of project participants in India in relation to their capability of voice. In India, in spite of ‘affirmative action such as reserved government employment [i.e. quotas for historically disadvantaged groups], incentives and subsidies for employers, tax exemptions, skill development training etc.’, employment opportunities for persons with disabilities continue to be characterised by lower participation in the workforce, lower wages, limited career advancement and discrimination (Kumar et al., 2012: 1). In a focus group, one RA, Arun, discussed his experience of tutor training in the P2PDM project and how it developed his knowledge of new teaching methods and skills (Arun, FG1). Arun stated that he had to consider the learners; ‘I see what interests them and what they like and match it with their level. If I continue at a high level and throw my teaching at them, they won’t develop’ (Arun, FG1). The research assistant is developing his capability of voice, by drawing on his own teaching experiences in order to meet the needs of deaf students and discussing this within the project. Arun achieved skills in the capability of ‘teaching English’ to deaf learners, which brought about benefits such as increased self-confidence in his own tutoring abilities, increased knowledge of English and the ability to adopt different teaching methods according to his students’ needs and learning levels. Through Arun’s realisation of his capability to teach English, and his enactment of the capability of voice, the expansion of his daily freedom and well-being was quite significant. By teaching English – his L2 – to other deaf peers, Arun experienced empowerment as a result of the reduction of linguistic imbalances and power differentials that would be present as a deaf tutor in a hearing classroom. With access to tutor training in the English language, Arun worked with peers who had an understanding of Indian Sign Language and English. This allowed his tutoring skills to develop in a more organic way and allowed the English skills of the learners to develop, too. As a deaf tutor within the project, Arun could act as a representative of learners and speak out on issues that learners commented on. Some project staff made reference to how being recruited for the P2PDM project enhanced their teaching skills. Arun, the RA, stated that after completing the P2PDM training, he went to Kerala, where he used his own methods from the training to teach deaf students. Arun stated: It was [necessary] for the deaf to be taught following deaf methods. I found many deaf leaders there who didn’t present themselves in that way while giving lectures in front of deaf learners […] I shared with them my experiences to bring a little change in the deaf environment. (Arun, FG1)

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The statement of a PT, Hara, supports the idea that involvement in the P2PDM project allowed project staff to transfer their knowledge and skills to other deaf teachers and had positive implications for methods used in deaf education. Hara stated: Peer2Peer was very good [as the training] included knowledge about sign language, knowledge of English, sentence translation, vocabulary and suggestions to the teachers how to teach deaf students. (Hara, FG1)

Hara stated that his suggestions for teaching deaf students to other teachers were accepted and implemented after he was trained in the P2PDM project: I showed them [the teachers] the current way of teaching […] what deaf students want […] changes have been made in this school. Now, the enthusiasm has increased among the students regarding studies, which itself is a big change. (Hara, FG1)

Other statements reinforced the role of deaf project staff as representatives for enhancing deaf education to large charities at the national level and to government officials at the Rehabilitation Council of India (RCI). Arun explained: ‘Since I have been working on this project for two years, I think that the project must be known to every educational institute or organisation; lectures on it have been delivered to RCI members, who are involved in deaf education, at high-level conferences’ (Arun, FG1). Arun’s voice capabilities were realised as he acted as a campaigner to transform the deaf education system through the P2PDM project work. Summarising the projects’ main goals in India, he expressed his desire […] to change the deaf education system and implement the correct methods to educate students in deaf schools. I have shared our thoughts regarding this project to many NGOs, deaf associations, youth associations, and they are understanding our concepts. (Arun, FG1)

Among other team members, both Arun and Hara have attended Rehabilitation Council of India meetings in Indore, India, where people are aware of the project (Arun, FG1). There, project staff are acting as representatives of the deaf community, advocating for sign language in deaf education and for teaching methods that are sign-language centred in deaf schools. These actions meant the project staff were not only realising their capabilities as PTs but also acting as advocates for deaf education, thus realising their capabilities of representation and of voice as they spoke out for themselves and on behalf of other deaf people in various areas of India at these meetings. Presenting at conferences to the Rehabilitation Council of India, and to other regional bodies fostered capabilities realisation, including

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individual self-confidence and increased staff experiences of conducting research. Alongside many individual capabilities, by presenting at conferences, project staff also arguably facilitated collective capabilities realisation (Samman & Santos, 2009) in their respective deaf communities as the presentations allowed them to use their voice and express their experiences as employees to other deaf people. This directly correlates with the (socio)linguistic citizenship model, where deaf project participants were advocating for how their language should be taught and learned in the Indian education system. Some conversion factors regarding presentations were related to difficulties with the English language. An RA stated that in this case, they found ‘academic words’ and ‘putting research related facts on PowerPoint slides’ to be the principal challenges to being able to realise their capability of presenting at conferences. As the participant was not confident in their academic English and expertise in searching for relevant background information and supporting literature, it was difficult for the participant to create academic slideshow presentations that were of a high enough standard for conference presentations without external assistance. This points to the importance of knowledge of the academic register in their second language (English) and the development of technical skills in searching for academic literature as two conversion factors that limited the participant’s ability to fully realise their capability of presenting at conferences. These difficulties suggest that future training of deaf staff within development organisations should take account of embedded linguistic inequalities, the impact of which is made explicit where skills in the dominant language are typically seen as essential knowledge for development project job roles. The project enhanced the capabilities of the project’s learners to be advocates for deaf education. Learner Shilpa commented, ‘the most important thing I want is for this multiliteracies project to be repeated for all the deaf schools and their curricula. This could happen through the advocacy of deaf leaders’ (Shilpa, FG2). Learners in the P2PDM have achieved functioning in planning for the future, as they plan to campaign for more accessible routes towards becoming a tutor for the deaf and for greater use of sign language in the Indian education system. They achieved functioning in their capabilities of voice and representation, as they are acting as positive advocates for change in the deaf community. For example, the Rehabilitation Council of India was taking account of the needs of deaf citizens throughout India to acquire sign language and to have access to sign language in educational contexts in order to learn more effectively. More recently, the Indian Sign Language Act 2021 has been passed, which aims to ensure Indian Sign Language is taught in all schools (Benu, 2021). Finally, the P2PDM project (P6) differed from the previous five development projects because it recruited deaf staff from three different project

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countries. This had potential to enhance the voice of deaf participants at the macro level, i.e. between various Global South countries. Project staff members Karthik (India) and Miremba (Uganda) had the highest number of overseas connections among the Indian and African teams, suggesting that these two individuals undertook the responsibility of acting as mediators between the two project countries, India and Uganda, respectively. Their roles as ‘super connectors’ increased the capabilities of individual staff members to utilise their transnational connections, impacting their capabilities of representation and voice on an international and national platform. Although the project assessed only transnational connections on a limited scale, for the Indian participants, being able to meet deaf people from other project countries was a rare occurrence, and many mentioned the impact that transnational awareness had on their capabilities as advocates for deaf education and signed languages. Staff throughout the project presented on their role as research assistants and as peer tutors to other development organisations, to other deaf associations and to government and municipal level organisations such as the Rehabilitation Council of India, which oversees accessibility and disability policies. Implications for Further Research and Practice

The development projects discussed all worked in regions that were resource-poor, yet their educational projects had a transformative impact on local deaf individuals and communities, acting as connectors to social capital. These development projects often acted as conduits through which individuals and deaf communities in local micro domains were able to discuss their beliefs and concerns with policymakers at the mesosphere, or in government, all of whom had the potential to drive positive change. These changes were driven by individual deaf people becoming more aware of their language rights; becoming aware of what could be possible in terms of access to sign language, and fully accessible education; and the provision of opportunities through these development projects for deaf people learn how to speak to policymakers and to grow more confident in their capabilities to enact the changes they wished to see at the local level. In his definition of ‘voice’, Hymes speaks of the ‘freedom to develop a voice worth hearing’ (Hymes, 1996), and how access to learning a sign language contributed to the subsequent realisation of the capability of voice in home and in school, and at the wider meso and macro levels for deaf participants. Some limitations of the study were that the questionnaires drew on the perspective of project leads; thus, they did not track agency and the capability of voice directly, although the focus groups did. Another shortcoming is that both the questionnaires and focus groups were only conducted at one point throughout the development projects. Future research could use the same questionnaires at two or three stages throughout a

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development project in order to capture capability development over time, thus offering a perspective of dynamic agency. All of the development projects discussed in this chapter aimed to promote deaf participants’ abilities to campaign on issues that affected them, to overcome the effects of linguistic deprivation and inaccessible education and to participate as political citizens in their respective countries. The capabilities approach has much to contribute to deaf communities in Global South contexts. As a flexible framework, the capabilities approach can bring fresh approaches to where quality of life can be enhanced for deaf individuals and communities, and empower in ways that are directly meaningful for them. The impact of the development projects upon deaf participants’ abilities to speak up, to participate in civic and national debates linked to issues that affected them and more broadly as a whole, and allowed deaf persons to initiate grassroots activities to promote and share sign languages in their local areas, often in non-formal manner, outside of formal educational contexts. The (socio)linguistic citizenship framework recognises that minority languages can be ‘political and economic “a site of struggle”’ (Rampton et al., 2018: 2). It is clear that for deaf communities, for many of whom the majority language is only accessible in its written form, the importance of access to sign languages to participate in daily life, in conversations of their villages and in wider civic discourses is critical. Participation in development projects allowed deaf people to build their self-confidence and act with agency to speak out on issues that affected them, as well as addressing the inequalities that affect them directly as a consequence of language access. The development projects also created new opportunity structures as they forged social variation, whereby deaf individuals could access local spaces that were sign-­language centred, thereby allowing them to fully access social contexts in their first languages. These factors allow for positive cycles to be set into motion for longer-term, sustainable change that allows deaf people and their sign languages to be empowered, and the forging of strong voices that speak directly from the Global South. References Ayres, R. (2004)  Deaf Diaspora: The Third Wave of Deaf Ministry. New York: iUniverse. Benu, P. (2021) One year of NEP: PM Modi says that Indian Sign Language will be introduced as a subject in schools. edexlive, 29 July. See https://www.edexlive.com/ news/2021/jul/29/one-year-of-nep-pm-modi-says-that-indian-sign-language-will-beintroduced-as-a-subject-in-schools-22897.html (accessed 6 August 2021). Braathen, S.H. and Loeb, M.E. (2011) ‘No disabled can go here…’: How education affects disability and poverty in Malawi. In A. Eide and B. Ingstad (eds)  Disability and Poverty: A Global Challenge (pp. 71–93). Bristol: Policy Press.  Connell, R. (2007)  Southern Theory: The global Dynamics of Knowledge in Social Science. London: Routledge.

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Cooper, S.B. and Cripps, J.H. (2015). Service-learning and deaf studies in the community. In O. Delano-Oriaran, M.W. Penick-Parks and S. Fondrie (eds) The SAGE Sourcebook of Service-Learning and Civic Engagement (pp. 287–294). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. Earth, B. (2013) The Deaf world in developing countries. See http://aslized.org/wpcontent/uploads/2013/05/Earth.pdf (accessed 26 September 2017). Emery, S.D. (2009) In space no one can see you waving your hands: Making citizenship meaningful to Deaf worlds. Citizenship Studies 13 (1), 31–44. Giddens, A. (1989) Social Theory of Modern Societies: Anthony Giddens and his Critics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Girvan, N. (2007) Power Imbalances and Development Knowledge. Ottawa, On: L'Institut Nord-Sud. See https://www.oecd.org/site/oecdgfd/39447872.pdf (accessed 21 December 2021). Gretch, S. (2015) Disability and development: Critical connections, gaps and contradictions. In S. Grech and K. Soldatic (eds) Disability in the Global South (pp. 3–19). Cham: Springer. Hymes, D. (1996) Ethnography, Linguistics, Narrative Inequality: Toward an Understanding of Voice. London: Taylor & Francis. Ibrahim, S. (2006) From individual to collective capabilities: The capabilities approach as a conceptual framework for self-help. Journal of Human Development 7 (3), 397–416.  Islam, M.R. (2012) Indigenous or global knowledge for development: Experiences from two NGOs in Bangladesh. International NGO Journal 7 (1), 9–18. Johnson, R.C., Snider, B.N. and Smith, D.L. (1994) The Deaf Way: Perspectives from the International Conference on Deaf Culture. Washington, DC: Gallaudet University Press. Kumar, S.G., Roy, G. and Kar, S.S. (2012) Disability and rehabilitation services in India: Issues and challenges. Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care 1 (1), 69–73. Kusters, A. (2010) Deaf utopias? Reviewing the sociocultural literature on the world’s ‘Martha’s Vineyard situations’. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 15 (1), 3–16. Kusters, A. (2014) Language ideologies in the shared signing community of Adamorobe. Language in Society 43 (2), 139–158. Lane, H. (1992) The Mask of Benevolence: Disabling the Deaf Community. New York: Knopf. Leigh, I.W., Marcus, A.L., Dobosh, P.K. and Allen, T.E. (1998) Deaf/hearing cultural identity paradigms: Modification of the deaf identity development scale. The Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 3 (4), 329–338. Leydesdorff, L. (2010) The communication of meaning and the structuration of expectations: Giddens’ ‘structuration theory’ and Luhmann’ ‘self-organization’. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 61 (10), 2138–2150. McIlroy, G. and Storbeck, C. (2011) Development of Deaf identity: An ethnographic study. The Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 16 (4), 494–511. MSDPWD (Ministry of Social Development and People with Disabilities, Malawi) (2006) National policy on equalization of opportunities for persons with disabilities. See https://www.malawi.gov.mw/index.php/proud/thuwala/candis?download=42:malawinational-policy-on-equalisation-of-opportunities-for-persons-with-disabilities (accessed 21 December 2021). Munthali, A.C. (2011) A situation analysis of persons with disabilities in Malawi. See  https://afri-can.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Situation-analysis-of-PWDsin-Malawi-Final-Report.pdf (accessed 21 December 2021). Narayan, D. (2005) Conceptual frameworks and methodological challenges. In D. Narayan (ed.) Measuring Empowerment: Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives (pp. 3–38). Washington, DC: World Bank.

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Nussbaum, M. (2000) Women’s capabilities and social justice.  Journal of Human Development 1 (2), 219–247. Nussbaum, M. (2003) Capabilities as fundamental entitlements: Sen and social justice. Feminist Economics 9 (2–3), 33–59. Nussbaum, M. (2007) Twentieth anniversary reflections. Harvard Human Rights Journal 20, 21–24. Nyst, V. (2012) Shared sign languages. In D. Brantari, R. Pfau, M. Steinbach and B. Woll (eds) Sign Language: An International Handbook (pp. 552–574). Berlin: de Gruyter.  Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science Education 17 (4), 68–83. Robeyns, I. (2003) The capabilities approach: An interdisciplinary introduction. Unpublished manuscript, University of Amsterdam. Sabiescu, A.G. (2011) The issue of collective agency in community-based open content creation.  In A.G. Sabiescu (ed.) Proceedings of the International Development Informatics Association (IDIA) Conference. Cham: Springer.  Samman, E. and Santos, M.E. (2009) Agency and Empowerment: A Review of Concepts, Indicators and Empirical Evidence. Oxford: Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative. Sen, A. (2001) Development as Freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sen, A. (2009) The Idea of Justice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.  Shaw, S. (2014) Preparing interpreting students to be allies in the Deaf community. The Interpreter’s Newsletter 19, 1–11. Shuman, M.K. (1980) The sound of silence in Nohya: A preliminary account of sign language use by the deaf in a Maya community in Yucatan, Mexico. Language Sciences 2 (1), 144–173. Skelton, T. and Valentine, G. (2003) Political participation, political action and political identities: Young D/deaf people’s perspectives. Space and Polity 7 (2), 117–134. Skelton, T. and Valentine, G. (2007) The right to be heard: Citizenship and language. Political Geography 26 (2), 121–140. Stroud, C. (2001) African mother-tongue programmes and the politics of language: Linguistic citizenship versus linguistic human rights. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural development 22 (4), 339–355. Stroud, C. and Kerfoot, C. (2020) Decolonising higher education: Multilingualism, linguistic citizenship and epistemic justice.  Working Papers in Urban Language & Literacies 265, 1–21. Swisher, V. (1989) The language-learning situation of deaf students. TESOL Quarterly 23 (2), 239–257. UNICEF and Republic of Vanuatu (2014) Vanuatu Statistics. See https://www.unicef.org/ infobycountry/vanuatu_statistics.html (accessed 20 September 2019). United Nations (n.d.) Small Island Developing States (SIDS). See https://sustainable development.un.org/topics/sids/list (accessed 21 December 2021). Wazakili, M., Chataika, T., Mji, G., Dube, K. and MacLachlan, M. (2011) Social inclusion of people with disabilities in poverty reduction policies and instruments: Initial impressions from Malawi and Uganda. In A.H. Eide and B. Ingstad (eds) Disability and Poverty: A Global Challenge (pp. 15–30). Bristol: Policy Press. Zeshan, U. (2010) Village sign languages: A commentary. In G. Mathur and D. Napoli (eds) Deaf Around the World: The Impact of Language (pp. 221–230). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Zeshan, U. and De Vos, C. (2012) Sign Languages in Village Communities: Anthropological and Linguistic Insights. Berlin: Mouton De Gruyter.

9 Forming (Socio)linguistic Citizenship through Philanthropy on Facebook Pages of the Vietnamese Diaspora in the UK Khoi Nguyen

This chapter describes the use of semiotic practices on social media to create community formations, based on examples of the Vietnamese diaspora in the UK mobilising collective action in response to crises in 2020. It argues that collective responses to crises can be a way for diasporas to actively make themselves visible, allowing them to positively shape external perceptions instead of being forced into a negative form of visibility through, in the case of the Vietnamese, associations with crime, human trafficking and illegal migration. Data are drawn from Facebook pages by and for Vietnamese people in the UK, and specifically how they were used as platforms to mobilise philanthropic action. The analysis will show how semiotic practices can simultaneously index multiple layers of social meanings and that differential access to the resources required for participation in those practices leads to complex patterns of inclusion and exclusion. Despite the different levels of participation in those practices, and thus different degrees of belonging, the participants are shown to be united around a shared orientation around the events of the crisis and the philanthropic response. This imagined simultaneous experience of a crisis in turn serves to temporarily transcend multiple internal divisions for a collective response. Introduction

The Vietnamese diaspora is segmented along regional origins, political camps and migration histories (Sims, 2007) which Barber (2018) has shown to impede the self-representation of Vietnamese people and lead to their invisibility in UK society, or being reduced to a negative form of visibility through associations with crime, human trafficking 166

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and illegal migration (Silverstone & Savage, 2010; Sims, 2007). This chapter explores how Vietnamese people in the UK express their own voices and employ multilingual and multimodal resources in acts of linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2018). The focus lies on how such acts contribute to the construction of Vietnamese diasporic communities, which are viewed as social practices which draw on and transmit shared knowledge of social meanings (Blokland, 2017; Cohen, 2013). To foreground bottom-up, non-hierarchical community formations, the analysis examines grassroots philanthropic actions organised via social media by the Vietnamese diaspora in the United Kingdom, which are argued to create community belonging through semiotic practices which connect individuals. While the chapter draws on Stroud’s (2001) criticism of minority language initiatives which create or reinforce monolithic community conceptualisations, following May’s (2018) view, in this context, rejecting constructed minority identities wholesale would entrench majoritarian discourses, which in the UK are largely negative towards Vietnamese people. Therefore, the approach here is to consider how Vietnamese people use their own heterogeneous voices to exercise agency over how they are perceived collectively, rather than simply dismissing Vietnamese collective identity construction. In doing so, the chapter adopts Werbner’s (2002, 2015) characterisation of diasporas as communities with multiple internal and external boundaries which become visible only to wider society through events that create a sense of shared moral responsibility. Acts of Vietnamese linguistic citizenship in the form of connective semiotic practices are examined in philanthropic activities in response to two such events, namely, the 2020 Central Vietnam floods, which were of particular significance for the overseas Vietnamese population, and the COVID-19 pandemic, which affected wider UK society, but which also saw collective responses organised within Vietnamese groups and networks. Examples for these activities are taken from Facebook pages by and for Vietnamese people in the UK. Additionally, scale analysis as operationalised by e.g. Blommaert (2007) illustrates how such practices simultaneously index multiple layers of social meanings and that differential access to shared knowledge leads to differential participation. The analysis further draws on Bennett and Segerberg’s (2012) notion of the logic of connective action from their work on social media advocacy and Blommaert’s (2019) call for social media research to start with actions rather than with assumed pre-existing community structures. This is combined with Djonov and Van Leeuwen’s (2018) and Poulsen and Kvåle’s (2018) frameworks for the multimodal analysis of semiotic practices on social media to examine what semiotic resources are employed by the practices and what mechanisms regulate their availability and usage.

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The chapter argues that philanthropic responses to crises is a way for diasporas to exercise agency over their visibility by positively shaping external perceptions, instead of being forced into negative visibility or invisibility. Despite differential belonging to Vietnamese collective identities, or practice communities, the participants are found to be united around a shared orientation around humanitarian crises, manifested through philanthropic responses. Crises and responses are condensed into chronotopes (Bakhtin, 1981) to create an imagined shared simultaneity (Anderson, 2006), which in turn serves to anchor the diaspora to a shared moral orientation (Werbner, 2002), thus temporarily transcending their multiple divisions for a collective response. These findings advance practice-based approaches to belonging and community, particularly in diasporic contexts, including social media interactions, which provide examples of multimodal as well as multilingual practices. The study also offers a way to reconstruct the notion of community as a useful analytical tool and object of inquiry while acknowledging the inherent heterogeneity of any diasporic population and incorporating it into the analysis. These practice-based and decentral forms of community construction, which rely on connecting individuals through bottom-up multilingual and multimodal communicative practices rather than imposing top-down hierarchical structures, are argued to constitute acts of linguistic citizenship which assert the collective belonging of Vietnamese people and their place in the UK on their own terms. At the same time, the analysis acknowledges and demonstrates the multiple internal boundaries and variable patterns of exclusions inherent to such collective identities, without dismissing constructed collective identities altogether as only essentialising. The chapter begins by providing sociohistorical context to the Vietnamese diaspora in the United Kingdom, followed by a section elaborating on the theoretical background of the analysis. After a description of the methods of data collection and analysis, the chapter presents and discusses examples of semiotic community practices. Sociohistorical Context The Vietnamese diaspora

The Vietnamese diaspora is the result of several distinct waves of emigration primarily taking place during the late 20th century. The first wave came from the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam) after its conquest by the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) at the end of the Second Indochina War (Dorais, 2001). The majority of these refugees were resettled in the United States and France, whereas the UK was only peripherally involved, receiving 32 refugees (Barber, 2018; Robinson & Hale, 1989). The second wave, popularly referred to as the Boat People, was a

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more numerous and more extended emigration, as around 850,000 people left the newly unified country between 1978 and 1988 (Dorais, 2001). The Boat People were motivated by several factors, including a worsening social and economic situation in the country as well as wars with Cambodia and the People’s Republic of China (Dorais, 2001). A third wave started from the late 1990s onward and continues into the present, facilitated by changes to the political situation in Vietnam (Sims, 2007). The Vietnamese in the United Kingdom

Although the UK was not central in receiving the first wave, the government pledged in July 1979 to receive a quota of 10,000 refugees from the UNHCR (Robinson & Hale, 1989). With the addition of some first-wave refugees and family reunifications, the UK received an overall 22,577 Vietnamese between 1975 and 1988. By 1991, this number had risen to around 24,000 (Barber, 2018). Once in the UK, the refugees were forcibly dispersed, which the government believed to help the integration of the population (Robinson & Hale, 1989), though most of them soon relocated to form clusters regardless (Barber, 2018; Robinson & Hale, 1989). In light of this relatively small population scattered across different urban centres, social media groups have taken on crucial functions in connecting Vietnamese people to share information, advice and resources and help recent immigrants settle in. These social media spaces became more active and more important during the pandemic, when physical gatherings were impossible, and enabled quick and far-reaching mobilisations for philanthropic responses, to the pandemic itself and to the 2020 Central Vietnam floods which took place during the same time period. External perceptions

The central argument here is that such collective responses, particularly when directed at wider UK society, allows the Vietnamese diaspora to actively determine how they are perceived by the majority population. To the extent that the Vietnamese are spoken about in the UK, they are negatively associated with criminality, e.g. the growth and trade in marihuana (Silverstone & Savage, 2010; Sims, 2007), as well as human trafficking and illegal immigration (Barber, 2018). Philanthropic activities in which groups of Vietnamese people present themselves as a community thus work against both a lack of visibility and negative visibility. Internal divisions

Further hampering the population’s self-representation, as reported by the leadership of Vietnamese community organisations, is a number of

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internal divisions within the population (Barber, 2018; Sims, 2007). For instance, refugees from South Vietnam were mostly urban professionals with higher educational background and were generally those who set up and led expatriate community organisations (Sims, 2007), while refugees from former North Vietnam tended to be rural peasants with low educational background (Barber, 2018; Sims, 2007). Regional origins can also be connected to political differences. Many Southerners remain vocally hostile to the Vietnamese government, whereas Northerners, who mostly left due to apolitical pressures, tend to be less politically engaged and usually maintain ties to Vietnam (Barber, 2018). The children of these immigrants are often socialised into separate social networks, and therefore, this divide can be passed on to British-born generations in the form of social exogamy or segregation (Barber, 2018). These divisions present a dual issue when it comes to Vietnamese voices in the UK. On the one hand, the few community organisations which do exist fail to reach large proportions of the Vietnamese population, who do not feel represented by them (cf. Barber, 2018; Sims, 2007). As Stroud (2001) suggests, collective representations by exclusionary structures thus can reproduce or create new forms of marginalisation. On the other hand, the lack of collective representation impedes the ability to advocate for issues faced by Vietnamese people, leading to invisibility, in Barber’s (2018) terms, or the silencing of Vietnamese voices in societal discourses. Furthermore, as May (2018) points out, a complete absence of collective minority identities can entrench majoritarian views, which in the UK are generally negative towards Vietnamese people. To grapple with this dual challenge, this chapter attempts to locate collective identity construction, or community formations, in grassroots movements which act largely independently from structured organisations or institutions. Their activities are argued to be acts of citizenship (Stroud, 2018) through which Vietnamese people are able to exercise agency over how they are collectively perceived externally, thus expressing a collective voice to wider UK society. Community is viewed in terms of multiple degrees of collective belonging, following Werbner’s (2002, 2015) work, to acknowledge the inherent heterogeneity of this population without dismissing the meaning these collective identities holds to the participants. The examples below are taken from UK-based Vietnamese Facebook pages during the year 2020. The semiotic practices analysed here serve philanthropic mobilisation, including several fundraising and donation drives, as well as volunteering projects. Those efforts are responses to the 2020 Central Vietnam flood, largely resulting in fundraising drives, and the COVID-19 pandemic, prompting fundraising, donations of PPE and other goods, as well as a volunteer action to sew hospital scrubs for the NHS in London. The 2020 Central Vietnam floods were selected due to the particular moral and emotional importance to the Vietnamese diaspora. The pandemic was chosen because the pandemic affected UK

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society as a whole and thus presented an opportunity for Vietnamese communities to assert their place within it. Theoretical Background

This section summarises the theoretical foundations, namely Stroud’s (2001, 2018) concept of linguistic citizenship, Werbner’s (2002, 2015) conceptualisation of diasporas, communities as cultural symbols and practices, and analytical frameworks for social media research. Discussing Linguistic Human Rights through the example of mother tongue programmes in South Africa, Stroud (2001) observes homogenising and essentialising tendencies which perpetuate and recreate inequalities, e.g. between ideas of standard and nonstandard language use. He consequently advocates focusing on the speakers via his notion of linguistic citizenship, ‘the situation where speakers themselves exercise control over their language’ (2001: 353). Picking up on Isin’s (2009) concept of ‘acts of citizenship’, actions through which people assert their entitlement to rights, Stroud (2018) also formulates ‘acts of linguistic citizenship’ as language practices which are disruptive and transformative of power relations. This chapter adopts the general focus on the voices of individuals by examining bottom-up, grassroots activities that function as acts of linguistic citizenship to the Vietnamese population of the UK. However, May (2018) critiques the wholesale dismissal of collective identity construction by minorities, which, he argues, serves to reinforce the majoritarian structures which marginalise minorities in the first place, and questions the presumption of democratic power relations in purely on-the-ground movements. Consequently, this chapter instead attempts to ascertain what collective identities, or community constructions, can be found on the grassroots level. Rather than dismissing or, in May’s (2018) terms, pathologising such constructions, the interest here lies in the complex degrees of belonging and exclusion manifested therein. To capture such internal complexities and divisions within diasporic collective identities while acknowledging their significance to the participants, the study draws on Werbner’s (2002, 2015) characterisation of diasporas as polycentric and segmented communities while also acknowledging the real roles they play for their members. Instead of having fuzzy or non-existent boundaries, Werbner views diasporas as having multiple boundaries that simultaneously include and exclude different segments but argues that an outer community boundary is created and/or solidified by certain events that render the community externally visible. Combining this with the linguistic citizenship framework, the study thus focuses on responses to events, namely humanitarian crises. These responses are viewed as acts of linguistic citizenship through which ethnic minorities exercise agency in making themselves visible on their own terms rather than being made externally visible.

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Since these acts are found in social interactions online, it also follows theoretical developments in the research on virtual communities, a term coined by Rheingold (2000), where there has been a gradual shift to more distributed and networked forms of online communication across multiple spaces (cf. e.g. Hine, 2017; Varis & Hou, 2019). Responding to such developments, Blommaert (2019) postulates a paradigm shift away from the heuristic of going from groups, i.e. speech communities, to individual members and eventually to language, which frame groups and their individual members as pre-existing and stable entities, and language as their product. Instead, he suggests going from actions to individuals and finally arriving at group constructions, which he argues is especially crucial in social media research due to a lack of stable group entities. This stance is adopted in this study, which examines online interactions in the form of semiotic practices and considers how these practices connect individuals, informed by Bennett and Segerberg’s (2011, 2012) work on networked group dynamics, rather than beginning with groups and considering how these groups engage in collective action. This approach emphasises individual agency over static group structures. Additionally, choosing examples from grassroots efforts, initiated and led by a distributed network of individuals without institutional top-down hierarchies, addresses Stroud’s (2001) critique and also enables inquiries into community construction in a diasporic context characterised by geographic dispersal and internal divisions, namely by viewing community itself as a social practice. That view has its roots in Anderson’s (2006) theory on nationhood as membership in imagined communities constructed in part through an imagined shared simultaneity enabled, e.g. by news media. Building on this, Cohen (2013) develops the concept of symbolic communities whose members share a symbolic vocabulary, even though they might derive differing meanings from the symbols. Expanding on this approach, Blokland (2017) characterises community as culture, i.e. the socialisation into those shared symbols. Consequently, this study’s interest in Vietnamese diasporic communities leads to a focus on such community practices and the symbolic vocabulary they employ. Viewing community in terms of practices is also compatible with recent trends in multilingualism research, which advocate approaching language as a social practice employing repertoires of linguistic resources (e.g. Heller, 2007; Otsuji & Pennycook 2010), the full use of which is contextually constrained and enabled (Blommaert et al., 2005; Pennycook & Otsuji, 2014). This perspective also allows for the inclusion of heritage speakers, i.e. individuals who would not be considered conventionally proficient in the heritage language but who incorporate fragmentary elements of it into their repertoire to symbolically signal their heritage (Canagarajah, 2019). This practice orientation avoids creating new

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inequalities within the minority population (Stroud, 2001), i.e. according to proficiency in standard language usage. A practice-based approach has also been introduced into media research by for example Couldry (2004) and has significantly influenced social media studies. Of particular relevance here are the multimodal analysis frameworks by Djonov and Van Leeuwen (2018), Jovanovic and Van Leeuwen (2018) and Poulsen and Kvåle (2018) which examine how social practices are enabled, constrained or transformed by the platform. Focusing on semiotic practices that include multimodal alongside multilingual communicative resources captures the full communicative repertoire of Vietnamese people in the UK and foregrounds their creativity in bridging differences in e.g. relative conventional proficiency in Vietnamese and English, but also digital literacy, in order to connect and achieve shared goals. Finally, due to the polycentric nature of diasporic communities (Werbner, 2002), a description of the corresponding community practices must also account for polycentricity to avoid the homogenising tendencies criticised by Stroud (2001). Polycentricity on the indexical level of language practices is the core of scale analysis as developed by Blommaert et al. (2005) and Blommaert (2007). Sociolinguistic scales illustrate how multiple meanings can simultaneously operate at different, often hierarchically arranged levels of indexicality. Here, scale analysis demonstrates how individual participants can simultaneously construct different degrees of belonging on different levels, e.g. be a more central member on a regional scale of locality but a more peripheral member on the transnational scale. This multi-dimensionality enables the analysis to encapsulate the multiple boundaries which segment Vietnamese diasporic communities while also acknowledging their significance to their members, and the material impact they can have through grassroots collective action, and the agency they thereby exercise over their place in UK society, thus actively asserting their citizenship (Isin, 2009). In summary, the goal of this study is to provide a dynamic and heterogenous description of community by examining communicative practices which connect individuals. The linguistic and semiotic resources employed in these practices serve as the shared symbolic vocabulary which underpins the community, and which members are socialised into. Crucially, the inclusion of scale analysis reveals how different levels of meaning are available to different members depending on their individual communicative repertoires, thus enabling a multidimensional view of the practice communities. This study focuses on social media practices, thereby expanding the scope of communicative resources to include multimodal and digital resources alongside multilingual ones. The central argument here is that these connective practices empower individuals to use their communicative resources in their own way without top-down norms, thus disrupting and transforming linguistic norms

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around Vietnamese as a heritage language, and the connections they form through such practices are able to transform the way Vietnamese people are collectively perceived, both from externally and internally. These uses of Vietnamese and multimodal resources thus constitute acts of linguistic citizenship both in their form and their outcomes. To capture and describe those resources as fully as possible, the analysis utilises frameworks from social semiotics, particularly methods of multimodal analysis in digital and social media contexts. Methodology

The data used in this study were collected from March to December 2020. Examples are taken from the London-based Vietnamese Family Partnership (VFP), which maintains two Facebook pages, and a page called Người Việt tại Manchester (Vietnamese people in Manchester). Following Ditchfield and Meredith (2018) on Facebook data collection, ethical considerations are guided by the research questions. Since the interest here lies with the multimodal and multilingual resources used in Facebook interactions, rather than any particular users, the approach here matches what Lester (2020) describes as treating data as text rather than as people or Thompson et al. (2021) term as focusing on documents rather than individuals. Thus, this study is limited to publicly accessible pages, to capture a wider variety of semiotic resources without intruding on the privacy of individual users, which would be the case with private pages or groups. Furthermore, care is taken to avoid any sensitive material and to ensure the anonymity of any individual user by removing identifying information and describing posts as a whole rather than individual views or behaviours. All posts on the pages between March and December 2020 were captured in their entirety, including pictures, videos, captions and comments. Under multimodal analysis, posts identified as relevant to the research questions, i.e. community construction through philanthropy, were revisited and, following Djonov and Van Leeuwen’s (2018) multimodal analysis framework, the semiotic resources employed were catalogued according to their mode (e.g. video, image, text), linguistic repertoires (English, Vietnamese but also emojis and politeness terms), and whether they were built into the platform (e.g. likes, reacts, user tagging) or user-generated. Further following Djonov and Van Leeuwen (2018), the catalogued resources were then thematically coded as to whether and how they serve social purposes, e.g. to connect individuals and accomplish goals, and how the resources transform this social practice. Under community analysis, the semiotic resources in those social practices were subsequently interpreted in terms of symbolic vocabularies which underpin community practices (Blokland, 2017; Cohen, 2013). Through scale analysis (Blommaert, 2007; Blommaert et al., 2005), these

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vocabularies were then examined as to how they facilitate or limit participation in such connective practices, and how the differential distribution of those resources leads to different degrees of participation. Results Multimodal analysis

Mobilisation practices rely heavily on the dialogic or interactive functions of the platform: fundraising, donation drives and volunteering calls are coordinated through Facebook pages and utilise many of the platform’s inbuilt resources and functions, but are not reliant on actual organisational or institutional structures. A crucial element of the practices here is the convention to thank contributors by name, usually accompanied by their exact contribution. Depending on the nature of the contribution, this most commonly means writing the amount of donated money, but can also be a list of physical goods or a description of volunteer labour. A helpful resource in this is the ability to tag users by writing out their names. This can be done in posts, but also in comments. In doing so, Facebook notifies the users of the post or comment in question, but also results in the names being publicly displayed to other users who are viewing the post. This inbuilt function of the platform is frequently used to thank contributors to a donation drive or volunteering project, either in a list within a post which is edited to be kept up to date, or by commenting on the post each time a new donation is made. This creative use of the platform’s resources echoes Bennett and Segerberg’s (2011) description of how collective action is personalised by focusing on individual contributions. Facebook’s tagging function, which notifies the user privately while displaying their name publicly, creates an immediately and inherently individualised and personalised effect and transforms the social practice of collective action into an individual choice, making grassroots philanthropy a matter of individual agency. Another key resource is the ability to provide immediate feedback, which draws on what Iedema (2003) terms resemiotisation, specifically as applied to social media analysis by Oostendorp (2018), i.e. the movement of a message between different dominant modes, e.g. from the spoken to the written and gestural mode. As shown in Figure 9.1, individuals who receive thank-you notes from healthcare institutions on behalf of ‘the Vietnamese community’ can resemiotise the message in order to share it with the wider network of donors. While these messages remain in the written mode, they can arrive in the form of an email or of a letter, as in Figure 9.1, which are then captured via screenshot or photography in order to be embedded into the Facebook interaction. The material dimension of this digital practice, i.e. the resemiotisation from paper to screen,

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Figure 9.1  Resemiotisation of thank-you messages

and from a private digital channel to a public one, transforms the underlying social practice. While it is possible to relate or reproduce thank-you notes non-digitally, the resemiotisation allows all participants equal access to a facsimile of the same note, with the sender and addressee clearly visible. Photographed letters in particular, which are a recurrent feature in several donation drives, convey an impression of originality, since the viewer can see a physical piece of writing, even though it is a digital photography of it. This choice of resemiotising thank-you notes further reinforces the personalised nature of the mobilisation. While there is an intermediary between the collective action and the beneficiary, evidenced by the fact that the letters and emails have a single recipient, this intermediary is not visible in the picture and does not intrude by paraphrasing the message. Instead, sharing this personal correspondence directly with all participants includes them in the exchange, simulating a direct connection between each individual donor and the beneficiary. Besides resemiotisation between different written modes of communication, multimodality is also commonly employed to provide photographic or video evidence of the physical outcomes of the mobilisation. This usually takes the form of showing physical goods, either collected through donations or purchased through donated money, with a few

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Figure 9.2  Livestream of goods arriving in Central Vietnam

representative beneficiaries posing next to them. In Figure 9.2, the arrival of the goods in Central Vietnam, purchased through donations from Manchester, is captured and communicated near-instantaneously by using Facebook’s livestream function. Like the resemiotised thank-you letters, seeing the beneficiaries facing directly into the camera emphasises a direct connection between the donor and the recipient: the user viewing the post is face to face with the recipients and can see the donation outcomes as if personally present for the transactions. This perceived immediacy and closeness to physically distant events constitutes a significant transformation of social practice through semiotic technology: Photographs and videos are quickly taken on mobile devices without specialist skills or equipment, and easily and immediately distributed to large groups of people without much additional effort or infrastructure. The semiotic practice therefore constitutes a blurring or even the disappearance of Poulsen and Kvåle’s (2018) distinction between production and distribution media, and performs the function of what Bennett and Segerberg (2011) describe as the personalisation or individualisation of collective action. Furthermore, while Poulsen and Kvåle’s (2018) framework describes a material dimension in terms of digital devices, the focus which participants place on physical items, i.e. letters or donated goods, suggests that materiality encompasses a wider variety of objects. Community analysis

To tie the above descriptions to the central focus of this chapter, i.e. citizenship and community, the semiotic resources required to participate in the practices are further analysed as the shared symbolic vocabulary which defines community practices (Blokland, 2017; Cohen, 2013). Additionally, scale analysis creates a multi-dimensional image by revealing differential participation in these practices and thus differential levels of belonging within the symbolic communities.

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Figure 9.3  Organisational pattern of Manchester PPE donation drive

Philanthropic actions generally follow a similar sequential pattern, exemplified by one of several COVID-19 pandemic-related donation drives conducted in the city of Manchester, as shown in Figure 9.3. In this case, an individual with a personal contact within the local healthcare system posts a call to action to the Facebook page named Vietnamese people in Manchester (Người Việt ta ̣i Manchester). The call asks Vietnamese residents of Manchester to contribute personal protective equipment (PPE), soap and hand sanitiser, or money for the above, to be given to local healthcare workers. Each contributor is thanked by name in the comments to the call to action. Once the accumulated PPE is delivered to the healthcare centres in question via the organiser’s personal contact, the organiser receives letters of thanks, which he shares with the contributors via resemiotisation, thereby closing the circle. This sequence, found across several mobilisation practices, echoes what Jovanovic and Van Leeuwen (2018) call multimodal dialogue on social media, specifically the overarching notion of exchange structure they employ. They define an exchange structure as a minimum of an initiating move and a response to be dialogical. Mobilisation practices always consist of at least one initiating move, i.e. the call to action, usually accompanied by images and sometimes videos of the crisis to be addressed. The elicited response sometimes comes in the form of comments, but in all cases, there is a response in the form of contributions; in the case of physical donations, once again with a material dimension to the

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Figure 9.4 Organisational pattern of Manchester Central Vietnam floods fundraiser

interaction. The exchange continues with the organiser thanking the donors, and often with the resemiotised message from the end recipients. In the case of photographed letters, the multimodal genre fits two of Jovanovic and Van Leeuwen’s (2018) multimodal genres, i.e. verbal and visual. Exchange structures have an additional significance for diasporic communities. Another mobilisation effort on the Manchester Vietnamese page from October, shown in Figure 9.4, raises funds for relief efforts following the 2020 floods which affected Central Vietnam, among other places. Such environmental and humanitarian crises that affect the homeland are exemplary for Werbner’s (2015) mobilising events which temporarily unify otherwise divided diasporic populations into a sense of community and provide them with a shared moral orientation across time and space (Werbner, 2002). This dynamic is discernible in the exchange structure of the semiotic practice: in this case, the initiating move contains images and video footage of the affected areas, resemiotised into a Facebook post and resituated from the original setting into the distant, diasporic perception of the homeland, stripped of all context (e.g. life before the flooding, the lived experiences of its former inhabitants, etc) save the immediate necessity for philanthropic action. The mobilisation otherwise resembles the aforementioned donation drive, with the organiser thanking each donor by name in the comments as well as in a continually updated list in the original post. Here he utilises the tagging function for several of the donors and when two restaurants with second-generation Vietnamese owners donate, he also links to their business pages. Once the fundraiser is concluded, the organiser shares a video on the Facebook page, taken in Central Vietnam, which shows the arrival and distribution of goods purchased with the

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Figure 9.5  Organisational pattern of London scrub sewing action

money collected in the fundraiser. Both the initiating move and the conclusion of this exchange originate in Vietnam, placing the diasporic donors in a transnational dialogic interaction with their imagined homeland, facilitated near-instantaneously through the semiotic technology of social media. The donors, from different backgrounds and generations, connect over a material need to produce a material outcome and the diasporic community briefly becomes manifest across the spatial and temporal separations of geographic distance and migration. A final transformative impact of the semiotic practices on social practice is the ability to connect individuals with special access. Figure 9.5 shows a volunteer action promoted and mediated via the VFP (Vietnamese Family Partnership) page. It utilises Facebook to connect somebody with a contact in the NHS to a number of individuals able to produce hospital scrubs for healthcare workers. The industrial scale and nature of this action require several different resources from different sources, i.e. fabrics, workshops, means of production including two different types of machines, and volunteer labour. To accumulate those resources, the organiser tellingly uses a Facebook function called community help to notify all followers of the VFP page and is quickly able to gather many responses and shares, with each share broadening the reach of the original call for help. By the end of the mobilisation practice, which otherwise matches the above examples, the people to be thanked include several participants of non-Vietnamese background who nonetheless participated. Though Facebook pages such as VFP or Vietnamese People in Manchester act as platforms for the calls to action and update posts, their main function is as places for individual users to disseminate information, interact and spontaneously launch and promote their own projects, as

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seen in the aforementioned fundraising lunch materialising in the comment section of a call to action. While there is usually an organiser with a central role, often acting as the intermediary between donors and recipients, institutional groups are neither the main initiators nor drivers behind the mobilisation efforts. Instead, the actions emerge from the connections themselves, as contributors find each other to pool their resources. The practices thus follow Bennett and Segerberg’s (2012: 742, own emphasis) second type of organisational pattern, namely, ‘technology platforms and applications taking the role of established political organizations’. In the corresponding logic of connective action, characterised by a relative absence of hierarchies and by ‘co-production and co-distribution’ (2012: 752), the power of these actions comes not from resources held by an organisation, but from the ability of individuals without prior connections to complement each other. This is evident in the examples here, e.g. when a South Asian businessman is able to provide a sewing workshop to Vietnamese volunteers, or when Vietnamese medical professionals are able to provide their colleagues with large quantities of PPE collected and purchased by a group of relative strangers who gathered around a Facebook post. Social media as semiotic technology transforms these practices through the speed and ease of making such connections and by extending the potential reach any individual user can have: across ethnic boundaries and national borders. In the networked structures described above, a one-dimensional analysis would suggest that belonging corresponds to centrality in the network, placing the organisers who issue the call to action at the centre and one-time contributors at the periphery. However, by including scale analysis and considering the symbolic resources required for participation, belonging is shown to be more fluidly constructed at several simultaneous levels. The fundraiser for the 2020 Central Vietnam floods conducted by the Manchester Facebook page displays the segmentation of diasporic communities, visualised in Figure 9.6. Both the original call to action and all comments which thank contributors are written in Vietnamese. Consequently, the organiser frequently uses the Vietnamese terms of address in the messages, which are primarily kinship terms determined by the relative ages difference between the addressee and the speaker. One woman he thanks jokingly objects to being referred to by the term for older sister (chị), to which the organiser counters that he promoted her to chị in recognition of her contribution. This small exchange, while still part of the mobilisation practice and centred around the donation, requires a broad range of Vietnamese resources to access: enough Vietnamese literacy and vocabulary to understand the content of the exchange, enough knowledge of the age-based politeness system to understand the faux pas the organiser made and a more nuanced familiarity with the system and the role of respect, besides age, to understand the

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Figure 9.6 Intersecting community boundaries for Manchester mobilisation practices

(joking) excuse the organiser offers after being called out. At present, Facebook’s inbuilt translation is unable to provide most of this information, and even a faithful translation would lack the cultural-pragmatic elements of the linguistic repertoire required to fully access the humour of the interaction. Even among those with many Vietnamese linguistic resources, there is a further level of exclusivity: since the floods primarily affected the Central region of Vietnam, the fundraiser is especially meaningful to people from that region. This is expressed repeatedly and frequently by a woman from the region and the main organiser himself, who both emphasise their personal ties to the afflicted area in thanking donors, particularly when the donors are also from the region. Locality is a particularly multi-faceted dimension of belonging, as shown in Figure 9.7: the core of the group is based in Manchester, giving the participation a geographical component, which is implicitly expressed by the organiser adding the place of residence after the donor’s name every time it is outside of Manchester (primarily Birmingham and London). Hence, on the local and more immediate scale of locality (Blommaert, 2007), people in Manchester are the default, and thus more central, whereas on a global and more abstract scale, those with ties to Central Vietnam are more central regardless of their current place of residence, and in turn, those from Vietnam in general are more central than those born in the UK. The British-born group is prominently represented by second-­ generation restaurant managers, two of whom are thanked for sizeable

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Figure 9.7  Higher and lower levels of locality scales

donations and have their businesses linked to in the message. Even though they lack the geographic and experiential knowledge of having grown up in Vietnam, let alone the Central region, by expressing their moral orientation towards the homeland actively through philanthropy, they have become part of the diasporic community; at least, for the purpose and duration of this fundraiser. Their membership consists of being included as equal participants in the exchange structure of the mobilisation practice, i.e. by being thanked just as everyone else, regardless of whether or not they have sufficient Vietnamese literacy to read and understand the thank-you messages or follow the larger conversation in the comments section. This belonging to a community defined by geographic origins despite personally lacking geographic ties is enabled by the already vague and somewhat abstract relationship between the Vietnamese diaspora and Vietnam. By definition, even those members born in Vietnam do not reside there, and in many cases have been away for the majority of their lives. The expression of familial or cultural ties is confined to gestures, symbolic or material. Consequently, British-born people of Vietnamese ancestry can belong just as much as someone who was born in Vietnam, provided that they actively participate in the same gestures; arguably, more than Vietnamese-born people who do not contribute. On the global and abstract scale of locality, the second-generation participants are thus peripheral, while remaining central on the local scale of locality by virtue of having grown up in Manchester. If this scale encapsulates family histories of migration from Vietnam, they are still more central participants

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than one donor who the organiser refers to as ‘the Indian doctor’ (translated from Vietnamese), who however is still demonstrably included by the donation and the response from the organiser, despite presumably being unable to read that message or parse the cultural references in the comments. Discussion

The results demonstrate that individual belonging through participating in semiotic community practices may vary according to multiple intersecting criteria, but that an overarching social configuration remains which all participants belong to. This configuration is what Blokland (2017) calls a durable engagement, an ephemeral and loosely composed, but still somewhat stable social unit centred around a shared set of activities aimed at a common goal. Durable engagements are not dependent on individual members: if most or all participants were to be replaced by others, the durable engagement would still persist. This is in fact the case for the several consecutive fundraisers and donation drives held on the Manchester Facebook page over the course of the year, which do not have and do not depend on a fixed set of participants. Durable engagements share some characteristics with Lave and Wenger’s (1991) community of practice but differ from it by virtue of only existing through and for the duration of the practice in question. This temporal dimension, the duration of the practice, is in fact a central component of these communities. The semiotic practices utilised for philanthropic action emplace the participants in a shared orientation towards a temporally-bound event, e.g. the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic or the 2020 Central Vietnam floods. The calls to action invoke a shared historical moment to underscore the need for the action. Photographs and videos from the flooded areas, though often taken in the past and always far away, are resemiotised into the viewer’s here and now, thereby placing all participants into a shared moment which requires a collective response. This imagined shared present echoes Anderson’s (2006) theory on the rise of nationalism, which he partly attributes to the proliferation of news media enabling large populations to imagine a shared simultaneous experience. Imagining a shared simultaneity is equally important to diasporas, whose lack of shared space makes them, in Werbner’s (2002: 121) words, ‘deterritorialised imagined communities which conceive of themselves, despite their dispersal, as sharing a collective past and common destiny, and hence also a simultaneity in time’. Diasporic community practices therefore draw on all available semiotic resources to inform participants of the smallest changes as quickly as possible, as indicated by the instant sharing of resemiotised thank-you letters and photographic evidence, usually in the comment section, instead of collecting all material for a final update at the end.

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These updates flatten all changes and progress into a one-dimensional plane where all events are listed beside and below each other, often out of sequence. The text and images of the crisis are part of the same post as the text and images of the response, condensing the mobilisation effort into a single shared moment of collective – or connective – action. This condensation of time can be described through Bakhtin’s (1981) concept of chronotope, especially as applied to sociolinguistics by e.g. Blommaert (2015) and social semiotics by Oostendorp (2018). Semiotic chronotopes are thus the outermost boundary which emplace the diasporic community in the imagined simultaneous experience of a shared event, and the semiotic practices creating and surrounding the chronotope form the shared symbolic vocabulary through which the community imagines itself. Besides time, physicality and materiality are crucial to the creation of community. In Iedema’s (2003) resemiotisation, physical artefacts are the final destination of a text’s journey, and in an extended sense, this is also the case for mobilisation efforts. Whether the goal is the donation of PPE, manufacturing hospital scrubs or delivering goods to flooded regions of Vietnam, the success of the mobilisation is measured by its physical outcome, as indicated by the centrality of sharing photographic and video evidence. This is particularly crucial to diasporas, which, in Werbner’s (2002) words, ‘are embodiments of cultural, political and philanthropic sentimental performances’ and ‘exist through material flows of goods and money’ (2002: 125, emphasis in original). Material gestures and a shared moral orientation towards an imagined homeland connect individual diasporic Vietnamese people, of different origins and backgrounds, into a Vietnamese diaspora. Even when directed towards the imagined new homeland of the UK, shared moral responsibility and its material manifestations remain the forces that create a community out of loose affiliations, even if only temporarily. Images of their donations and of the thank-you letters prove not only that they have accomplished something, but that they have done so together. The thank-you letters reinforce this: they are commonly addressed to ‘the Vietnamese Community’. Collectively, the participants were able to express their voice independently from dominant discourses and were able to assert their collective place in wider society in an act of citizenship. Degrees of recognition may differ, but the members of these temporary communities recognise each other as having achieved the same goal, for the same moral reason, and having done so as the Vietnamese community. Several donation calls even reference this, asking for help from the Vietnamese community, and in one case, explicitly states that the philanthropic action will help promote Vietnamese values. In speaking directly to a Vietnamese community, a line of continuity links the calls to action and the eventual thank-you messages. There may be no permanent members, but the organiser calling towards a fundraiser and the recipient writing a letter of thanks are talking to the same community. Whether or

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not there is such a community before or after, for the duration of this act of linguistic citizenship, it becomes real. It is summoned into existence through this temporary shared purpose, united by the shared imagined simultaneity of the event, and becomes physically manifest in the fruits of its collective work. Conclusion

This chapter aimed to create an account acts of linguistic citizenship in the form of temporary and loosely organised community formations, constituted by the use of the semiotic technology of social media, which nonetheless form part of the social reality of their members and have the potential for material impact. The grassroots actions described here give agency to individual members of the Vietnamese immigrant and/or ethnic minority population, who were shown to utilise the full breadth of the semiotic resources offered by the platform as well as their own repertoires in often creative ways to accomplish their goals. By fluidly utilising different multilingual and multimodal repertoires, the described semiotic practices manage to pool resources from individuals across generations, with different amounts of Vietnamese and English resources, and with different national and regional origins, thus demonstrating internal diversity as a resource for the Vietnamese population. This heterogeneous population was temporarily united in acts of linguistic citizenship, without top-down imposition of communicative norms and the related power relations. The practices also exemplify diversity as a resource for the UK. The collective philanthropic actions are not accomplished through community organisations, which are not representative of the Vietnamese population, resulting in the silencing of individual diverse voices, and are ineffective in advocating for Vietnamese people in mainstream society, resulting in the silencing the collective voice of the population. Instead, a large number of Vietnamese individuals take the initiative and are able to utilise their own full multimodal and multilingual repertoires in the form of grassroots actions, which benefit both the Vietnamese population and the NHS in London and Manchester, and thus the population of the UK as a whole. The case studies here also show that in addition to events that make diasporic communities visible, as Werbner (2015) describes, responses to crises can be a way for communities to actively become visible. Agency in their own visibility is evidenced in calls to action when directed at local efforts, which appeal to improving the external perception of the community, and in subsequent thank-you letters directed at the same community. The external response shows that Vietnamese communities can actively decide the terms of their visibility, thereby disrupting the dominant power dynamic in which Vietnamese people are either rendered invisible and thus unable to express their voice (Barber, 2018), or

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are reduced to a negative visibility (Sims, 2007) associated with crime, illegal migration and human trafficking. This disruptive quality and transformative potential corresponds to Stroud’s (2001, 2018) idea of linguistic citizenship, albeit in a diasporic context. This diasporic citizenship is a bottom-up, non-centralised form of collective self-empowerment which acknowledges the diaspora’s heterogeneity but manages to bridge its multiple internal boundaries to assert its place in society on its own terms. References Anderson, B. (2006) Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso books. Bakhtin, M.M. (1981) The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. Austin: University of Texas Press. Barber, T. (2015) Chinese, Japanese or ‘Oriental’?: Vietnamese-passing in ‘super-diverse’ London. Identities 22 (4), 524–542. Barber, T. (2018) The integration of Vietnamese refugees in London and the UK: Fragmentation, complexity, and ‘in/visibility’. WIDER Working Paper 2018/2. https://doi.org/10.35188/UNU-WIDER/2018/444-5. Bennett, W.L. and Segerberg, A. (2011) Digital media and the personalization of collective action: Social technology and the organization of protests against the global economic crisis. Information, Communication & Society 14 (6), 770–799. Bennett, W.L. and Segerberg, A. (2012) The logic of connective action: Digital media and the personalization of contentious politics. Information, Communication & Society 15 (5), 739–768. Blokland, T. (2017) Community as Urban Practice. Oxford: John Wiley & Sons. Blommaert, J. (2007) Sociolinguistic scales. Intercultural Pragmatics 4 (1), 1–19. Blommaert, J. (2015) Chronotopes, scales, and complexity in the study of language in society. Annual Review of Anthropology 44, 105–116. Blommaert, J. (2019) From groups to actions and back in online-offline sociolinguistics. Multilingua 38 (4), 485–493. Blommaert, J., Collins, J. and Slembrouck, S. (2005) Spaces of multilingualism. Language & Communication 25 (3), 197–216. Canagarajah, S. (2019) Changing orientations to heritage language: The practice-based ideology of Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora families. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 255, 9–44. Cohen, A.P. (2013) Symbolic Construction of Community. Abingdon: Routledge. Couldry, N. (2004) Theorising media as practice. Social Semiotics 14 (2), 115–132. Ditchfield, H. and Meredith, J. (2018) Collecting qualitative data from Facebook: Approaches and methods. In U. Flick (ed.) The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Data Collection (pp. 496–510). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. Djonov, E. and Van Leeuwen, T. (2018) Social media as semiotic technology and social practice: The case of ResearchGate’s design and its potential to transform social practice. Social Semiotics 28 (5), 641–664. Heller, M. (2007) Bilingualism as ideology and practice. In M. Heller (ed.) Bilingualism: A Social Approach (pp. 1–22). London: Palgrave Macmillan. Hine, C. (2017) From virtual ethnography to the embedded, embodied, everyday internet. In L. Hjorth, H. Horst, A. Galloway and G. Bell (eds) The Routledge Companion to Digital Ethnography (pp. 47–54). Abingdon: Routledge. Iedema, R. (2003) Multimodality, resemiotization: Extending the analysis of discourse as multi-semiotic practice. Visual Communication 2 (1), 29–57.

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Isin, E.F. (2009) Citizenship in flux: The figure of the activist citizen. Subjectivity 29 (1), 367–388. Jovanovic, D. and Van Leeuwen, T. (2018) Multimodal dialogue on social media. Social semiotics 28 (5), 683–699. Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lester, J.N. (2020) Going digital in ethnography: Navigating the ethical tensions and productive possibilities. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies 20 (5), 414–424. May, S. (2018) Commentary – Unanswered questions: Addressing the inequalities of majoritarian language policies. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 65–72). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Oostendorp, M. (2018) Extending resemiotisation: Time, space and body in discursive representation. Social Semiotics 28 (3), 297–314. Otsuji, E. and Pennycook, A. (2010) Metrolingualism: Fixity, fluidity and language in flux. International Journal of Multilingualism 7 (3), 240–254. Pennycook, A. and Otsuji, E. (2014) Metrolingual multitasking and spatial repertoires: ‘Pizza mo two minutes coming’. Journal of Sociolinguistics 18 (2), 161–184. Poulsen, S.V. and Kvåle, G. (2018) Studying social media as semiotic technology: A social semiotic multimodal framework. Social semiotics 28 (5), 700–717. Rheingold, H. (2000) The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier (rev. edn). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. Robinson, V. and Hale, S. (1989) The Geography of Vietnamese Secondary Migration in the UK. Warwick: Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations. Silverstone, D. and Savage, S. (2010) Farmers, factories and funds: Organised crime and illicit drugs cultivation within the British Vietnamese community. Global Crime 11 (1), 16–33. Sims, J.M. (2007) Vietnamese Community in Great Britain. Thirty Years On. London: Runnymede Trust. Stroud, C. (2001) African mother-tongue programmes and the politics of language: Linguistic citizenship versus linguistic human rights. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 22 (4), 339–355. Stroud, C. (2018) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Thompson, A., Stringfellow, L., Maclean, M. and Nazzal, A. (2021) Ethical considerations and challenges for using digital ethnography to research vulnerable populations. Journal of Business Research 124, 676–683. Varis, P. and Hou, M. (2019) Digital approaches in linguistic ethnography. In K. Tusting (ed.) The Routledge Handbook of Linguistic Ethnography (pp. 229–240). Abingdon: Routledge. Werbner, P. (2002) The place which is diaspora: Citizenship, religion and gender in the making of chaordic transnationalism. Journal of ethnic and migration studies 28 (1), 119–133. Werbner, P. (2015) The boundaries of diaspora: A critical response to Brubaker. In F. Kläger and K. Stierstorfer (eds) Diasporic Constructions of Home and Belonging (pp. 35–52). Berlin: De Gruyter.

10 Reclaiming a Plurilingual Voice in EMI Classrooms: Co-creating Translanguaging Space through the MultimodalitiesEntextualisation Cycle Phoebe Siu, Bong-gi Sohn and Angel M.Y. Lin

In Hong Kong, plurilingual teachers and students are consistently socialised to uphold monoglossic principles reinforced through English Medium Instruction (EMI) education, under which a foreign standard variety of English (often called ‘British English’) functions as the supreme dominant language. To most plurilingual teachers and students, pursuing the finishing line in EMI higher education suggests inhibiting the use of their familiar linguistic and cultural repertories for the ‘sacredness’ of native-speakerism in English. Such ideological entrapment, however, still prevails in many EMI contexts in Hong Kong. This chapter, thus, begins with problematising the influences of (post-)colonial desires for colonial English (Lin & Motha, 2020) and the discourse of linguistic purism (Lin, 2006; Lin et al., 2020) permeating EMI higher education. In this chapter, we suggest a pathway to reclaim a plurilingual voice through documenting a case study of 72 plurilingual students enrolled in a 13-week Public Relations Writing course in a tertiary education institute in Hong Kong. The study traces how the Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle (MEC) (Lin, 2015a, 2016) was adopted by the teacher-researcher as a heuristic tool for co-creating translanguaging space (García & Lin, 2016; Li, 2011) with her plurilingual, pluricultural community college students in Hong Kong who are natively fluent in Cantonese or Mandarin, but are obliged to use English as the target language for handling assessment, teaching, and 189

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learning in higher education. The significance of this study provides a discernible account of the roles of multimodal meaning-making resources on sustaining plurilingual, pluricultural voices of students and teachers in EMI higher education in a post-colonial city like Hong Kong, where traces of wrestling efforts on reconstructing (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2001, 2009) from non-Anglophone perspectives through translanguaging are observed in the EMI tertiary classrooms. Introduction Language ideologies in English Medium Instruction higher education in Hong Kong

Monolingual practice is often seen as the best approach in universities in Hong Kong as it is thought to better position students in their vocational market especially in disciplines such as Business and Public Relations. Teachers and students in English Medium Instruction (EMI) classes in Hong Kong are expected to follow a monoglossic approach to gain appropriate levels of academic English literacy, using only English and only standardised varieties of English (Flores, 2013; Flores & Rosa, 2015). In EMI classrooms, Hong Kong students are often giving up their rights to use plurilingual and multimodal resources that they have developed in everyday genres and registers, which can leverage their performance in academic genres and registers (Lin, 2016). In EMI classrooms in Hong Kong, plurilingual teachers and students are consistently socialised to accept monoglossic principles where English monolingualism is seen as the norm. This has been reinforced through EMI higher education, under which a foreign standard variety of English (often called ‘British English’) is seen as the supreme prestigious language. In doing so, it undervalues other cultural and linguistic practices. It regulates chains of social relations, directing hierarchical ‘acts of submission and obedience’ interlocked with ‘cognitive structures, forms of categories of perception, principles of vision and division’ (Bourdieu, 1998: 53). However, the issue of monoglossic principles in higher education has not been problematised. Dearden (2014: 2) defines EMI as ‘the use of the English language to teach academic subjects in countries or jurisdictions where the first language (L1) of the majority of the population is not English’. Such framing of EMI classroom practices in academic contexts cannot fully depict the complex ideological construction of EMI in nonAnglophone and post-colonial sociocultural contexts like Hong Kong. As Hong Kong is a key economic marketplace and competitive arena of global higher education, the monolingual ideologies have been exacerbated in EMI higher education. The dominance of English in Hong Kong both before and after the 1997 handover has been well-researched by international scholars (Lin, 1996; Lin & Motha, 2020; Pennycook, 1994). The historical, political and socioeconomic conditions of EMI higher

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education in Hong Kong have been reinforcing not only the ways English has been perceived as a lingua franca, but also as a sociolinguistically privileged capital and a discrete and superior language code. As highlighted above, the socioeconomic influences of (post-)colonial desires of colonial English indicate symbolic inequality (Kramsch & Zhu, 2016) of language and culture in Hong Kong. In EMI tertiary classrooms, (1) western imaging for developing disciplinary academic literacies and (2) hierarchical packaging of privileged language use in English as the only target language are two key challenges for students and teachers in Hong Kong to reclaim their plurilingual, pluricultural voices through fully adopting the notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship, from which ‘language falls firmly within citizenship discourses, and that it is the very medium whereby citizenship is enacted and performed’ (Stroud, 2009: 217). In the subsection of this chapter, we will explain how the EMI higher education practice of Anglo-dominant/Anglophone curriculum designs, along with the English-only classroom policy, have been marginalising the plurilingual, pluricultural voices among teachers and students in EMI classes. This creates a serious concern in (socio)linguistic citizenship and linguistic human rights (Stroud, 2001). The celebratory view of EMI as a global phenomenon in higher education does not do justice to the struggles of plurilingual, pluricultural teachers and students in Hong Kong, and they are often blamed for not following monolingual EMI tertiary classroom policy. Reclaiming a plurilingual voice in higher education in Hong Kong, thus, calls for attention to students’ plurilingual, pluricultural voices expressing their (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2001), especially through academic programmes in tertiary education. Reclaiming plurilingual, pluricultural voices through (socio)linguistic citizenship

To break through the monoglossic chains of social relations, Stroud (2001) supports cultivating plurilingual students’ access to a plurilingual and pluricultural curriculum through upholding (socio)linguistic citizenship. It focuses on encouraging the use of diverse sociolinguistic forms that are constantly connected to pluralities rather than singularities in social life (Blommaert, 2005). It is important to reconceptualise the roles of L1/L2, along with Stroud’s notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship, to reclaim a plurilingual voice. Advocating a more plurilingual, pluricultural curriculum in EMI higher education, a translanguaging space should be provided for dynamic, creative meaning-making in EMI classrooms. When teachers and students perceive translanguaging as ‘a multilingual, multisemiotic, multisensory, and multimodal resource that human beings use for thinking and for communicating thought’ (Li, 2018: 30), they may challenge the uncritical perspectives that prescribe the English-only policy in EMI

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classrooms. This is especially important in postcolonial societies such as Hong Kong. And in this context, we see the importance of connecting translanguaging pedagogies to the notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship, which exposes the elite forms of multilingualism underpinning much ­educational policy that focuses on named languages only. Instead, ­(socio)linguistic citizenship asserts that raising awareness about people’s everyday, grassroots language practices that cut across the discrete boundaries of officially recognised named languages is necessary for democratic participation, where citizens cannot simply be pigeonholed into discrete linguistic categories. Instead, sociolinguists ask us to focus on people’s linguistic repertoires, without any a priori assumptions about the connection between one’s origins, upbringing, proficiency and the types of language they speak or use. The general sociolinguistic consensus is that one has a plurality of styles, registers, genres and practices and various fragmentary grasp of different features of these ways of speaking, writing, and meaning-making (Rampton et al., 2018). Lin et al.’s (2020) recent term of ‘trans-featuring’, conceptualised as an extension of translanguaging theories, resonates with Rampton et al.’s (2018) perspectives. We notice the converging theoretical and pedagogical perspectives of (socio)linguistic citizenship and translanguaging theories and pedagogies as both focus on valuing the plurality of voices and ways of meaning-making that deviate from the official discourses of EMI and its exclusive focus on named and standardised languages. To provide tools for a plurilingual, pluricultural voice in an EMI tertiary classroom, especially in an East Asian context such as that of Hong Kong, where the official discourses of named languages and the monolingual policy of English-only frequently police and micro-manage classroom events, it is important to recognise the heavy examination pressure and the official policy pressure imposed on teachers and students alike, and that any innovative departure from the officially legitimate route has to come with tremendous courage and agency on part of both the teacher and the students. It is against this background that we present how the Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle (MEC) (Lin, 2016, 2019) approach to EMI was adopted in an exploratory pilot study conducted by the first author as a teacher-researcher in 2018–2019 for her doctoral research project. The MEC is known for its potentials to leverage plurilingual, pluricultural meaning-making resources. Yet, the effects of the MEC have not been fully explored in EMI tertiary education. Highlighting a Multimodal, Multilingual, and Multicultural Framework

Addressing the research gaps in EMI tertiary education, we used the MEC approach to explore how multiple linguistic, multimodal and sociocultural resources can be leveraged in EMI classrooms, as an

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agentic, innovative form of (socio)linguistic citizenship, re-asserting multiple voices through creating a space in both the classroom and the assessment structure for translanguaging and trans-semiotising, which means disregarding boundaries of named languages and encouraging flexible use of diverse modalities (Lin 2015a, 2015b, 2020). The MEC (Figure 10.1) is a heuristic tool for teachers to recognise and encourage plurilingual students’ translanguaging and trans-semiotising practices. Accordingly, the MEC is designed to guide plurilingual and pluricultural teachers and students to use socioculturally relevant materials. Through translanguaging and trans-semiotising, plurilingual and pluricultural teachers and students may fully employ their holistic linguistic and cultural repertoires to engage in learning, making meaning, and creating new knowledge and new forms of expression (Lin, 2020 ; Lin et al., 2020). In this study, three key benefits were identified for adopting the MEC approach to co-creating translanguaging space in EMI tertiary classrooms. First, the MEC provides iterative cycles of curricular and pedagogical co-designs for plurilingual, pluricultural students and teachers to integrate familiar everyday life sociolinguistic resources into the target academic registers and genres. Second, the leveraging power of the MEC supports plurilingual, pluricultural students and teachers to raise their translanguaging awareness and projects a dynamic view of languaging/translanguaging in local EMI higher education. The translanguaging space co-created through the MEC in EMI tertiary classrooms motivates students and teachers to cherish their familiar communicative repertories, such as visual images, classroom interaction and dialogues in their languages, gestures and facial expressions, through the aid of multimodalities. The final key benefit of the MEC addressed in this chapter is the transformative view of languaging/translanguaging in EMI higher education. Instead of hierarchically locating plurilingual, pluricultural students’ mother language and culture as something inferior to the target language and culture in EMI tertiary classrooms, the MEC encourages students to benefit from their trajectorial development of academic success in higher education without giving up their agency and voice. Taking the teacher-researcher perspective, the first author used the MEC approach to consolidate her first-hand experience in promoting social semiotic awareness of both herself and her students through cocreating translanguaging space in a Public Relations Writing course in an EMI tertiary educational institute. Social semiotic awareness resonates with (socio)linguistic citizenship’s idea of sociolinguistic awareness – gaining a deeper understanding of how people on the ground engage in meaning-making using their holistic linguistic repertoires, disregarding official boundaries of named languages. The MEC approach was used by the first author to orchestrate diverse plurilingual, pluricultural materials to stimulate creativity and active class participation from 72 plurilingual

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students enrolled in a 13-week Public Relations Writing course in a community college in Hong Kong during the academic cohort of 2018–2019. The Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle (MEC) Approach in EMI Tertiary Classrooms

In this section, we demonstrate how the iterative cycles of the MEC can be implemented with three core stages. At MEC-stage 1, the teacherresearcher created a rich experiential context with a fluid flow of multimodal meaning-making resources in the students’ plurilingual repertoires. To co-create translanguaging space in the EMI classroom for Public Relations Writing, students were invited to develop their social semiotic awareness through paying attention to a wide diversity of semiotic resources (e.g. corporate logos, brand building mascots and background information in multiple language codes) circulated among authentic corporate websites, YouTube channels and printed or electronic corporate social media materials. All these examples serve to ‘create a rich experiential context to arouse students’ interest and immerse the students in the content topic field using multimodalities’ (Lin, 2016: 101). At MEC-stage 2, students were engaged in reading a piece of academic text on the specific academic topic introduced in stage 1. For example, a short press release from Cathay Pacific was provided to students to understand the overall arrangements done for a public relations event. Through these discipline-specific academic reading activities, various classroom activities, including individual, pair-up, or group note-making, and collaborative brainstorming activities were designed. These can help students to sort out, reinterpret, and recontextualise meanings, while drawing on different kinds of everyday spoken and written genres and multimodalities that cut across the boundaries of the named languages of Chinese and English. These can range from bilingual notes, graphic organisers, mind maps, visuals, diagrams, pictures, oral descriptions, storyboards to comic scripts. In doing so, stage 2 activities allowed tertiary students to engage in their everyday grassroots translanguaging and trans-semiotising practices, freely drawing on multiple linguistic and multimodal resources from their holistic semiotic repertoires. The conceptual understanding of (socio)linguistic citizenship can only be put into practice when teachers and students are fully aware of how monolingual practice in traditional EMI classrooms may delimit the heterogeneity of linguistic resources readily available for them to amplify their plurilingual, pluricultural voice and agency. At MEC-stage 3, students were scaffolded to produce semiotic products in target genres and languages as required by the institutional examinations through using discipline-specific vocabulary lists, key sentence frames and writing and speaking prompts, and English written and spoken academic genres. In doing so, plurilingual students were supported

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Figure 10.1  The Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle (MEC) (adapted from Lin, 2015a; Lin, 2019, Ss: students)

to compose discipline-specific academic texts, such as backgrounders and press releases, in public relations communication. These scaffolding practices can be iterative and encourage students to develop some disciplinerelated identities, such as a Public Relations officer and a Media Kit designer while allowing students’ flexible use of multiple linguistic and semiotic resources. Research Participants and Design

In this section, we introduce the multilingual everyday practice of the 72 students enrolled in the Public Relations Writing course. As an orientation and ice-breaking activity, the teacher-researcher invited all students to draw their language portraits (Busch, 2006) to introduce the familiar communicative resources they prefer using in their everyday communication. From the 54 copies of language portraits collected, the teacherresearcher has observed multilingual practice in students’ everyday life communication, mainly using written/spoken Chinese (Cantonese/ Mandarin), English, and some local varieties, such as Shanghainese. Some students attained elementary proficiency levels in Korean, Japanese and

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French through co-curricular training in secondary schools and tertiary education. On top of multilingual practice, some students highlighted their use of emojis, gestures and gifs as multimodal communicative repertories in social media and peer networking. Based on the preliminary understanding of the students, the teacherresearcher has designed a mixed method of participatory action research (PAR) (MacDonald, 2012) to investigate two key issues for reclaiming voice in EMI higher education: (1) the roles of the MEC on creating a translanguaging space in EMI tertiary classrooms and (2) the roles of the MEC on liberating plurilingual, pluricultural voices of students and teachers for affirming their disciplinary identities and (socio)linguistic citizenship. Having these two key research agenda in mind, the teacher-researcher completed data collection through triangulated research methods, including lessons observation (three-hour face-to-face lessons per week in February–April 2019; video-recorded lesson observation was done with the assessment tasks mapped with the Media Kit production in March– April 2019), fieldnotes, designing and reviewing iterative cycles of MECcurriculum genres and materials (composed weekly in the process of developing teaching, learning and assessment tasks with the MEC approach; used in the weekly lecture and tutorial sessions for 72 students enrolled in three parallel class groups in February–April 2019), semistructured interviews (conducted with four in-depth case study informants in English with pseudo names; audio-recorded with prior consents in 2–3 face-to-face interview and follow-up phone meetings per student informant in Hong Kong in June–October 2019; member check completed through email and phone follow-up communication), and two focus group discussion sessions conducted among five student research informants with pseudo names (face-to-face focus group discussion in English held on the school campus in July 2019; member check completed in July through emails and phone follow-ups). Research Analysis Reframing Public Relations Writing through the MEC: Plurilingual materials, voice and translanguaging

To illustrate how the MEC was used to plan the lesson activities and assessment tasks for business writing genres, such as backgrounders, factsheets, press releases, brochures and newsletters, a unit of work using the MEC approach will be described here to provide a classroom example to illustrate the dynamic flow of plurilingual materials, voice and translanguaging in Public Relations Writing in English for Specific Purposes (ESP) contexts. Through composing a business writing genre, Backgrounder, with the aid of plurilingual materials, the first author has challenged the traditional approach in using only anglophone textbook materials and

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professional writing samples to develop genre-specific reading and writing skills (Rose, 2014, 2017) in EMI tertiary classrooms. The unit of backgrounder writing demonstrates how the MEC may promote plurilingual, pluricultural voice and translanguaging with full respect to the creativity and social habitual preferences among plurilingual students in Hong Kong, especially when some of them have developed strong emotional attachment towards Asian popular cultures. In the following subchapter, we will use a unit of work to showcase how plurilingual materials, such as online access of Japanese or Korean animation, music, digital games, along with snacks and drinks, may be integrated into multimodal composition of Public Relations-specific backgrounder in ESP. Example 1 MEC-stage 1: Creating a rich experiential context with plurilingual materials

In the week six lecture episode, students were guided to learn how to tailor-make backgrounders for Public Relations purposes. Since the officially adopted academic textbook chapters did not provide any concrete written samples of backgrounders, the teacher-researcher has guided the students to read and learn from authentic international companies’ webpages to understand the professional practice of backgrounders writing and design. To arouse students’ interest in the backgrounder writing topics, the teacher-researcher has adopted multilingual and multimodal resources from the official webpage of KitKat Japan (2018) and invited students to browse plurilingual corporate information, chocolate product photos and animated videos in groups (in Japanese songs and dialogues, with optional selection of subtitles in English or Chinese). At MEC-stage 1, students were guided to form small groups to conduct in-class discussions through translanguaging. Instead of relying on monoglossic learning materials provided through formal academic registers and genres, students were guided to create discipline-specific interest in authentic corporate information and brand building knowledge through their everyday sociocultural encounters with familiar plurilingual materials, such as YouTube videos, social media posts and digital posters. Example 2 MEC-stage 2: Engaging students with reading/note-making tasks

In the week six lecture episode, the teacher-researcher adopted the MEC as a leverage tool for reclaiming plurilingual students’ voice with ample dialogic scaffolds (Bakhtin, 1981; Wu & Lin, 2019). Instead of prescribing ‘English’ as the only medium of communication, students were guided to have more flexible use of multiple semiotic resources (both

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written/spoken language and multimodality, including facial expressions, gestures and vocal apparatus) to enrich their social interactions before entextualising their experiences into public relations texts (written/ spoken). Multilingual notetaking and free style highlighting of disciplinerelated sentence groups and linguistic patterns were done by plurilingual students in the EMI classroom in the process of multimodal reading and note-making activities. Through personalising lesson handouts and revision notes, students were invited to manifest their voice and develop (socio)linguistic citizenship through co-creating emotional affordances (e.g. personalised drawings, Chinese wordings and attention-symbols) of the target content and language in the disciplinary practice of backgrounder composition (see Figure 10.2). Example 3 MEC-stage 3: Engaging students in entextualising the experience through translanguaging

In the week six lecture episode, the teacher-researcher attempted to develop students’ discipline-specific academic literacies through entextualising their experience with translanguaging. With the aid of plurilingual materials and diversified reading/note-taking experience, students were guided to utilise their cultural and linguistic repertoires (Canagarajah, 2013; Lin & Lo, 2018) for creatively composing corporate backgrounder materials for a target client (e.g. KitKat Japan). Despite the target language restriction labelled officially on the assessment guidelines and rubrics designed for backgrounder composition in ESP contexts, students were encouraged to entextualise their experience through translanguaging, a process of meaning-making and experience-shaping for gaining better understanding of the target content and language through using multiple semiotic resources (Baker, 2011; Lin, 2016). Research Findings and Discussion Reclaiming voice in EMI higher education

To reclaim a plurilingual, pluricultural voice in EMI tertiary classrooms, it is important for the school authority to break through the monolingual grip of TESOL traditions (Lin, 2020), blocking free flows of meaning-making resources, translanguaging, and trans-semiotising agency and equal rights to language, capital and power. In this subchapter, we focus on the focus group discussion among five student informants to investigate the potentials and challenges encountered by some students in Hong Kong to use their plurilingual voices, especially in the process of co-developing better understanding of diversified linguistic human rights  (Stroud & Heugh, 2011), along with undervalued access to (socio)linguistic citizenship (Stroud, 2018).

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Figure 10.2  Multimodal reading and note-taking activities in MEC-stage 2: A digital reading and note-taking task completed by a student informant in their plurilingual repertoire for a backgrounder sample

To provide a more detailed account of student informants’ opinions towards the use of multilingual and multimodal meaning-making resources throughout the design, production, and delivery of a media kit for a target local or international company, along with the mapped ­teaching/learning experience entextualised at MEC-stages 1–3, five ­voluntary student informants (pseudo-named as Amy, Billy, Cathy, David and Emily) who have completed the 13-week Public Relations Writing course in 2018–2019 were interviewed in Excerpt 1 to elicit their views in English.

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Excerpt 1 Focus group discussion

The teacher-researcher: Right? Okay. Now, you all are happy about completing all the coursework in this Public Relations Writing course in your final semester. What are your opinions about the teaching/ learning resources? Would you recommend the same teaching/ l­ earning resources for students taking the same course next year? For example, to tailor-make the media kit, what do you think students should learn from, apart from the textbook written in English? What are the good things or bad things about using plurilingual resources online on top of English-only lesson materials? David: For the media kit, we watch online videos from YouTube in both Cantonese and English to know more about the client, our target company. We cannot just use the English textbook for this. And I think, um, you can also see some real company examples online through ‘google’ some websites. Because in the textbook, the Public Relations writing examples are just designed for the textbook reading. They are not Hong Kong related examples. And I think we’ll use local company examples, uh, as good models for the students here. Amy: Um. For me, I recommend uh, other students to learn something online about design software because you know, um, you have to do a Media Kit is not just about writing a passage, but you need to decide your layout and the format or some resources like product photos. A basic concept of using some design software is very important for us. So, I recommend them [Public Relations Writing students in the next academic cohort] to learn it [using design software] in the future.  Cathy: So. And I agree that it is important to explore different companies’ website[s] because they have good examples of uh, how the companies write their news releases or about their backgrounds. Any more things, um, the videos Phoebe [i.e. the teacher-researcher] has provided in the lectures would show some components of the Media Kit. We also think learning online for making a Media Kit is better than you just using [use] the textbook, because the video is more um, lively. Okay? Billy: Also, because it’s ours [responsibility/role] to referred [refer] for a professional in the field, you feel that it’s more up-to-date and more trustworthy, maybe some nowadays materials. We hate something is full of ... full of words and [we] hate to read long English texts. So therefore, yeah, so that if a video is talking about the company’s background, we will choose to watch their videos to listen [to] what the speakers told us instead of reading a long passage about the company’s brief background.

To sum up, the focus group discussion highlighted some obstacles for plurilingual students in Hong Kong to reclaim voice and affirm their (socio)linguistic citizenship if they are just allowed to use English-only materials in some target disciplinary sociocultural meaning-making process in EMI higher education. To amplify voice with familiar everyday

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Figure 10.3  A summary mapping of multimodal plurilingual materials resource genres co-created in the Public Relations Writing course for facilitating a heteroglossic approach to content and language integrated learning (CLIL) in EMI tertiary classrooms

multimodal multilingual resources, the research informants indicated personal preferences in (1) shuffling plurilingual meaning-making resources into their assessment tasks in EMI tertiary classrooms and (2) reflecting critically on how multimodal plurilingual materials (see Figure 10.3), such as company videos channelled on social media and corporate website information provided in different languages, may liberate their plurilingual voice and agency through ‘shifting between different kinds of textual and multimodal mediation of academic content and experience’ (Lin & Lo, 2018: 101) at MEC-stages 1–3 (refer to Figures 10.1 and 10.2). In this study, we have put forward the underlying research agenda in using multimodal plurilingual resources as a heteroglossic approach to promoting (socio)linguistic citizenship in classroom discourses that are predominately hindered by monoglossic language ideologies (Cummins, 2007; Flores & Schissel, 2014; García & Flores, 2013). Creating a translanguaging space

In this subsection, we focus on illustrating how the MEC is adopted to create a translanguaging space for Public Relations majors in EMI tertiary classrooms, especially when students were invited to brainstorm creative

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ideas for composing a Media Kit for their target clients through simulating the disciplinary practice of a team of Public Relations professionals. Rooted in the deficit perspective (Lin, 2020) that marginalises non-native speaking student writers, some plurilingual teachers and students in Hong Kong may feel anxious about their cognitive and linguistic deficiencies in the target content knowledge and language in EMI tertiary classrooms. In the Public Relations Writing course, students were guided to flexibly cocreate a translanguaging space in their languages and familiar social semiotic resources, such as emojis and mind-map symbols, in their disciplinary meaning-making processes. To facilitate Public Relations ideas brainstorming and capture dialogic peer feedback for Media Kit project writing, teacher-to-student dialogic scaffolds and student-to-student dialogic scaffolds were identified in the social interaction developed on Moodle forums. In addition, students proceeded with semi-formal academic consultation in groups with their preferred linguistic repertoires and semiotic resources displayed in some group-based design applications, such as Trello project management boards. Students co-created translanguaging space through the process of meaning-making in their preferred registers and styles. In the process of discipline-appropriate meaning-making, heterogenous semiotic/language development, pinpointing the emergence of lexico-­ grammatical resources (Canagarajah, 2011) and patterning (Macqueen, 2013) among individual students and dynamic groups, was investigated to understand the roles of their linguistic repertoires and visual images in Public Relations Writing. Based on some Media Kit project samples shared by student informants, we identified three key benefits for plurilingual teachers and students to co-create a translanguaging space with their preferred social semiotic resources for providing tools to voice and reaffirm (socio)linguistic citizenship. First, students show more vivid examples of creativity with their familiar communicative repertoires in the process of socially networking with sociolinguistic affordances (Aronin & Singleton, 2010), such as groupbased WhatsApp dialogues. Second, students develop stronger affective attachment to branded sociocultural objects (Ahmed, 2004) when they are allowed to use translanguaging strategies (i.e. express ideas and develop content knowledge with more than one modality and one target language) to boost creativity for composing multilingual materials. In addition, students are invited to reflect on their prolonged ideological, psychological and emotional attachment to post-colonial desires (Kubota, 1998, 2011, 2014; Lin & Motha, 2020; Motha & Lin, 2014). Plurilingual/pluricultural voices of students and teachers

Instead of presuming perfection in the MEC adopted in the Public Relations Writing course, the teacher-researcher has developed inter-rater reliability and triangulated perspective in identifying the problems, limitations, and challenges encountered in students and their teachers in

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co-developing plurilingual/pluricultural voices in EMI tertiary classrooms. In this subsection, we focus on highlighting some alternative ways for students to breakthrough from current ideological entrapments of being monologic and monoglossic in attaining academic success in EMI higher education. For creating translanguaging space and reaffirming (socio)linguistic citizenship through the MEC, the teacher-researcher has invited students to take part in some online Moodle writing forum activities regularly throughout the 13-week Public Relations Writing course so that students may create more interactive posts in their linguistic repertoires outside the official EMI tertiary classroom face-to-face interaction hours. To understand students’ points of view sharing their plurilingual/pluricultural voices through Moodle online forums, Excerpt 2 provides an excerpt of a focus group discussion (26 July 2019) among five case informants (pseudonamed as Amy, Billy, Cathy, David and Emily) for overviewing how students’ voices got heard through the peer-to-peer interaction on Moodle. All case informants speak Cantonese as their common home language. All of them are proficient in Mandarin and English. Two informants reported that they completed an introductory course to Japanese in the community college. One informant studied elementary French in her secondary school education. Excerpt 2 Focus group discussion on peer interaction on Moodle.

Teacher-researcher: Right, did you join any Moodle online forum writing activities or feedback sessions during the 13-week coursework training for PR writing? Billy: No. Um, I didn’t join peer evaluation through Moodle. To some extent, I think group project discussion in our private time may be more important. Um, because in the semester, we take this course to learn how to write PR things. But there are many students got awfully busy or maybe they have their part-time jobs. So, they will ignore your Moodle tasks. I will just read some good examples of students’ writing posts on Moodle occasionally on my own. Amy: Oh, yeah. So, if next year, um, you may consider including peer evaluation on the uploaded Moodle writing practice here for peer evaluation of our group project writing performance, but you can give the freedom to the students whether they would like to submit their writing examples or not.  Teacher-researcher: Okay. And what you mean is the writing peer feedback may not be attractive to you all. How about the speaking part of peer feedback? Do you want to share peer ideas or peer evaluation in Cantonese or just in English only? For peer evaluation, do you all want it to be circulated within your project group of Media Kit assignment? Or do you prefer listening to ideas and feedback among other project group members in the classroom? How should I give you all more freedom to express ideas in your PR writing course?

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Amy: Ah. Ok, so for our interest, it is good to have external feedback, uh, I think, um, I think our group members’ internal peer evaluation judgment are similar as we are in the same project group. Because as we share the same project group topic and materials through the same Google drive, our point[s] of view may not be the same.  Emily: Um, however, I think teacher can use the most professional and the most accurate, accurate angle and the point of view to comment on us. Therefore, I think, um, the peer evaluation for external feedback is useless if we don’t have the summary feedback from our teacher. We don’t know whether we should listen to our peers’ opinions or not as we share a similar student knowledge level. We don’t know much about real PR practice in Hong Kong.  Teacher-researcher: Okay, but do you want any non-marking feedback? Peer feedback before the final assignment submission due date? I gave you a SWOT (i.e. strength-weakness-opportunity-threat) analysis form in the classroom hours in Week 11 before you must hand in the Media Kit final project task in Week 13. I originally invited each group to write some peer feedback when you upload some writing practice on Moodle. But when I checked, it seems that everyone forgot to post your SWOT feedback for other groups! I didn’t push you because I think you’re busy enough at the end of the semester. And how about the SWOT analysis form I gave you? Is it useful or useless to you?  David: Uh, I think it’s useless for us to write our feedback in English on the SWOT peer evaluation form. Instead of using that SWOT analysis form, um, we prefer after the sharing on Moodle, our classmates can talk to us immediately during the lecture break in our preferred styles or explain some key ideas briefly inside our tutorial hours to share their opinions about our performance of the Media Kit designs. So, I think the immediately [immediate] face to face the communication is [pause] is more useful than this one. And as for SWOT, we have limitation of insufficient class time at school.

From the focus group discussion, the teacher-researcher observed that students prefer more intimate human touch channels to interact socially with their peer groups dialogically in the assessment-specific co-meaningmaking process, such as some peer conversational feedback on the media kit document drafts in their various languages. Even though the research informants did not provide very concrete examples of the peer evaluation registers or styles they prefer in the EMI tertiary classroom hours, two informants did not show interest in using some written templates in English, such as the widely adopted SWOT table format analysis for business students. To some of the students, limited personal time to manage the coursework and classroom hours in the Public Relations Writing course remains a challenge in interacting with their peers effectively. For instance, some research informants did not expect to upload Moodle forum posts or peer dialogic feedback frequently in some non-assessment

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activities. They prefer using self-directed channels to collect their teacher’s judgmental feedback on their assignment drafts. To promote effective use of the linguistic repertoire and multimodal meaning-making resources through the MEC, the teacher-researcher needs to improve the iterative MEC-guided pedagogical cycles to co-­ create more self-directed translanguaging space, such as some private social networking chatrooms established among peers in their languages and other visual images in the classrooms. To ensure effective academic progress, some informants indicated their priorities to capture direct comments from the course teacher since the final assignment submission will be graded by the same teacher. Informants from the focus group interview did not challenge the macro view of completing assessment tasks in the target subject matter knowledge and language. Yet, they indicated some interest in finding an ‘economical’ and ‘efficient’ way to develop some peer dialogic support in their preferred registers, genres and styles, along with their preferred semiotic resources without being assigned to complete some parallel non-assessment tasks intensively on Moodle. In the process of co-designing more iterative cycles in the Public Relations Writing course with the aid of multimodalities and the informants’ linguistic repertoires, the teacher-researcher may potentially explore how multimodalities embedded in the MEC stages may breakthrough the logocentric curricular, pedagogical and assessment co-designs in EMI tertiary classrooms to promote (socio)linguistic citizenship among students in Hong Kong for culturally sustaining their familiar home language, culture and social semiotic resources. On top of Moodle, social media networking tools, such as Signal, WhatsApp, Google drive and Trello, are new design applications to facilitate plurilingual, pluricultural resources-making and transmission among tertiary students who opt for more flexibility to selfdirected disciplinary meaning-making and socialisation. They opt for making peer decisions through having direct conversations, such as using voice tags in mobile devices or meet face-to-face or online as a peer group, rather than posting written feedback on assessment tasks in public review channels, such as the Moodle platform accessible by all course registrants. Conclusion

The MEC approach in EMI classrooms has been adopted as a heuristic tool in primary and secondary school, along with tertiary education contexts, in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Mainland China, focusing mainly on supporting plurilingual teachers and students in the academic disciplines of Science and Social Sciences (Gupta, 2020; Liu et al., 2020; Tsang, 2020; Wu & Lin, 2019). The research and pedagogical implications highlighted in this chapter indicate that the roles of multimodalities and plurilingual, pluricultural meaning-making resources are prominent in business writing genres of Public Relations and Communication. To

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provide opportunities for plurilingual voices in EMI tertiary classrooms, the teacher-researcher has investigated the challenges and possibilities in raising social semiotic awareness through developing teacher-to-student and student-to-student dialogic scaffolding with the MEC. The value of  the dialogic scaffolding also lies in contributing to promoting (socio)linguistic citizenship (Rampton et al., 2018) through providing fluid and socially equitable access of local sociocultural meaning-making resources in the otherwise formal EMI tertiary curricula in Public Relations and Communication. Most importantly, the dialogic scaffolding co-designed in a plurilingual, pluricultural curriculum genre has captured positive peer rapport for nurturing emergent plurilingual Public Relations writers in creating innovative styles and formats. Although plurilingual teachers and students are advised by institutional authorities to conform to the monolingual policy in Hong Kong, the peer-to-peer dialogic scaffolding exemplified in the MEC approach has indicated students’ interest in co-creating a dialogic space in EMI higher education, challenging some mental and emotional constraints that the monoglossic approach has imposed on plurilingual teachers and students, who may benefit from reclaiming a more active, dynamic and empowered plurilingual voice when English (though as a target language) is no longer regarded as the only officially permitted meaning-making resource in the EMI tertiary classroom. Implications for further research and practice

Instead of presuming perfection in the MEC (Lin, 2016, 2019), the teacher-researcher has to develop triangulated perspectives in identifying the problems, limitations, and challenges encountered in this case study for promoting a plurilingual, pluricultural approach to Public Relations Writing in EMI higher education, especially focusing on the potentials to liberate plurilingual tertiary students in Hong Kong from some ideological entrapment and idol-worshipping attitudes for using English as the only meaning-making resource in developing their discipline-specific academic literacies. Still, it is important to note that the MEC adopted in the Public Relations Writing course as a bridging pedagogy (Lin, 2016, 2019) to align assessment, teaching, and learning does not aim at abolishing the adoption of official textbooks and academic reference sources in English (i.e. the target language). Instead, the MEC aims at enriching the entextualising experience of plurilingual teachers and students in EMI higher education curriculum genres. In addition, the MEC activated through the Moodle learning platforms as a 24/7 teacher-to-student dialogic scaffolding and peer-to-peer dialogic scaffolding channel may welcome more in-depth case studies and further narrative inquiries. However, the 24/7 flexible access to teacher-to-student dialogic scaffolding resources and peer-to-peer dialogic scaffolding

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resources cannot replace face-to-face classroom engagement activities in the MEC. The round-the-clock access to genre-specific peer dialogic writing practice and feedback on Moodle does not guarantee students’ active engagement in the peer dialogic scaffolding process. Nor does it guarantee students’ higher emotional commitment and attachment towards this innovative approach. There is the urgency to develop more variations of the MEC approach to tackle diverse contexts and challenges. To promote (socio)linguistic citizenship in EMI tertiary classrooms, it is important for plurilingual, pluricultural content subject specialists and language specialists in Hong Kong to collaborate and investigate new approaches for matching current research interests in overcoming the limitations of homogeneity and monolingual practices by cultivating plurilingual, pluricultural students’ academic literacy. New approaches and constructs in EMI tertiary classrooms are recommended to critically reflect on various traces of social inequalities observed in EMI higher education for plurilingual, pluricultural students in Hong Kong. In addition, reclaiming a plurilingual voice in EMI tertiary classes may also redirect plurilingual, pluricultural teachers and students to develop critical linguistic and semiotic awareness and identify some potentials in manifesting voice, agency and (socio)linguistic citizenship through plurilingual pedagogies (Lin, 2013; Lin & He, 2017; Lin & Lo, 2017). The MEC approach adopted in this study is one feasible example of heuristic tools for co-creating socioculturally sustaining plurilingual resources and cultivating discipline-appropriate plurilingual, pluricultural competence in EMI tertiary classrooms, expanding not only disciplinary lexico-­ grammatical resources in the target language, e.g. English, but also social semiotic landscapes that may potentially support (socio)linguistic citizenship in Hong Kong, taking full respect to ‘the diverse populations in this day and age and provide equal participation not limited to dominant languages and dominant people’ (Shohamy, 2011: 428). References Ahmed, S. (2004) The Cultural Politics of Emotion. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Aronin, L. and Singleton, D. (2010) Affordances and the diversity of multilingualism. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 205, 105–129. Baker, C. (2011) Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism (5th edn). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Bakhtin, M. (1981) Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. Austin: University of Texas Press. Blommaert, J. (2005) Discourse: A Critical Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bourdieu, P. (1998) State Nobility (trans. R. Nice). Cambridge: Polity Press.  Busch, B. (2006) Language biographies for multilingual learning: Linguistic and educational considerations. In B. Busch and A. Jardine (eds) Language Biographies for Multilingual Learning (pp. 5–17). Cape Town: PRAESA Occasional Papers.

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Stroud, C. and Heugh, K. (2011) Language education. In R. Mesthrie (ed.) Cambridge Handbook of Sociolinguistics (pp. 413–429). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tsang, M.K.-Y. (2020) Building on language support in a Hong Kong CLIL chemistry classroom. Journal of Immersion and Content-Based Language Education 8 (2), 149–172.  Wu, Y. and Lin, A.M.Y. (2019) Translanguaging and trans-semiotising in a CLIL biology class in Hong Kong: Whole-body sense-making in the flow of knowledge co-making. Classroom Discourse 10 (3–4), 252–273.

Afterword: Localising (Socio)linguistic Citizenship Ben Rampton, Mel Cooke, Constant Leung, Dermot Bryers, Becky Winstanley and Sam Holmes

As ‘an attempt at a comprehensive political stance on language’ (Stroud, 2008: 45), ‘(socio)linguistic citizenship’ (LC) deserves to be a mainstream concept in socio- and applied linguistics. But the evaluation of its potential needs to be context-sensitive, reckoning with the specifics of the environments where it is taken up. In this chapter, we review LC’s relevance to the UK, focusing on the ways in which we have been working with it at the Hub for Education and Language Diversity (www.kcl.ac.uk/held). HELD aligns with LC’s commitment to democratic participation, to voice, to the heterogeneity of linguistic resources and to the political value of linguistic understanding, as well as with LC’s emphasis on ground-level citizenship acts and practices, and its profound embedding in socio- and applied linguistics. But education and everyday life are also influenced by state-centred definitions of citizenship, bringing state policy and provision into focus at HELD, as well as the role that universities can play promoting LC. The chapter also discusses two concepts we have been working with that complement (socio)linguistic citizenship: the ‘Total Linguistic Fact’, an encapsulation of sociolinguistic thought that can be turned to the practical planning of classroom activity, bringing out its ideological dynamics; and the ‘diasporic local’, which creates new possibilities for multi-directional communication and learning by dispensing with ‘non-citizen outsider’ as a hegemonic classification in language teaching and language teacher education. As the Editors note in their description of this book, the notion of (socio)linguistic citizenship (LC), developed in southern Africa by Christopher Stroud and colleagues, involves ‘commitments to democratic participation, to voice, to the heterogeneity of linguistic resources, and to the political value of sociolinguistic understanding’ (Rampton et  al., 2018b: 77). In this volume, the concept is integrated into a very rich array of case studies that cover refugee empowerment, diaspora mobilisation, Deaf emancipation, language revitalisation, minority language education, decolonial education and international development. This range suggests 211

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that LC has the potential to become part of mainstream thought and action in applied and sociolinguistics, and this is a development which we very much welcome. At the same time, however, (socio)linguistic citizenship is, according to Stroud (2018: 45), ‘an attempt at a comprehensive political stance on language’, and as such, it invites much more of a positioned assessment, grounded in the reader’s own engagement with particular sets of social and political conditions, than an ordinary theory or set of empirical claims. This positioning makes it quite difficult to offer a detailed evaluation of LC’s relevance and potential in these chapters, and instead, we will provide an account of how we are engaging with LC in the UK, integrating it with our own work while also interrogating some aspects of its formulation. In doing so, we will add one more case to this edited collection while also indicating (a) the specific areas where we find LC very helpful, (b) the points where we perhaps diverge from the account provided by Stroud and colleagues, and (c) two other concepts we have identified that have a lot of practical value in language education and seem to complement LC (‘the Total Linguistic Fact’ and ‘diasporic locals’). To follow this through, we need to start with a brief sketch of the Hub for Education and Linguistic Diversity (www.kcl.ac.uk/held), the outfit where we are engaging most actively with (socio)linguistic citizenship ideas. Hub for Education and Linguistic Diversity

Established at King’s College London in 2019, the Hub for Education and Language Diversity (HELD) is a collaboration between academics and professionals in non-profit organisations, coordinated by a group of seven individuals.1 Our strapline is Ground-level analysis and action, enhancing language repertoires, and HELD’s work is guided by three basic ideas: • shared language is vital to social life, but linguistic diversity is also central. Both can be enhanced by education, enriching both the individual and society; • local conditions and participant perspectives really matter; • theories and research can be powerful tools, helping people to think differently. We have been trying to follow these tenets in a number of different activities: seminars for language teachers (on e.g. ‘Multilingual classrooms: Challenges & opportunities’; ‘Sociolinguistics, participatory pedagogy & language education’); a summer school; teaching and assessment materials developed in socio- and applied linguistic research projects (e.g. www.ourlanguages.co.uk; EAL Assessment Framework); development work with cultural and arts organisations on multilingual creativity among young people; MA teaching with language education placements; and a range of publications both for academics and professionals.

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Areas of compatibility with the idea of (socio)linguistic citizenship should already be clear: both value linguistic diversity; HELD’s view of theories and research as tools for thinking differently matches LC’s commitment to the practical value of sociolinguistic understanding; the importance that HELD attaches to local conditions and participant perspectives is broadly congruent with LC’s emphasis on democratic participation. In addition, there is also significant strand of work on language and citizenship at HELD that has developed more or less independently of Stroud’s ideas (see Bryers et al., 2013; Cooke & Simpson, 2012; Cooke & Peutrell, 2019b), so that when we ran a summer school in 2021 with LC in the title – Language, education & linguistic citizenship – this strand was also a substantial, complementary, source of input. HELD’s alignment with (socio)linguistic citizenship has been supported by a sustained (>10 yr) trans-institutional relationship with colleagues at the University of the Western Cape (UWC), involving staff and student visits, publications and working papers, doctoral summer schools and MA coteaching on-line.  We’ve gained far more from this relationship than ‘(socio)linguistic citizenship’ alone, but because a lot of foundational work on LC has taken place at UWC, the link has helped us to keep in touch with developments in LC thinking. In addition, a degree of familiarity with the South African environment has maybe made it easier to see how and why our own appropriation of an originally ‘a Southern and de-colonial concept’ (Stroud, 2018: 18) diverges from its source, potentially addressing different challenges for decolonisation. We should begin, though, with two of our most important reasons for seeking to align with LC. What we Get from (Socio)linguistic Citizenship

One reason for embracing (socio)linguistic citizenship is closely related to political debates in the UK, where language and citizenship are most commonly connected in two discourses. On the one hand, there is a European Union discourse about ‘plurilingual citizens’ competent in European standard languages. This is very much elite multilingualism, involving named languages with unified, codified norms of correctness embodied in literatures and grammars (Gal, 2006; Moore, 2011) – a long way off from the heteroglossic rhetorical power that Stroud and colleagues have in mind. Alternatively and now much more powerfully, language and citizenship come together when the British state tells immigrants to speak English and take citizen tests, characterising any lack of English as a threat to social cohesion and national security (Cooke & Simpson, 2012; Khan, 2017). Neither of these discourses capitalises on the realities of vernacular multilingualism in the UK, where a huge range of different forms of language get used in different combinations in daily life. In fact, in this respect, the UK isn’t so different from South Africa where Stroud and colleagues are based, and LC engages productively with this kind of

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mixed, heteroglossic environment by looking beyond citizenship as an administrative category or state certification to Engin Isin’s (2008, 2017) highly influential ‘acts of citizenship’ perspective. Isin focuses on the political agency of people like asylum-seekers and undocumented immigrants who occupy precarious positions in the states where they reside (2008: 15–16; 2017: 504–5), and he argues that in ‘acts of citizenship’, people actively constitute themselves as citizens by making claims to particular rights and duties, even though they are not formally seen as citizens by the law, falling outside the realm of those eligible to claim such entitlements (Isin & Nielsen, 2008: 2). In fact, in a country like the UK where there is quite widespread recognition that the demographic categories guiding British public policy no longer adequately fit the UK population (Arnaut et  al., 2015; Fanshawe & Srikandagarajah, 2011; Rampton et al., 2018a), Isin’s approach has rather general significance. But it is also directly relevant to HELD because a lot of our work involves people who have migrated, and because the emphasis on making claims about rights and political positioning generates a set of practical concerns and attainable goals for work in and around classrooms. Indeed, classroom practitioners at HELD have been committed to supporting the capacity of language learners to engage in citizenship acts and actions for a number of years, working on this through the participatory pedagogy promoted by the non-profit organisation English for Action (www. efalondon.org), as well as through publications and action research projects (Bryers et al., 2013, 2014; Cooke et al., 2019). Isin’s work has itself become a significant reference point in this activity (Cooke & Peutrell, 2019a; Peutrell, 2019), and for us, Stroud and colleagues’ linguistic citizenship strengthens this by embedding Isin’s (2017) citizenship practices within contemporary socio- and applied linguistics, underlining the fact that claim-making is itself very much a communicative activity. In fact, this constitutes the second major reason for our attraction to LC, and it can be elaborated as follows. (Socio)linguistic citizenship offers a political stance on language, but at the same time, this is built on the strong theoretical and empirical foundations provided by contemporary sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology. This mix of concerns has a substantial pedigree. In the 1970s, Dell Hymes (1977: 204–6) took the view that the careful comparative study of communicative repertoires and practices ultimately serves the higher ethical goals of Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité because it ‘prepares [sociolinguists] to speak concretely to actual inequalities’, and following this much more recently, Jan Blommaert (2010: 15) argued that ‘no social cause is served by poor analysis. Only the best work stands a chance of making a difference’. 2 So although (socio)linguistic citizenship is a normative rather than a descriptive concept, stressing ‘what should be’ rather than ‘what is’, Stroud and colleagues also produce first-rate academic analyses and are very well embedded in contemporary sociolinguistic research. Right from

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the outset, LC drew on a growing analytical challenge to the belief that distinct languages exist as natural objects, arguing instead that ‘English’, ‘German’ and ‘Bengali’ are cultural and ideological constructions, and that named languages are actually rather shallow and restrictive constructs when it comes to understanding how people really communicate (Blommaert, 1999; Kroskrity, 2000; Stroud, 1999, 2001; Makoni & Pennycook, 2007). Following this through, Stroud and colleagues have also provided very rich documentation of, for example, the use of visual and bodily signs, embedding these in accounts of situated practice in which interlocutors are guided by the particularities of the genre and activity, their background knowledge, their attitudes and expectations of each other and so forth (e.g. Peck & Stroud, 2015; Stroud & Mpendukana, 2009; Williams & Stroud, 2015). At HELD, LC’s close proximity to this analytic tradition is very valuable in practical terms. It is a rich resource for language teacher education (see §4 below), and in a non-vocational context, it also provides a strong warrant for developing a form of advanced post-graduate training in applied and sociolinguistics that includes practical internships for students in language teaching organisations. So when MA students spend time in a non-profit organisation like English for Action, 3 they are participating in language classes that subscribe to LC-compatible principles, and this provides fertile terrain for setting in motion a potentially rather far-reaching dialogue between the students’ practical placement experience and their sophisticated booklearning, all pivoting around (socio)linguistic citizenship (for an illustration, see Dupret, 2021). To register this sociolinguistics pedigree and to underline its difference from EU and British state versions of citizenship and language, we sometimes speak of ‘sociolinguistic’ rather than just ‘linguistic citizenship’ at HELD, even though this affirms the key dimension of our alignment with the southern African concept. There are, though, several areas where our approach to language and citizenship looks a little different. Where We (Maybe) Diverge

Stroud and colleagues quite often present linguistic citizenship as a radical alternative to state-centred perspectives, and they are especially critical of the way in which the idea of Linguistic Human Rights often dominates debates and policies focusing on the promotion of subordinated languages, arguing that this generates new sociolinguistic inequalities, presupposes membership of a single state, neglects population mobility, and builds on arbitrary and essentialist definitions of language and group identity (Stroud, 2001; Stroud & Heugh, 2004). We concur with much of this critique, agree that it would be a big mistake to make legal definitions of citizenship the exclusive focus of attention in debates about language, and very much endorse Stroud et al.’s emphasis on Isin’s (2017)

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citizenship practices (Cooke & Peutrell, 2019a; Rampton et al., 2018a, 2018b). Even so, state-based citizenship status also influences our environment, shaping curricula in language education, generating barriers, exclusions, suspicions and insecurities that people have to deal with on a daily basis, affecting their experiences of public services, health, education, housing and safety in general. In other words, laws, institutional mandates and everyday practices are all closely entwined, and in adapting the idea(l) of (socio)linguistic citizenship in the UK, it’s important to try to work with structures as well as practices, critically and constructively looking for ways of making a difference at whatever levels look tractable. Classrooms are one very significant arena for this, but as implied in our overview of different types and sites of language education in England (English, EAL/English as an Additional Language (in schools), ESOL/ English for (adult) Speakers of Languages other than English, MFL/ Modern Foreign Languages, and Community/Heritage Languages; Rampton et al., 2020), more broadly based engagement with varied forms of state policy and provision is also important, as is reflexive attention to the specific contributions that a university can make, in spite of a hostile climate in national politics. None of these points are news for Stroud and colleagues, but maybe a difference between us emerges around the word ‘transformation’. (Socio)linguistic citizenship, they often suggest, is a transformative rather than simply affirmative framework, and they cite Nancy Fraser (1995: 82) to clarify the distinction: ‘affirmative remedies for injustice [are] aimed at correcting inequitable outcomes of social arrangements without disturbing the underlying framework that generates them’; ‘transformative remedies [are] aimed at correcting inequitable outcomes precisely by restructuring the underlying generative framework’. We’re very committed to promoting (socio)linguistic citizenship at HELD, but we are also more hesitant about claiming a transformative impact for our efforts. As Jaspers (2017: 7, 11) notes, many sociologists of education ‘question the idea that interventions at school can transform society in any significant way’, and ‘all classrooms must be approached as complex interactive settings where, rather than simply accepting what is offered, pupils always negotiate what is put on the table (curricula, teaching styles, teachers) and develop different strategies depending on their short- and long-term ambitions, the classroom climate, and local socio-economic conditions’ (2017: 11; Charalambous et  al., 2016). Indeed, socio- and applied linguistics show that every communicative act entails a huge range of linguistic, interactional and institutional structures, and each one of them is a ‘generative framework’ – as a result, it is very complicated saying which of these generative frameworks is and is not being challenged or changed, and how much more general the effects are going to be. Certainly, there are at least two counter-arguments to these reservations. First, yes, socio- and applied linguistic analysis can play a valuable

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part alerting us to the intricacies of change. But in the end, the assessment of whether an action is transformative, affirmative, reproductive or indeed repressive is likely to involve a holistic, all-round judgement that departs from and/or goes well beyond the linguist’s scientific expertise, and movement back-and-forwards between a technical and a more encompassing moral and political vantage point is wholly consistent with the programme of applied and activist linguistics elaborated by Hymes and Blommaert. Second, as we have already said, it is vital to consider the places where people are talking about transformation, and here it is worth bringing in Conversations with Bourdieu: The Johannesburg Moment, a book by Michael Burawoy and Karl von Holdt (2012). Bourdieu was an arch-­ sceptic when it comes to ideas about radical transformation (taking the view that tout ça change, tout c’est la meme chose), but Burawoy and von Holdt are writing from South Africa, and they show just how contextspecific Bourdieu’s work was. In stable post-war bourgeois France where Bourdieu lived, ‘habitus’ and ‘bodily hexis’ might fit seamlessly into social structure, continually ratifying it in the routines of everyday life, but in South Africa, bodies are marked by colonial domination, racial classification generates endless physical and cultural assault, there is a habitus of defiance, and Bourdieu’s merely symbolic violence looks distinctly genteel (see also Deumert, 2018: 291–3). So although the word ‘transformation’ might sound naively optimistic in France, it actually has a great deal of public currency in South Africa, and far from being light-headed when they speak of transformative effects, Stroud and colleagues are very welltuned to the environment where they work. Nevertheless, life in England is probably closer to France than South Africa (even though both European countries also have major colonial histories as well as a lot of contemporary racism), and for us at HELD, references to transformation need to be carefully hedged, as well as alert to the possibility that it can be affirmative rather than transformative remedies that subordinated people are looking for. The history of language education in England generates a second line of self-differentiation, pushing us towards a stronger sense of LC’s mainstream potential. In Stroud and colleagues’ account, (socio)linguistic citizenship tends to develop at the margins of state provision,4 and consistent with this, there certainly are in the UK quite a large number of thirdsector, non-profit organisations that promote citizenship acts and actions around language in the manner analysed by Isin, largely beyond state control (see above and Endnote 3). Even so, there is no essential incompatibility between state funding and the principles of (socio)linguistic citizenship, and this can be shown with a brief sketch of language education in England from the 1960s to the late 1980s. From the 1960s to the late 1980s, schooling in England was dominated by ‘progressive’ pedagogies, and local authorities, teaching unions and subject associations had much more influence than central government. In

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language education, there was huge interest in the voice and language use of pupils, and for many, this brought the politics of gender, class and ethnicity into lessons. All of this work was supported by local authorities like the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA), and there was also a lot of interest in socio- and applied linguistics. Indeed, in the late 1980s, this culminated in Language in the National Curriculum project (LINC) which was guided by principles compatible with Stroud’s LC, 5 ran from 1989–1992, involved 25 coordinators and more than 10,000 teachers in over 400 training courses, supported with £21 million from central government (£165 million at current values) (LINC, 1992). Admittedly, the training materials that LINC produced were eventually banned by a Conservative government committed to ‘teaching children to use their language correctly’, 6 and since then, even though there are still glimpses of an alignment with LINC-like values in state schooling,7 ‘the discourse around standards, accountability, performance and attainment [has become so hegemonic] that it can appear that this is just the way things are’ (Gibbons, 2017: 3). But our overall point here is that the promotion of (socio)linguistic citizenship is not necessarily confined to relatively shortterm projects operating on the periphery of state education. It can also work on a national scale, as attested from the 1960s to the 1980s. Recognition of this history runs with HELD’s active engagement in contemporary language education policy, at both local and regional levels of government (see Endnote 11). Admittedly, in a Brexit Britain where the national government officially promotes a ‘hostile environment for migrants’, where local government budgets have been slashed, and the education system is now heavily marketised and fragmented, policy engagement is challenging and there is not much chance of a programme for (socio)linguistic citizenship suddenly emerging sector-wide on a largescale. Nevertheless, it can still draw purpose and direction from the interaction of at least two rather substantial resources: (a) the huge numbers of people in British cities who know more than just the national language, as well as a very large range of grass-roots organisations working to maintain and develop ground-level multilingualism outside the mainstream education – complementary schools, community initiatives and arts organisations;8 and (b) universities and their shifting missions. The neoliberal marketisation that reconfigured schooling in the 1990s has also very substantially affected universities, but as Matras and Robertson (2017: 5) note from the vantage point of a major 10-year research-teaching and outreach programme in linguistics at the University of Manchester, 9 somewhat ‘unexpectedly’, ‘growing [neo-liberal] emphasis on the economisation of research, commodification of teaching, and a need to demonstrate a “return on investment to clients and sponsors” creates favourable conditions’ for activist research on urban multilingualism. In the UK, universities are expected to play a significant role in their regional economies, and this is part of a much wider and now

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well-established pattern. According to an OECD study of higher education (HE) in 12 countries, ‘higher education institutions… are strongly placed to interpret global issues on a local scale’ (Chatterton & Goddard, 2000: 490), and this process of regionalisation is itself also potentially good news for multilingualism, because local organisations and local governments are often much better attuned to the opportunities and challenges presented by linguistic diversity than national ones, and they’re potentially more responsive.10 Collaboration between universities and grass-roots organisations focusing on language certainly is not straightforward: they generally work to rather different time-scales, financial procedures and measures of success (Rampton & Cooke, 2021). But in the words of one non-academic partner, ‘it can be a win-win situation! Third sector organisations can provide a rich interface between practice and theory and provide valuable opportunities for academics to get in-depth, authentic exposure to their field of interest. University partnership adds credibility/kudos, plus rigour to research/evaluation’ (Rampton & Cooke, 2021: 3). Indeed, the potential that universities offer for promoting a perspective like (socio)linguistic citizenship has not gone unnoticed, and for the people and parties likely to object to the principles it stands for, declaring ‘culture war’ and berating ‘cancel culture’, universities are already seen as substantial antagonists, spreading ‘concern about equalities, human rights and identity politics among Britain’s graduate class’ (Goodhart, 2018). If this platform is connected with the drive, networks and campaigning experience quite commonly found in the not-for-profit sector, the impact potential increases, as we have experienced ourselves.11 So rather than seeing (socio)linguistic citizenship as always peripheral and inescapably oppositional, the particularities of HELD’s location encourage us to look for ways of actually institutionalising (socio)linguistic citizenship as a normative ideal in language education and initial and ­continuing language teacher training. This can take a lot of arduous struggle, but we are also finding quite powerful support for this in a couple of concepts that we have been working with. Supplementing ‘(Socio)linguistic Citizenship’: Diasporic Locals and the Total Linguistic Fact

Stroud and colleagues’ (socio)linguistic citizenship highlights and encapsulates a political perspective that is often left only implicit in contemporary socio- and applied linguistic research on ground-level communicative practice, and this gives it a two-fold utility when talking to language teachers, students and others. On the one hand, it can serve as a banner that flags up a set of values and ideals for language use, while at the same time, it points to a doorway that leads towards a sophisticated analytic toolkit that, to refer back to Hymes (1977: 204–6), can ‘speak

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concretely to actual inequalities’. In our work at HELD, there are two more concepts, the ‘Total Linguistic Fact’ and ‘diasporic local’, that provide keys to unlock rather rich paths for thinking differently, at the same time as being accessible and useful to people who may not have a lot of time to explore these avenues, and who quite quickly need to see their practical potential. The ‘Total Linguistic Fact’ (TLF) is a phrase coined by one of the most important figures in contemporary sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology, Michael Silverstein, and the word ‘total’ implies that other traditions of language study provide only rather an incomplete picture of what linguistic communication actually involves. Pioneered by John Gumperz (1982: 29; Hanks, 1996: 230; Silverstein, 1985: 220), the TLF encapsulates a perspective that has been elaborated in a great deal of work on language in both society and education (including Peutrell & Cooke, 2019; Rampton, 2006), and the central idea is that if you want a properly rounded account of language, you need to reckon with the way in which (a) linguistic form, (b) interactional activity and (c) cultural values and identities, perceptions and beliefs about of the social world – ideology in short – are all closely interconnected in communication.12 The TLF can be diagrammed as illustrated in Figure A.1. With its two-headed arrows connecting each of the elements, the diagram says that whenever we speak, write, sign, listen, etc., we’re not just selecting phonological and grammatical forms (‘formal structures’) for the tasks we are engaged in (‘activity’) – we are also operating with a sense of how our words could or should fit the situation, how much weight they are likely to carry, the kinds of place where they could resonate, the kinds of identity they project, etc. We may well get it wrong, but that just means that for the next time round, we will need to adjust our model of the do’s and don’ts, and of how our utterances fit the social world we are moving in (‘ideology’).

Figure A.1  The Total Linguistic Fact (TLF)

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Each of the terms in the diagram opens into large and elaborate analytical frameworks: ‘formal structure’ covers phonetics, morpho-syntax, and semantics; interactional ‘activity’ invites the modes of exploration developed by Goffman, discourse and conversation analysts; and ‘ideology’ calls for the investigation of culture, social and institutional knowledge, inter-group perceptions, feelings, and beliefs about language, etc. More than enough for a lifetime’s study. But at the same time, the TLF can still be useful to people who do not have the space to delve into all of these frameworks, and here, it can serve as an orientational heuristic that reminds people of different angles to consider in deciding how to address a particular problem in language pedagogy, or how to design a particular task (much like Jim Cummins’ (2008) BICS/CALP framework or Christopher Brumfit’s (1984) accuracy/fluency distinction, even though they cover very different ground). To make the case for the TLF’s practical potential in language teaching, one only has to think of the way in which its elements have often been disaggregated. So there are language teaching traditions where, for example, language structures are targeted first. Later on, they are inserted into particular activities, and then ideology is kept until last, focusing on it in more advanced classes on literature, in projects about the target culture and so on. But the TLF says that this is a delusion. Okay, in a structural syllabus, you might concentrate on grammar and vocabulary, gradually increasing their complexity, but all the time you are together in class with other people, you are exposing each other to particular understandings of language-in-the-world, and all the time you are being pressured to see yourselves as particular kinds of teacher-and-students, to line up behind particular kinds of authority and so forth. Sociologists have called this the ‘hidden curriculum’ but that is quite a broad characterisation: The Total Linguistic Fact lets us zoom in on particular episodes, even on particular moments, and it pushes the question: exactly what are the ideological influences on the activities organised in this class? What are the ideological effects? What roles and identities are these language structures making available? What backgrounds and futures are being spotlighted or obscured? Maybe this sketch of conventional language teaching sounds like a caricature, and it would be hard to find teachers and students who do not try to connect forms to activities, structures to functions. Indeed, in the UK in something like ESOL-for-employability or ESOL-for-citizenship, ideology is right up there, front and centre, as well as in the explicit emphasis on ‘British Values’ in school and college inspections. But more generally, compared with subjects like history or geography or literature, questions about our-positioning-in-the-world are often rather muted in language teaching. In contrast, the TLF tells us (a) that we are not being gratuitously political if we think about the ideological dimension – we are head-in-the-sand ostriches if we do not; (b) it is a mistake to be entirely

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student-centred, focusing everything on the students, because teachers are also participants in the ideological space of the classroom, very often with a lot less control over what actually happens than their managers desire; and (c) the creative rearrangements that we try to generate in classrooms can be expanded beyond linguistic form and interactional activity to culture and ideology. This third point requires elaboration, bringing us to the second supplementary concept that we are finding rather resonant at HELD. Even in very conventional classes, language teachers encourage students to experiment with the different possibilities that language provides. With grammar, for example, there are substitution tables, sentence completion tasks, dictoglosses and so forth, and for language use in interaction, there is pair work, group work, games, role-play, card clusters, etc. But what scope is there for some creative flexibility in our approach to ideology, the third element in the TLF? Peutrell and Cooke (2019: 231) work with a model of language that is very similar to the TLF, and we can see one powerful possibility when they suggest that in ESOL classes, [t]here is a marked difference between, on the one hand, seeing ESOL students as non-citizen outsiders, who we assist to acquire the language and cultural norms of their adopted homeland, and on the other, as diasporic locals, with their own linguistic, cultural, social, affective and other resources; whose very presence reshapes the locality they live in. (2019: 229)

In an adult ESOL class where, for example, there are students who have been in London for 10 years, two years, or just six months, it is not actually very difficult to imagine this ideological reorientation, just as it is quite simple to achieve if one thinks of the local kinship networks in which a lot of newly-arrived EAL school pupils are embedded. Indeed it is very easy, too, to see a lot of teachers as diasporic locals, and this loosens classroom interaction from the ideological straightjacket forced onto it by the equation of culture and expertise with just one language and the idea that knowing more of its structures-and-functions means knowing more in general. Instead, in a gathering of diasporic locals, even though it really matters, English becomes just one thread in the webs of knowledge and experience that the participants bring with them, and this frees up a far richer set of resources, links and differences for everyone to learn from. The shift to diasporic locals from citizen/non-citizen in-/outsider is a rather profound – perhaps even transformative – example of the kinds of reconfiguration that can open up when one starts to explore the ideological dimensions of linguistic practice brought into focus by the TLF. And it may be much easier to follow through in some forms of language education than others – at HELD, it is probably most developed in adult ESOL classrooms practicing participatory pedagogy (Bryers et al., 2013, 2014).

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But drama and role-playing are two quite common forms of pedagogy for spotlighting and experimenting with ideology, and the interconnection of elements in the Total Linguistic Fact means that different ideological ­possibilities – status implications, potentials for agency, levels of deference, political connotations, etc. – can of course also be addressed in classroom work on discourse structure, grammatical form, word choice and pronunciation. In the way that it makes space for the voice and expertise of people in a classroom, ‘diasporic local’ fits well with the principles of (socio)linguistic citizenship, and to the extent that the TLF is likely to denaturalise relations of power that might otherwise be masked or taken for granted, so too does an active orientation to the ideological dimension of the Total Linguistic Fact. But the relationship between the Total Linguistic Fact and (socio)linguistic citizenship is more complicated, since after all, the TLF could also be used as a practical heuristic in the ideological design of tasks and exercises that target subservience, obedience, and discipline. To clarify the LC/TLF relationship, we can say that if, as suggested above, (socio)linguistic citizenship points to the doorway into a room full of sophisticated analytic apparatus, the Total Linguistic Fact takes us through and starts to equip us with tools for the investigation and design of ‘concrete’ activities capable of reducing – or indeed of intensifying – ‘actual inequalities’. Stroud (2018: 23) acknowledges that (socio)linguistic citizenship carries the ‘aesthetic or euphoric resonances’ of a utopia, in much the same way that about 50 years ago, Hymes cited Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité as ideals that needed a linguistics that could offer them practical support. The TLF is a succinct encapsulation of the linguistics that Hymes called for and Stroud aligns with, but its power as a resource derives from its political indeterminacy as a form of science – a science that can be technologised and put to a range of different uses. Perhaps the most one can say is that whatever their goals, the TLF can be a contribution to the agency – to the ability to ‘act otherwise’ (Giddens, 1984: 14) – of whoever grasps it. Localising (Socio)linguistic Citizenship at HELD

At HELD, the concept of (socio)linguistic citizenship meshes with a good deal of our own work in language education, teacher training, and in socio- and applied linguistics, and it strengthens the bridge between analysis and practical action, connecting with the TLF research tradition and energising our sense of its relevance to language development. The formulation of (socio)linguistic citizenship provided by Stroud and colleagues links most directly to our work in teaching English to adults, where, for example, Peutrell and Cooke (2019: 230–1)) propose that ESOL should be ethnographically informed, that the pedagogy should be participatory, and that the ideological dimensions of language should be

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addressed alongside the pragmatic and the grammatical (Cooke et al., 2019). But in this educational arena, as in others, state policies and statecentred classifications of citizenship and language are also very consequential. So a pursuit of the values that (socio)linguistic citizenship articulates – democratic participation, voice, linguistic heterogeneity, understanding about language – also entails tactics and alliances in and around the corridors of power, necessarily emphasising some of LC’s values more than others in order, for example, to gain entry and uptake within the schooling system. The analytic perspective that we associate with LC retains its potency, and it could enable, for example, investigation of the creative strategies, struggles and spaces in which school-teachers and parents seek recognition for their diasporic local sensibilities. But even within the locale where we are exploring (socio)linguistic citizenship, we need to keep shifting gear, simultaneously testing and embracing the dynamism that Stroud and colleagues place at (socio)linguistic citizenship’s core. Notes (1) Dermot Bryers, Melanie Cooke, Sam Holmes, Constant Leung, Ben Rampton, Anthony Tomei, Becky Winstanley. (2) ‘Solving [real world problems] requires the best possible work, because there is no room for errors, failures, or half-baked work – people’s fate may depend on it.’ (Blommaert, 2008: 200); ‘relevance without rigour is no better than rigour without relevance’ (Guba, 1981, cited in Lather, 1986: 65). (3) Others include Babel’s Blessing (www.babelsblessing.org), Beyond the Page (www. beyondthepage.org.uk), Hackney learning Trust (www.learningtrust.co.uk) and Xenia Women (https://xenia.org.uk/). (4) See Kerfoot (2018: 264, 283) and Deumert (2018: 293–294) on challenges where the machinery of state is itself relatively weak. (5) For example: ‘language and its conventions of use are permanently and unavoidably unstable and in flux’ (Carter, 1990: 17); ‘[b]eing more explicitly informed about the sources of attitudes to language, about its uses and misuses, about how language is used to manipulate and incapacitate, can empower pupils to see through language to the ways in which messages are mediated and ideologies encoded’ (Carter, 1990: 4); ‘many bilingual children operate naturally… switching between languages in speech or writing in response to context and audience’, and teachers should ‘create the conditions which enable children to gain access to the whole curriculum by encouraging them to use, as appropriate, their strongest or preferring language’ (Savva, 1990: 260, 263). (6) According to the Conservative minister responsible asking: ‘Why is so much prominence given to exceptions rather than the norm – to dialects rather than standard English, for example… Of course, language is a living force, but our central concern must be the business of teaching children how to use their language correctly’ (Eggar, 1991). (7) See e.g. ‘EAL learners and Reading’ in the EAL Journal, Issue 16, 2021, pp 19–35. (8) According to the UK four National Academies (The British Academy, the Academy of Medical Sciences, Royal Academy of Engineering, the Royal Society), the development of the country’s ‘untapped reservoirs of linguistic capacity’ could make the country ‘more prosperous, productive, influential, innovative, knowledgeable,

Afterword: Localising (Socio)linguistic Citizenship  225

culturally richer, more socially cohesive, and, quite literally, healthier’ (British Academy, 2020). (9) http://mlm.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/. (10) The same OECD research also suggests that HE pedagogies are changing, ‘from a linear model of transmission of knowledge based upon the classroom’ to ‘becoming more interactive and experiential, drawing upon, for example, project work and work-based learning’ (Chatterton & Goddard, 2000: 480). Placement opportunities and practical work outside the university setting seem to be a growing part of the higher education curriculum, and at least in principle, this means that there is a degree of institutional support for outreach programmes designed to build (socio)linguistic citizenship. (11) To give three examples from our own work: HELD colleagues participated in the Action for ESOL Campaign, producing The ESOL in Manifesto (2012), which successfully fought off funding cuts, at least for a while at least. A collaboration between King’s, Cambridge University and the Bell Foundation recently produced a freely available EAL assessment framework that forms ‘part of an engagement with policy related to quality of education and equity for minoritized pupils’ (Leung, 2021: 48), that helps school teachers to understand and evaluate their students’ language development, and that has now been adopted by the Welsh Government. And currently, the #LoveESOL campaign is targeting the Greater London Authority, pressing for a website to help people find ESOL provision (https://loveesol.co.uk/). (12) In some traditions, ideology is associated with false consciousness, which needs to be fought with systematic analysis that brings us closer to reality. But for the most part in sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology, researchers use the word ‘ideology’ more neutrally, focusing on how our thoughts and feelings about language are tied into our social lives, our biographies and histories.

References Arnaut, K., Blommaert, J., Rampton, B. and Spotti, M. (eds) (2015) Language and Superdiversity. London: Routledge. Bryers, D., Winstanley, B. and Cooke, M. (2013) Whose integration? Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 106. Bryers, D., Winstanley, B. and Cooke, M. (2014) The power of discussion. In D. Mallows (ed.) Language Issues in Migration and Integration: Perspectives from Teachers and Learners (pp. 35–54). London: British Council.  Blommaert, J. (ed.) (1999) Language Ideological Debates. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.  Blommaert, J. (2008) Grassroots Literacy. London: Routledge. Blommaert, J. (2010) Policy, policing and the ecology of social norms: Ethnographic monitoring revisited. Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 63.  British Academy (2020) Languages in the UK: A Call for Action. London: British Academy with the Academy of Medical Sciences; the Royal Academy of Engineering; and the Royal Society. Brumfit, C. (1984) Communicative Methodology in Language Teaching. The Roles of Fluency and Accuracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Burawoy, M. and von Holdt, K. (2012) Conversations with Bourdieu: The Johannesburg Moment. Johannesburg: Wits University Press. Carter, R. (1990) Introduction. In R. Carter (ed.) Knowledge about Language. London: Hodder and Stoughton. Charalambous, P., Charalambous, C. and Zembylas, M. (2016) Troubling translanguaging: Language ideologies, superdiversity and interethnic conflict. In J. Jaspers and L. Madsen (eds) Sociolinguistics in a Languagised World. Special issue of Applied Linguistic Review 7 (3). See https://doi.org/10.1515/applirev-2016-0014.

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Chatterton, P. and  Goddard, J. (2000) The response of higher education institutions to regional needs. European Journal of Education 35 (4), 475–95. Cooke, M. and Simpson, J. (2012) Discourses about linguistic diversity. In M. MartinJones, A. Blackledge and A. Creese (eds) The Routledge Handbook of Multilingualism (pp. 116–130). London: Routledge. Cooke, M. and Peutrell, R. (eds) (2019a) Brokering Britain, Educating Citizens: Exploring ESOL and Citizenship. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Cooke, M. and Peutrell, R. (2019b) Brokering Britain, educating citizens: An introduction. In M. Cooke and R. Peutrell (eds) Brokering Britain, Educating Citizens: Exploring ESOL and Citizenship (pp. 1–20). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Cooke, M., Bryers, D. and Winstanley, B. (2019) ‘Our languages’: Towards sociolinguistic citizenship in ESOL. In M. Cooke and R. Peutrell (eds) Brokering Britain, Educating Citizens: Exploring ESOL and Citizenship (pp. 137–153). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Cummins, J. (2008) BICS and CALP: Empirical and theoretical status of the distinction.  Encyclopedia of Language and Education (Vol. 1). New York: Springer. Deumert, A. (2018) Commentary: On participation and resistance. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 289–299). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.  Dupret, P. (2021) The lived complexities of language teaching in Belgian superdiversity. Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 285. Eggar, T. (1991) Correct use of English is essential. Times Educational Supplement, 28 June. Fanshawe, S. and Sriskandarajah, D. (2011) ‘You Can’t Put Me in a Box’: Super-diversity and the End of Identity Politics in Britain. London: IPPR. Fraser, N. (1995) From redistribution to recognition? Dilemmas of justice in a ‘post-­ socialist’ age. New Left Review 212, 68–93. Gal, S. (2006) Contradictions of standard language in Europe: Implications for the study of practices and publics. Social Anthropology 14 (2), 163–181. Gibbons, S. (2017) English and its Teachers: A History of Policy, Pedagogy and Practice. London: Routledge. Giddens, A. (1984) The Constitution of Society. Cambridge: Polity Press Goodhart, D. (2018) Why universities aren’t fit for purpose. Daily Mail, 7 April. See https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5587837/Why-universities-arent-fitpurpose-writes-David-Goodhart.html. Gumperz, J. (1982) Discourse Strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hanks, W. (1996) Language and Communicative Practices. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Hymes, D. (1977) Foundations in Sociolinguistics: An Ethnographic Approach. London: Tavistock. Isin, E. (2008) Theorising acts of citizenship. In E. Isin and G. Nielsen (ed.) Acts of Citizenship (pp. 15–43). London: Zed Books. Isin, E. (2017) Performative citizenship. In A. Shadhar, R. Bauboeck, I. Bloemraad and M. Vink (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Citizenship (pp. 500–523). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Isin, E. and Nielsen, G. (ed.) (2008) Acts of Citizenship. London: Zed Books Jaspers, J. (2017) The transformative limits of translanguaging. Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 226. Kerfoot, C. (2018) Making and shaping participatory spaces: Resemiotization and citizenship agency in South Africa. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 263–288). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Khan, K. (2017) Citizenship, securitization and suspicion in UK ESOL policy. In K. Arnaut, M. Karrebæk, M. Spotti and J. Blommaert (eds) Engaging Superdiversity:

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Recombining Spaces, Times and Language Practices (pp. 303–320). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.  Kroskrity, P. (ed.) (2000) Regimes of Language. Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research Press.  Lather, P. (1986) Issues of validity in openly ideological research. Interchange 17 (4), 63–84. Leung, C. (2021) EAL assessment in primary and secondary schools. In HELD [Hub for Education and Language Diversity]. Linking Universities and Third Sector Organisations in Language Education: Notes from Participants (p. 44). London: King’s College London. LINC (1992) Language in the National Curriculum Materials for Professional Development. Nottingham: Nottingham University English Department. Makoni, S. and Pennycook, A. (eds) (2007) Disinventing and Reconstituting Languages. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Matras, Y. and Robertson, A. (2017) Urban multilingualism and the civic university: A dynamic, non-linear model of participatory research. Social Inclusion 5 (4), 5–13. Moore, R. (2011) Standardisation, diversity and enlightenment in the contemporary crisis of EU language policy. Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 74. Peck, A. and Stroud, C. (2015) Skinscapes. Linguistic Landscape 1 (1/2), 133–151. Peutrell, R. (2019) Thinking about citizenship and ESOL. In M. Cooke and R. Peutrell (eds) Brokering Britain, Educating Citizens: Exploring ESOL and Citizenship (pp. 43–62). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Peutrell, R. and Cooke, M. (2019) Afterword: ESOL, citizenship and teacher professionalism.  In M. Cooke and R. Peutrell (eds) Brokering Britain, Educating Citizens: Exploring ESOL and Citizenship (pp. 227–234). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. Rampton, B. (2006) Language in Late Modernity: Interaction in an Urban School. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  Rampton, B. and Cooke, M. (2021) Collaboration between universities and third sector organisations in language education. Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 281. Rampton, B., Cook, M. and Holmes, S. (2018a) Promoting linguistic citizenship: Issue, problems and possibilities. Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 233. Rampton, B., Cooke, M. and Holmes, S. (2018b) Sociolinguistic citizenship. Journal of Social Science Education 17 (4), 68–83. Rampton, B., Leung, C. and Cooke, M. (2020) Education, England and users of languages other than English. Working Papers in Urban Language and Literacies 275. Savva, H. (1990) The rights of bilingual children. In R. Carter (ed.) Knowledge about Language (pp. 248–268). London: Hodder and Stoughton. Silverstein, M. (1985) Language and the culture of gender. In E. Mertz and R. Parmentier (eds) Semiotic Mediation (pp. 219–259). New York: Academic Press.  Stroud, C. (1999) Portuguese as ideology and politics in Mozambique: Semiotic (re)constructions of a postcolony. In J. Blommaert (ed.) Language Ideological Debates (pp. 343–380). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Stroud, C. (2001) African mother-tongue programmes and the politics of language: Linguistic citizenship versus linguistic human rights. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 22 (4), 339–355. Stroud, C. (2008) Bilingualism: Colonialism and post-colonialism. In M. Heller (ed.) Bilingualism: A Social Approach (pp. 25–49). Basingstoke: Palgrave. Stroud, C. (2018) Linguistic citizenship. In L. Lim, C. Stroud and L. Wee (eds) The Multilingual Citizen: Towards a Politics of Language for Agency and Change (pp. 17–39). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

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Stroud, C. and Heugh, K. (2004) Linguistic human rights and linguistic citizenship. In D. Patrick and J. Freeland (eds) Language Rights and Language Survival (pp. 191–218). Manchester: St Jerome. Stroud, C. and Mpendukana, S. (2009) Towards a material ethnography of linguistic landscape: Multilingualism, mobility and space in a South African township. Journal of Sociolinguistics 13 (3), 363–386. Williams, Q. and Stroud, C. (2015) Linguistic citizenship: Language and politics in postnational modernities. Journal of Language and Politics 14 (3), 406–430.

Index

academic English 161, 190, 191, 194, 206 acts of citizenship 65, 72–4, 76, 104, 129, 167, 170, 171, 173 acts of linguistic citizenship 167, 168, 171, 174, 186 Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 3–21, 148 adaptive preference formation 128, 139–40 adolescents 114 advocacy work 9, 91, 140, 147, 154, 157, 160, 161 affirmative actions 159, 216 Afghanis 85, 87–98 after-school activities 95 agency acts of citizenship 214 adaptive preference formation 128 capability approach 127, 147 and citizenship 104 collective versus individual 150, 175–7 deaf capabilities in Global South 146–65 immigration 66, 70–1 Kalmyk 49–50 misunderstandings 74–5 of mothers in children’s learning 82–100 and nation states 137 of native speaker in language policy and planning 45 networked group dynamics 172 shifting location of 136 Ahearn, L. 104 Akanlig-Pare, G. 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 13, 14 Akuapem Twi 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14 Albizu, J.A. 25 Alcalde, G.S. 25 Allen, C. 10 Alòs i Font, H. 43

ambiguity 61–81 American Sign Language (ASL) 15 Anderson, B. 168, 172, 184 Androtsopoulos, J. 26, 27, 33, 35, 44 Anglo-dominant/Anglophone curriculum 191 applied linguistics 67–70, 216–17, 218 Arbes, D. 47 Arts-Based Research methods (ABR) 88–9 Australia 87–98 Austria 23, 61–81 Ayres, R. 148 Bakhtin, M. 168, 185, 197 balanced bilingualism 107, 110 Baldauf, R.B. 45, 50 baldyr 52–5 Ball, J. 140 Barber, T. 166, 170, 186 Barnes, M. 82, 95, 97 Basque 52, 102, 103, 104–8, 109–15, 116 Belmar, G. 24, 25, 36 Bennett, W.L. 167, 172, 175, 177, 181 Berent, G.P. 3–4, 6 Bernstein, B. xvi Bhaskar, R. 125 bicultural dialogue model 148 bilingual education 10 bi/multimodalism 3–4, 8–9, 12 blogging 49, 51, 52 Blokland, T. 172, 174, 177, 184 Blommaert, J. 46, 48, 104, 132, 167, 172, 173, 174, 182, 185, 191, 214, 215, 217 Boit, R.J. 83, 84, 85, 91, 96 borrowings 51, 53 bottom-up practices see also grassroots participation Basque and Galician 102, 103, 105, 107, 109–15 229

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Kalmyk 41–58 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 167, 168, 187 Bourdieu, P. xiv, 85–7, 89, 97, 190, 217 Bouzanis, C. 86 ‘breathing spaces’ 24–5, 26, 35–7 Brexit 218 British Sign Language (BSL) 151 Brock-Utne, B. 3, 4 Brumfit, C. 221 Bryers, D. 222 Bucholtz, M. 45 Buddhism 48 Burawoy, M. 217 Burriss, K. 95 Busch, B. 63, 64, 66, 67, 75, 78, 195 Canagarajah, S. 172, 198, 202 capability approach 123–45, 146–65 capital (Bourdieu) 85–7, 97 Carter, R. 224n(5) cell phones 13 Cenoz, J. 25 Central Vietnam floods (2020) 170–1, 179, 182, 184 certification versus really speaking 70–1 Chatterton, P. 219 children from refugee backgrounds 82–100 Chinese 194, 195, 200, 203 Chiwere 47 chronotopes 168, 185 citizenship acts of citizenship 65, 72–4, 104, 129, 167, 170, 171, 173, 214 and agency 104 and the capabilities approach 149–50 civil rights 38 and communicative competence 76 and democracy 73–4 family-level language policies 104 global citizens 134, 137, 138 and Linguistic Human Rights (LHR) 216 nation states 38, 64 plurilingual citizen discourse 213 semi-citizens 134–5, 137 Tanzania 129–39 three-tiered citizenship 134–9 and voice 129

Civic Mexico 155–6 civic participation 149, 155–6 see also democratic participation civil rights 38 code switching Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 8, 13, 18 in interviews 44 Kalmyk 49, 51, 53 Cohen, A.P. 172, 174, 177 collaborative enquiry 67 collaborative group discussion methods 88 collage methods 89 collective capabilities 150, 152–62 collective minority identities 170, 171 colonialism 12, 190–1, 192, 211, 213, 217 comedy 49, 53 comics 49 Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) 62, 70, 71, 72, 75–9 communicative repertoires 173, 193, 202, 214 communities of practice 184 community analysis methods 174–5, 177–84 Community for Learning Partnership Program 87–98 competence action-oriented perceptions of 77–9 Basque and Galician 110 CEFR language levels and residency 62, 63, 65, 75–9 certification versus really speaking 70–2, 78 communicative competence for employment 72 concept of ‘communicative competence’ 76–9 continuum of 46–7, 50–2 English in Tanzania 133 fluidity of 51 refugee parents helping children 84, 91 Connell, R. 148 Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) 110, 201 conversion factors 127–8, 139–40, 153, 154

Index 231

Cooke, M. 213, 214, 216, 219, 220, 222, 223, 224 Cooper, S.B. 149 co-production 181, 193, 194, 197, 198 copy/paste language 33 core-periphery arrangements 14–15, 16, 17, 18 Cornish 47 corpora 51 cosmopolitanism 65, 137 Couldry, N. 173 Coulmas, F. xiii COVID-19 169, 170–1, 178, 184 Cripps, J.-H. 149 Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) 125, 135–6 critical realism 125 cuisine 51, 94–5 cultural capital 90 cultural differences 85 cultural dislocation 25 cultural identity 46, 130, 136 Cummins, J. 221 Curdt-Christiansen, X.L. 104, 125, 134 Dakar Framework for Action (UNESCO) 140 Dalal, J. 86 Dari 89, 92 Deaf communities Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 3–21 Global South 146–65 Deaf Studies 149 Dearden, J. 190 decolonisation 148, 213 democratic participation 64, 72–4, 132, 149, 171 Deng, S.A. 84, 85, 91, 92, 96 Deumert, A. 104, 217 dialects 107 dialogic scaffolding 206–7 diaspora deaf communities 148 Facebook communities 27, 31, 35, 37–8, 166–88 diasporic locals 212, 219–23 digital language divide 24 digital literacy 37, 38, 87–8, 173 dislocation 24–5, 37, 61–81 see also refugees

Ditchfield, H. 174 Djonov, E. 167, 173, 174 documentation of languages 18, 24, 155, 157–8 Dorian, N.C. 46, 55 durable engagement 184 Durand, T.M. 84, 85, 91 Dworkin, J. 83, 97 education aspirations 83 Basque 104–6, 110, 112–13, 115, 116 bilingual education 10 ‘breathing spaces’ 25 deaf capabilities in Global South 146–65 deaf communities 156 deaf education in Pacific Islands 153, 154–5 Deaf signers in Ghana 4, 7, 8, 13 Facebook communities 32–3 family-level language policies 103 Galician 105, 107, 109, 111 for immigrants 62 informal education 7, 17, 48–9, 137–8 Kalmyk 48, 50 lack of key vocabulary in minority languages 14 language-in-education 123–45 marketisation of 218 multilingual education (MLE) 124, 139–40 non-traditional language competence 51 policies 104 refugee children’s learning at home 83–5 rights to 10 Tanzania 123–45 Total Linguistic Fact 221 transformation 216–17 UK 217–18 YouTube 48, 49 Edward, M. 8, 9, 10, 13, 14–15, 16, 18 Edwards, J. 6 Eisenlohr, P. 56 elite multilingualism 213 elites 14, 112 Elster, J. 128 Emirbayer, M. 66, 70

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employment, communicative competence for 72 endangererd languages indigenous African sign languages 4, 8 Kalmyk 41–58 Şexbizinî 22–40 English academic English 161, 190, 191 cell phones 13 deaf capabilities in Global South 147, 159, 161 EAL (English as an Additional Language) 87–8, 212, 216, 222 EMI classrooms 189–210 English for Specific Purposes (ESP) 196–8 English-only policies 191, 192, 200 ESOL (English as Second or Other Language) 216, 221, 222, 223–4 Ghana 5, 7, 8, 12, 13–14, 15 Hong Kong 190–1 as ‘named language’ 215 refugee parents helping children to learn 90–6, 97–8 refugees in Austria 83, 84, 91 for social mobility 133–4 Spain 110, 116 Tanzania 124, 129, 131, 132–4, 137, 138, 139 English for Action 214 entextualisation 189–210 errors 52 ethnic identity 47–8, 136–7 ethnographic research 26–7, 44, 108–9, 129, 223 Ethnologue 23 European Union 213 exchange structures 178–9 expanded intergenerational disruption scale (EGIDS) 23 extracurricular activities 95, 114 Facebook 22–40, 166–88 Fairclough, N. 125, 135 Family Language Policy (FLP) 101–20, 125, 134 field 85–7, 97 Finnish Association of the Deaf (FAD) 157

Fishman, J. 24, 25, 37 Flores, N. 190 Flubacher, M.C. 78 focus-group methods 108, 126, 152, 162–3, 196, 200, 203 Fogle, L.W. 103 food/cuisine 51, 94–5 forced displacement 64, 169 formulaic language 33 Fraser, N. 216 freedom 66, 127, 159, 162 Frisian 25 Gaelic 55 Galician 102, 105–8, 109–15, 116 Garcìa, O. 25, 67 Garcia-Ruiz, M. 108 Georgis, R. 85 geo-social capabilities 138–9 German 62, 63, 65, 67, 72, 76 Ghana 3–21 Ghanaian Sign Language (GhSL) 4, 8–9, 10, 13, 14, 15, 16 Gibbons, S. 218 Giddens, A. 150, 223 global citizens 134, 137, 138 globalization 45 Goddard, J. 219 Goffman, E. 221 Goodhart, D. 219 Gorter, D. 25 grassroots participation see also bottom-up practices Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 17 Austria 63, 65 boundaries of ‘named’ languages 192, 194 Civic Mexico 155–6 family-level language policies 103 Galician 107–8 Kalmyk revitalization 41–58 participatory research methods 67 philanthropy in Vietnamese Facebook groups 166–88 Şexbizinî Facebook groups 38 sign languages 153 UK multilingual initiatives 218–19 Gretch, S. 148 group constructions 172 Gumperz, J. 220

Index 233

habitus 85–7, 97, 217 Haualand, H. 10 HELD (Hub for Education and Linguistic Diversity) 212–24 heritage speakers 46, 172, 174 Heugh, K. 86, 128, 198, 215 Heyen, H. 24, 25, 36 hidden curriculum 221 hierarchies of languages 78–9, 132, 134, 142, 168, 173, 193 hip-hop 49 Hollingworth, S. 83 home language policies 101–20 home-school partnerships 97 homework assistance 84, 85, 90, 91, 93–6 Hong Kong 189–210 Hornberger, N.H. 45 human rights 10 see also Linguistic Human Rights (LHR) hybridisation 18 Hymes, D. xvi, xvii, 17, 27, 66, 117, 162, 214, 217, 219–20, 223 Ibrahim, S. 150 idealized native speakers 78 identity-based capabilities 135–7 Iedema, R. 175, 185 imagined communities 172, 184 immersion programmes 111 ‘impact beliefs’ 103 India 151, 158–62 Indian Sign Language 151, 159, 161 indigenous languages 5, 105, 123–45 informal education Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 7, 17 Kalmyk 48–9 Malila (Tanzania) 137–8 informal usages 17 insider languages 16 Instagram 49, 53 intercultural communication 13 interdisciplinary research 67 intergenerational language transfer 24–5, 37, 102, 106, 114 International Sign 151 interpreters 149, 152, 153, 156 interview methods 44, 102, 108, 126, 196 invisibility 166–7, 170, 186–7

Isin, E.F. 65, 70, 72, 104, 171, 173, 214, 216, 217 Islam, M.R. 148 Japanese 197 Jaspers, J. 216 Jonsson, C. 67 Jovanovic, D. 173, 178, 179 Kalmyk 41–58 Kalmykia 47–52 Karsli-Calamak, E. 83, 84, 91, 92, 97 Kelly-Holmes, H. 14, 16, 18 Kemp, S. 86 keyboard layouts 48 kindergartens 112, 126 King, K.A. 103 King’s College London 212 Kornai, A. 23, 24 Kramsch, C. xiv, xvii, 191 Kumar, S.R. 159 Kurdish people 22–40 Kurmanji 27–8, 32, 35, 37 Kusters, A. 5, 8, 9, 11, 13, 14, 16, 148 Kvåle, G. 167, 173, 177 Lakoff, R. xiv LangLife 67–79 language activism Basque 105 Kalmyk 45, 49–52 language clubs 48 language contact 8, 18 language diaries 67–8 language ideologies 103, 117, 125, 132, 133, 206, 207, 220–2 see also monolingual norms Language in the National Curriculum project (LINC) 218 language of instruction (LoI) Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 11 Basque 116 Basque and Galician 110 EMI classrooms in Hong Kong 189–210 Galician 107, 111 Spanish 106, 107 Tanzania 124, 130, 131–2, 133, 134– 5, 138, 141–2 ‘language of wider communication’ 35

234  The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies

Language Policy and Planning (LPP) Austria 61–3 family language policies in Spanish settings 101–20 Kalmyk 41–58 measuring success of 44–5 UK 218 language portraits 67–8, 73, 195 language-based punishment 131–2 language-in-education 123–45 Lanza, E. 103 Lave, J. 184 LC (linguistic citizenship) Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 10–11, 16–17, 18 defined xvi mainstream potential of 217–18 in UK 212–24 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 171, 186 and voice xvii Leavy, P. 89 Lester, J.N. 174 Leung, C. 225n(11) Lewendî, M. 23, 26, 32, 35, 36 Leydesdorff, L. 150 Li Wei 191 life worlds (Lebenswelt) 63 Lin, A.M.Y. 192, 193, 194, 198, 201, 202, 205, 206, 207 Lindseth, A. 68 lingua francas between deaf and hearing participants 16 English 191 for research purposes 67 linguistic capital 85–7, 89, 91, 106–7 linguistic ecology 18 Linguistic Human Rights (LHR) access to education 10 accountability for failure to provide 10 Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 9–12 and citizenship 216 compared to linguistic citizenship xvi, 215–16 plurilingualism 198 recognition of voice 64 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 171

linguistic imperialism 10, 14 linguistic landscapes 43 linguistic repertoires/resources capability approach 128–9 continuum of competence 46–7 cultural-pragmatic elements 182 Deaf signers in Ghana 13, 15 language as a social practice 172 linguistic capital 86 Moodle forums 203 multilingual Africa 9 opportunities for mobility 138–9 relational processes 66 relocation/migration 63 for research purposes 67 translanguaging 192, 198, 202, 203, 205 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 173 linguistic rights 9, 10–11, 55, 104, 129, 135, 171 literacy, digital 37, 38, 87–8, 173 literacy and capability 128 literacy materials, access to 85, 92, 112 literacy skills and online participation 37, 38 lived language experience 63, 64–5, 67–79 livestreaming 177 locality, belonging by 182–3 Lüpke, F. 9, 12 Macqueen, S. 202 Malawi 156–8 Malila language community 123–45 Manx 47 Marlowe, J.M. 84, 85, 91, 92, 96 Marquis, Y. 47 Matras, Y. 218 Matsunaga, K. 86 May, S. xvi, 167, 170, 171 McBrien, J.L. 83 McNamara, T. 76 media (broadcast) 43, 172, 177 see also social media medium of instruction Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 11 Basque 116 Basque and Galician 110 EMI classrooms in Hong Kong 189–210

Index 235

Galician 107, 111 Spanish 106, 107 Tanzania 124, 130, 131–2, 133, 134–5, 138, 141–2 Meredith, J. 174 messaging apps 48, 113–14, 202 metalanguage 36, 54 Mexican Sign Language 155 Mexico 155–6 migration 24–5, 61–81, 214 see also refugees Mische, A. 66, 70 misunderstandings 74–5 ‘mixed languages’ 52–5 mobilisation practices 105, 107, 109, 111, 116–17, 169–70, 175–6, 178–81 Moè, A. 90 Mongolia 42 monoglossic principles 190, 191, 198, 203 monolingual norms 43, 190, 198, 203 Moriarty, M. 49 mother tongue education (MTE) 124, 130, 133, 139, 141 mothers 82–100 multicultural frameworks 192–4 multilingual education (MLE) 124, 139–40 multimodal analysis methods 174, 175–7 multimodal dialogue 178–9 Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle (MEC) 192 multimodality 168, 189–210 see also bi/ multimodalism multimodality-entextualisation cycle 189–210 Munthali, A.C. 156 Murray, J. 9 music 50 ‘named’ languages 38, 192, 194, 213, 215 Nandi, A. 103, 104, 108, 114 Narayan, D. 152 nation states 37–8, 64, 137, 172 national language status 10, 129, 132, 137, 147 nationalism 184 native speaker models 78

neoliberalism 72, 218 networked audiences 35, 36, 37 networked group dynamics 172, 181–2 networked individuals 35–6 ‘new speakers’ attitudes to 52 Basque 106 Kalmyk 46–7, 51–5 Nielsen, G.M. 65, 70, 72, 214 nonce-borrowings 53, 54 non-linguistic expression 68, 88–9 see also multimodality non-native speakers 202 see also ‘new speakers’ non-standard varieties Kalmyk 42, 45, 52–5 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 171 nursery schools 126 Nussbaum, M. 125, 127, 128, 149–50 Nyst, V. 4, 5, 8, 14, 16, 148 official language status Austria 61–2, 63 Basque 105–6 Galician 105–6 Kalmyk 43–4 sign languages 10 Spanish 105–6 Tanzania 129, 136 translanguaging 192 Turkey 35 Oirat 51 ‘one parent one language’ 115 online ethnography methods 26–7, 44 online/offline integration 48–9 Oostendorp, M. 175, 185 O’Rourke, B. 46, 47, 107 orthography Kalmyk 42, 49 and pronunciation 47 Şexbizinî 32, 34, 35, 36, 38 Pacific Islands 152–5 parents 82–100, 101–20 participatory pedagogy 222–3 participatory research methods 67, 88–9, 196 peer feedback 202, 203–5, 206–7 Peer-to-Peer Deaf Multiliteracies project 152, 158–62

236  The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies

‘people with influence’ 45, 50 periphery/core arrangements 14–15, 16, 17, 18 ‘person with expertise’ 50 Peutrell, R. 213, 214, 216, 220, 222, 223, 224 philanthropy 166–88 philosophical group dialogue 68–9 philosophy 67–70 Pietikainen, S. 14, 16, 18, 49 play 95–6 plurality 64–5, 75 plurilingualism 76, 107, 147, 189– 210, 213 polycentricity 173 population transfer 24–5, 37 post-colonialism 190, 191, 192, 202 Poulsen, S.V. 167, 173, 177 power Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 14 asymmetries 147, 159 communicative power 149 of definitions 65 linguistic capital 86 multilingual societies xiv ‘people with influence’ 45 Spanish in Galicia 112, 113 symbolic capital 109 symbolic power xiv transformation of 171 pre-schools 112, 126 prestige, languages of 13, 45, 190 priming 46 proficiency see competence pronunciation 47 questionnaire methods 151, 162–3 Rampton, B. xvi, xvii, 11, 38, 45, 55, 63, 66, 76, 102, 117, 149, 151, 163, 192, 206, 214, 216, 219, 220 Reershemius, G. 24 refugees 61–81, 82–100, 168–9, 214 Rehabilitation Council of India (RCI) 160–1 resemiotisation 175–6, 179, 184, 185 revitalization Basque and Galician 101–20 family-level language policies 103 Kalmyk 41–58

Rheingold, H. 172 Ricento, T. 45 Robertson, A. 218 Robeyns, I. 127, 128, 142n(1), 150 Rosa, J. 190 Rose, D. 197 Rubagumya, C.M. 127, 129, 134, 135 Russia 42 Russian 43, 44, 49, 53 Russian Federation 43 Sabiescu, A.G. 150 Sallabank, J. 47 Samman, E. 149, 152, 157, 161 Santos, M.E. 149, 152, 157, 161 Savva, H. 224n(5) scaffolding 139, 194, 197, 206 scale analysis 173, 174–5, 177–84 school cultures 85, 96 Schuchter, P. 67 Schwartz, M. 114 Schwartz, S. 47 Segerberg, A. 167, 172, 175, 177, 181 self-confidence 154, 155, 158, 159, 161, 163 Seligman, A.B. 64–5 semi-citizens 134–5, 137 semiotic practices 166–88, 193–4 semi-speakers 46, 55 Sen, A. 125, 127, 128, 141, 147, 149–50 Şexbizinî 22–40 Shaw, S. 149 Shohamy, E. 207 sign languages Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 3–21 deaf capabilities in Global South 146–65 Ghana 3–21 mouthing 6, 8 research methods 151–2 urban/rural dichotomy 4–5 Silverstein, M. 220 Sims, J.M. 166, 167, 169, 170, 187 Skelton, T. 150 social cohesion 36, 38 social hierarchies 134–5 social inclusion 146–65 social justice 125, 128 social meanings 167

Index 237

social media see also Facebook; YouTube Kalmyk 44, 48 as plurilingual, pluricultural tools 205 Public Relations Writing 197 Şexbizinî 22–40 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 166–88 ‘wall events’ 27 social networks 13 social practices 136, 172–3, 176–7 social semiotics research 174, 185, 202 socialisation 113–14 (socio)linguistic citizenship Adamorobe Sign Language (AdaSL) 9–12, 16 and the capabilities approach 148–51 capability approach 128–9 defined xvi–xvii dialogic scaffolding 206 family policies in Spanish multilingual settings 101–20 HELD (Hub for Education and Linguistic Diversity) 213 heteroglossia 201 Kalmyk 45, 55 localising 211–28 Multimodalities-Entextualisation Cycle (MEC) 193 ‘new speakers’ 52–5 plurilingualism in Hong Kong 191, 198 refugee parents helping children 86–7, 92, 97–8 refugees in Austria 64–6, 69–80 Tanzania 123–45 Total Linguistic Fact 223 translanguaging 192 universities 219 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 166–88 South Africa 171, 213, 217 spaces of vulnerability 63 Spain 101–20 Spanish (Castilian) 109–10, 115 speech communities 46, 55, 172 speech events 27 speech recognition software 24 Spivak, G. xvi Spolsky, B. 103

sport 95–6 Spotti, M. 104 standardization 51, 65, 76, 190 stigmatization 14, 15, 155 Storch, A. 9, 12 Stroud, C. xv, xvi, xvii, 11, 16–17, 18, 45, 46, 55, 62, 63, 64, 78, 85, 86, 87, 102, 104, 110, 117, 125, 128, 136, 140, 149, 167, 170, 171, 172, 173, 187, 191, 198, 207, 212, 214, 215, 217, 219, 223, 224 student activism 45 Sugiura, L. 44 Suleymanova, D. 43 super connectors 162 Swahili 124, 126, 129, 130, 131–2, 134, 139–40, 141 Swisher, V. 148 symbolic capital 106, 109 symbolic communities 172, 177 symbolic power xiv symbolic representation versus intersubjective bodily gesture 71 symbolic violence xv, 217 Tadesse, S. 97 tagging 175 Tanzania 123–45 Tatar 43–4 teacher training 159–60, 219, 223 teacher-researcher perspectives 193–4, 196 Thompson, A. 174 Timmons, J. 83, 97 Timor-Leste project 154 Total Linguistic Fact 212, 219–23 Tour, E. 82, 95, 97 traditional activities, use of minority languages for 17 transcription Kalmyk 42 Şexbizinî 32, 35, 36, 38 trans-featuring 192 transformation 56, 216–17 ‘transformative remedies’ 87 translanguaging 67, 189–210 translation 33–4, 35, 182 transnational awareness 162 trans-semiotising practices 193 trilingual schools 110–11 Tsao, L. 95

238  The Power of Voice in Transforming Multilingual Societies

Turkey 23, 24, 26–7, 30 Turkish 27–8, 29, 32, 35, 36, 37 Tzanakis, M. 102 Uganda 162 UK LC (linguistic citizenship) 212–24 vernacular multilingualism 213–14 Vietnamese diasporic Facebook communities 166–88 UN CRPD 158 UN Sustainable Development Goals 156 UNESCO 42, 140 UNHCR 169 universities 218–19 University of Manchester 218 University of Western Cape (UWC) 213 urban sociolinguistics 105–8 Valentine, G. 150 Van Leeuwen, T. 167, 173, 174, 178, 179 Vanuatu 152–5 Verein Migrationspädagogische Zweitsprachdidaktik 63, 65 Vietnam 158, 166–88

Vietnamese 181, 183 virtual communities 172 voice defined xvi–xvii, 11, 16–17, 62, 162 and freedom 66, 159, 162 and LC (linguistic citizenship) xvii negotiation of 17 von Holdt, K. 217 Wacquant, L. 86 ‘wall events’ 27 Wazakili, M. 156 Wee, L. xvi Wegleitner, K. 67 Weller, R.P. 64–5 Wenger, E. 184 Werbner, P. 167, 168, 170, 171, 173, 179, 184, 185, 186 WhatsApp 48, 113–14, 202, 205 Whitmarsh, J. 84, 85, 91 Wilcox, S. 4 Williams, Q. xvii, 86 Wohlgemuth, J.A. 53 YouTube 48, 49, 51, 197, 200 Zhao, S.H. 45, 50 Zhu, H. 191