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Programme: accepted abstracts

Abstract ID: 964

Part of Session 169: Sociolinguistic perspectives on the internationalization of HE (Other abstracts in this session)

Attitudes to linguistic variation in the international university

Authors: Mortensen, Janus
Submitted by: Mortensen, Janus (Roskilde University, Denmark)

Since the late 1990s, internationalization of European Higher Education has primarily been facilitated by the introduction of English as a medium of instruction, either as a supplement to - or replacement of - the local language.

In many countries, this has upset the sociolinguistic order of universities and other institutions of Higher Education and led to debates over the role and future of the local/national language (or languages) vis-à-vis English as ‘the World language’.

However, it still remains largely unexplored how the language attitudes of university students and staff (as opposed to politicians and public commentators) are affected when they are faced with the linguistic and cultural diversity that follows in the wake of university internationalization.

In a first attempt to fill this gap, this paper reports on a study of the attitudes to linguistic variation observed amongst a small cohort of students at ‘an international study programme’ at a Danish university.

The study is based on explorative interviews with six students from the programme in question, three local students, and three students from abroad who have come to Denmark to study.

The interviews were designed with a view to tap into three potential aspects of the students’ linguistic attitudes, namely their

1.attitudes to the role of the local language (Danish) vis-à-vis English in the university context and beyond (is Danish considered a relevant/useful language by the students?)

2. attitudes to different forms of English in the university context (is there ‘a best kind of English’? or are all forms equally accepted?)

3. attitudes to other languages in the university context, i.e. attitudes to languages other than English and Danish that transnationally mobile students bring with them when they come to Denmark to study (do students value this linguistic pluralism?)

The paper reports on the findings of the study in relation to these themes, and discusses to what extent a case study of this kind can contribute to our general understanding of the sociolinguistic processes that characterize multilingual and multicultural transient communities in Late Modernity.