Translanguaging practices and language ideologies in adult migrants’ Chinese learning classrooms and beyond

ABSTRACT

The arrival of trade migrants in China has increased the demand for Chinese as a Foreign Language (CFL) education, and their superdiverse sociolinguistic profiles also present challenges to native Chinese-speaking teachers and their monolingual teaching approach. Compared to the research on foreign traders’ mobility in China, fewer studies have explored their day-to-day language use and learning experiences. This research unpacks the complex reality of teachers and students’ language ideologies and practices in a migrant community in Yiwu. While ethnographic data showed that translanguaging was adopted for both academic and social purposes, interview data revealed three types of conflictual language ideologies, i.e. ‘supporters of multilingualism’, ‘believers of monolingualism’, and ‘pragmatists valuing functionality and practicality of languages’. Despite the discrepancies, I argue that translanguaging was not an arbitrary choice by teachers and students; instead, it represents a natural response to the superdiverse linguistic landscape of the community. This study contributes to the conceptual development of translanguaging practices as I apply it as a legitimate theoretical framework and a valid practice in CFL education and outside the West. It is suggested that multiple languages and external resources should be dynamically integrated into superdiverse classrooms to create a multilingual and multimodal learning environment.

KEYWORDS:

• Translanguaging
• Chinese language learning
• multilingualism
• monolingual ideology
• migrants
• Yiwu

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China – Humanities and Social Sciences Research Youth Foundation [grant number: 23YJC740078] and Shanghai Pujiang Talent Program [grant number: 23PJC067].