Reciprocal multilingual awareness for linguistic citizenship

Abstract

In this paper, we build on southern and decolonial theories of multilingualism and invite a south-north conversation through a concept we propose as ‘reciprocal multilingual awareness’. Reciprocity is a core value of southern societies that balance pluralities of episteme, language, and communality. Central features of southern multilingualisms, including transknowledging (reciprocal exchanges and translation of knowledge), and linguistic citizenship (the exercise of linguistic agency and choice), are usual moves that people make every day. Here, we lift forward southern reciprocities and linguistic citizenship together in conversation with northern conceptualisations of ‘multilingual awareness’. We draw attention to the longue durée of expertise and knowledge of multilingualism in post-colonial societies to invite conversation with critical multilingual language awareness (CMLA) as a contribution to this special issue. In this frame, we recognise the potential in ‘multilingual awareness’ for a dynamic and reciprocal process situated within specific place, time and ideology. We offer eirical experiences of multilingual reciprocities from Australia and Brazil in which community, student and teacher agency are foregrounded to illustrate and amplify southern theorisation of multilingualisms and linguistic citizenship. In conceptualising reciprocal multilingual awareness as a practice of linguistic citizenship our primary concern is to offer a contribution to teacher education that can more fully engage with organic, community and student-generated language ideologies.

RESUMO

Neste artigo, baseamo-nos nas teorias do sul e decoloniais do multilinguismo e convidamos a uma conversa sul-norte através de um conceito que chamamos de ‘consciência multilíngue recíproca’. A reciprocidade é um valor central das sociedades do sul que equilibram pluralidades de epistemologia, linguagem e comunidade. As características centrais dos multilinguismos do sul, incluindo o transconhecimento (trocas recíprocas e tradução de conhecimentos) e a cidadania linguística (o exercício da agência e da escolha linguística), são movimentos habituais que as pessoas fazem todos os dias. Aqui, promovemos as reciprocidades do sul e a cidadania linguística em conjunto, em conversa com as conceptualizações do norte global de ‘consciência multilíngue’. Chamamos a atenção para a longue durée da experiência e do conhecimento do multilinguismo nas sociedades pós-coloniais e convidamos ao diálogo com a consciência crítica de língua multilíngue (CCLM) como uma contribuição para esse dossiê. Neste quadro, reconhecemos o potencial da ‘consciência multilíngue’ para um processo dinâmico e recíproco situado num lugar, teo e ideologia específicos. Oferecemos experiências eíricas de reciprocidades multilíngues da Austrália e do Brasil, nas quais a atuação da comunidade, dos alunos e dos professores é colocada em primeiro plano, para ilustrar e aliar a teorização do sul dos multilinguismos e da cidadania linguística. Ao conceptualizar a consciência multilíngue recíproca como uma prática de cidadania linguística, a nossa principal preocupação é oferecer uma contribuição para a formação de professores que possa envolver-se mais plenamente com ideologias linguísticas orgânicas, comunitárias e geradas pelos alunos.

PLAIN LANGUAGE STATEMENT

This article shows how different communities view their own multilingual practices, including use of multiple languages for different purposes in relation to education. Our research data point to ways in which community members and students can teach educators about the variable nature and contextual functions of multilingualism. Over the last two decades, knowledge about multilingualism and how to promote awareness of multilingualism in schools has focused on North America and Europe. Here, we look at how multilingualisms in two different national settings, Australia and Brazil, are distinctive and pluridimensional. Our research indicates that teachers, teacher educators, and even linguists may need to listen more carefully to local communities and students - we use the term reciprocal multilingual awareness to describe this process.

Keywords:

• Linguistic (and multilingual) citizenship
• multilingual awareness
• transknowledging
• vertical and horizontal multilingualism
• southern multilingualisms
• agency
• reciprocal multilingual awareness

Acknowledgement

The authors are grateful to the reviewers for their valuable suggestions that have shaped the paper in important ways.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Northern, here, refers to the epistemological and ontological claims of modernity, rather than a set geopolitical space. By contrast southern theory (Connell, 2007) or southern epistemologies (e.g., de Sousa Santos, 2018; Mignolo & Walsh, 2018), refer to knowledge that has been marginalised by the intellectual project of modernity, or which centres the experiences and claims of populations marginalised by coloniality.

2 Many pre-service teachers are employed as instructors from the time that they are teenagers. Pre-service teachers are often successful graduates of such courses (Almeida, 2021).