Biographical perspectives on language ideologies in teacher education

Abstract

Universities represent spaces where language ideologies are taken up, modified, and transformed. The monolingual orientation of most universities contributes to the (re)construction of inequalities between students perceived as “native speakers” and others labelled as “non-natives”. Therefore, language ideologies can be a challenge for linguistically minoritized students if their multilingual practices are not accepted as legitimate. Linking biographical with sociolinguistic and educational theories, this article focuses on the experiences of linguistically minoritized student teachers who aspire to work as German teachers in Austria. The research is based on biographical interviews. Through a comparison of three different cases, in which interviewees describe personal experiences with language hierarchies, the article elaborates on the following: how biographies of linguistically minoritized student teachers are shaped by language ideologies; how the processes of inclusion and exclusion in teacher education are linked to multilingual practices; and how linguistically minoritized student teachers position themselves against and make sense of language ideologies in their educational biographies. In the concluding section, the article makes an argument for the relevance of biographical theory and methodology to research on multilingual practices in educational institutions.

Keywords:

• Language ideologies
• teacher education
• biographical research
• biographical analysis
• multilingualism

Introduction

Recent sociopolitical and educational discourses in Austria have been dominated by the notion of ‘language as a key to integration’ (Gatt 2013). In these discourses, German is constructed as constitutive of the ‘nation’ (De Cillia et al. 2020), and German language competences of migrants are presented as an unquestionable key to their successful integration into the nation state and labor market. Integration through participation in the dominant language community is presented as mandatory and is implicitly understood as assimilation (Gatt 2013). At the same time, linguistically minoritized students and their parents are constructed as subjects “unwilling to integrate” (Rheindorf 2017). These discourses have been materialized in policies which successively tie entry and residence permits to German language skills (Flubacher 2021; Plutzar 2010). Several studies have revealed, however, that competence in the dominant language is no guarantee for integration and that integration can be seen as a prerequisite of language acquisition, and not vice versa (Plutzar 2010).

These discourses and related measures have led to the marginalization of these individuals and groups in Austria. Beyond legal barriers, institutional expectations of migrants’ German skills also lead to exclusion from social services and benefits (Holzinger 2020). In addition, there has been a significant shift to the right in the political landscape, which is characterized by the normalization of a view that constructs linguistically minoritized individuals and groups both as a threat to national security and as a burden to the social state and the educational system (Rheindorf 2017; Wodak 2018).

Against this background, my concern is minorization and the German language in Austria, with a focus on linguistically minoritized student teachers pursuing careers as German teachers. Following Patrick (2010), I conceptualize minorization as a social process through which certain minority groups are constructed as politically, economically, and socially less powerful in relation to a dominant group (Patrick 2010, 176). According to such a definition, dominant or minority status is not based on the number of speakers, but “on the basis of the social positioning of particular social groups within a hierarchical social structure” (ibid.). My research findings point toward a possible ‘multilingual turn’ (May 2013) and the implications of such a turn for a growing contingent of linguistically minoritized student teachers at universities. This article reconstructs the experiences student teachers have with language ideologies imposed and supported by the Austrian education system in the course of their education and concludes by outlining key ways in which teacher educators need to be prepared to deal with a multilingual reality at university and in schools – the future workplace of student teachers.

Theoretical background – connecting language ideology research and biographical theory

This article draws from two central theoretical frameworks: research on language ideologies (Flores and Rosa 2015; Mar-Molinero and Stevenson 2006), and biographical theory (Dausien and Alheit 2019; O’Neill et al. 2002). In this section, I position my analysis at the intersection of these concepts in order to show how biographical research can enhance our understanding of language ideologies in teacher education.

Language ideologies in teacher education

Language ideology (Silverstein 1979) has become a major concept in research on multilingualism (e.g. Blackledge 2000; Coupland 2016). Language ideologies are social constructs based on assumptions about the value and power of linguistic forms and discursive practices. They serve the interests of social groups, in many cases those of the social elite, and they legitimate hierarchical power relations (Kroskrity 2010; Woolard 1998). As educational institutions are spaces in which power is reproduced (Bourdieu and Passeron 1977), it is essential to understand the language ideologies that underlie educational policies and practices.

Numerous studies have examined ideological orders in educational institutions and revealed how monolingual ideologies conflict with the language use and views of some students who resist these ideologies (Heller 2006; Jaffe 2009). Moreover, researchers have investigated and theorized ‘raciolinguistic ideologies’, i.e. the co-construction of language and race in education (Flores and Rosa 2015). Analyzing raciolinguistic ideologies across different national and regional contexts, researchers have described manifold facets of the marginalization of differently racialized individuals and groups in education (e.g. Chaparro 2019; Sung 2018; Thoma 2020).

For the study at hand, research on language ideologies in teacher education is especially relevant. Researchers have shown that teachers reflect, reinforce, and simultaneously confront the ideologies of educational systems in which they work (Palmer 2011) and that teachers, despite their academic knowledge of multilingualism, hardly ever reflect critically on their own role, thus perpetuating language ideologies through their everyday teaching practices (Gkaintartzi, Kiliari, and Tsokalidou 2015). Scholars have also examined the extent to which teaching approaches are able to include marginalized varieties in standardized curricula thus opposing prevailing language ideologies (Siegel 2006). Challenging such language ideologies in teacher education can potentially enable student teachers to develop greater language awareness (Iversen 2019).

In the education of language teachers, language ideologies are especially relevant. This is especially true for ideologies of native speakerism (Knappik 2016), i.e. ideologies which presume a natural connection between languages, speakers and territories. They are often compounded by normative assumptions about educational biographies, in this way once again minoritizing the actual educational pathways of multilingual students (Dausien, Ortner, and Thoma 2015). In teacher training programs, such as the one examined in this study, language ideologies that prepare students for future positions as German teachers in Austria are particularly strong, since they connect ‘nativeness’ to the teaching profession (Thoma 2018).

In line with the demand to ask critical questions “from multiple, flexible, and broad angles or orientation” (Canagarajah 2005, 932), the focus of this article is on language ideologies in the biographies of linguistically minoritized student teachers who are pursuing careers as teachers of German, the dominant language in Austria.

Biography as a theoretical concept

Since its beginnings in the 1920s, biographical research has contributed to considerable cross-disciplinary research. Theoretically, ‘biography’ is conceived as a social format of self-construction and as a process of sense-making which emerged with the rise of modern societies (Hahn 2000). Biographical approaches place the individual within a nexus of socio-historical events and life experiences and regard the construction of life narratives as a historically and socio-cultural specific practice of representing ‘the self’ in a temporalized narration (O’Neill et al. 2002). Thus, biographies represent unique and creative processes of (re-)interpreting life experiences, while at the same time reflecting socio-historical and socio-cultural contexts and discourses which create specific formats for self-construction (Dausien 2015).

Using biographical approaches has helped to reveal processes of exclusion – processes that are based on deficit-oriented assumptions about minoritized groups in institutions of education. Exclusion, however, stands in contrast to the experience of belonging which also plays a crucial role in educational spaces and can shift over one’s life course (Schwendowius 2015). Biographies are an ideal means for reconstructing both personal experiences of learning, exclusion and/or belonging and the institutional circumstances that shape the acquisition of knowledge. Regarding multilingualism, the complexity goes even further; biographical researchers have revealed how biographies are constructed both in postcolonial and post-apartheid settings (Busch 2016) and in migration societies and how individuals experience and subvert language ideologies (Thoma 2018).

Biographical approaches have also been used to analyze professionalization. Through a biographical lens, professionalization is, first, regarded as a process of developing professional identity in the context of a life story (Nittel and Seltrecht 2008); and second, professionalization is a biographical process of knowledge and identity construction and re-structuring which encloses both experiential knowledge and knowledge acquired in formal qualification processes. In sum, professionalization can be described as a “principally unfinished qualification, education and learning process” (Fabel-Lamla and Wiezorek 2008, 332) which is related to specific socio-cultural and institutional contexts. Biographical research on teacher education has revealed that pre-professional contexts of socialization and school experience are highly significant in the shaping of the teaching profession (Schwendowius 2015). Studies have also shown how deeply teachers’ biographies are anchored in family contexts and how closely the development of professional patterns of orientation, interpretation, and action as well as professional identity is interwoven with the development of biographical identity (Fabel-Lamla and Wiezorek 2008). In order to understand all these aspects in their intertwining, this article takes a biographical perspective to understand teacher professionalization in light of multilingualism and minorization.

A biographical approach to educational and professional biographies does not focus on isolated individuals but on “subject-context relations” (Dausien, Rothe, and Schwendowius 2016). Thus, biographical learning processes are conceptualized as integral parts of social worlds, which include not only concrete situations but also socio-historical spaces and specific structures of inequality. The consideration of subject-context relations makes it possible to understand social contexts not in an abstract way (for example, as a “milieu of origin”), but to look at them in their respective concrete constellations, which include educational institutions. Therefore, the focus is not only on individual experiences, but also on the institutional and social structures and conditions in which subjects’ experiences take shape.

The following research questions have guided the research and analysis: 1) How do linguistically minoritized student teachers make sense of and position themselves against language ideologies experienced in teacher education?; and 2) What would be necessary for a ‘multilingual turn’ in teacher education dealing critically with language ideologies?

Methods

In biographical interviews as developed by Schütze (1983), research participants are asked to tell their whole life story and are encouraged to focus on their experiences, which enables them to structure their narration according to the criteria they find relevant. During the main narration, interviewers adopt the role of attentive listeners, and only afterwards do they ask questions to encourage the interviewees to elaborate further.

This study draws on biographical interviews with linguistically minoritized student teachers at an Austrian university. At the time of data collection, research participants were enrolled in a teacher training program for German teachers. The interview excerpts of three biographical interviews chosen for analysis here are part of a broader research corpus on language biographies¹ in Austria.

The search for interviewees “with a migration background”² was conducted via networks of university teachers and flyers aimed at student teachers. Initially, I received responses only from student teachers with biographical ties to Turkey and the former Yugoslavia, countries considered ‘typical countries of origin’ in Austria. After a second search, in which I emphasized that I was interested in all origins and languages, the spectrum of interested student teachers became wider. I conducted twelve interviews with student teachers with different individual and familial migration histories and linguistic repertoires. Among the languages which were relevant in the biographies of the student teachers were Albanian, Azerbaijani, Bosnian, Italian, Romanian, Serbian, Turkish, and different dialects of the respective languages. German varieties and dialects were also included. Before the interviews, I had an informal meeting with each of the 12 participants to clarify any questions and to build trust for the biographical interview. The 12 interviews,³ all conducted in German, lasted between 71 and 169.5 minutes each (average time for interviews was 115.3 minutes). They were audio-recorded, transcribed, and anonymized.

“Biographical case reconstruction” (Rosenthal 2010) consists of several steps of analysis: I started with a formal text analysis (Schütze 1984), in which formal elements and aspects of content (e.g. changes of topic) were analyzed. I related narrative, descriptive, and argumentative passages to each other in order to establish connections between narrated events and experiences as well as retrospective interpretations of the interviewees. In line with a biographical approach, the text was not analyzed according to predefined categories. Rather, the individual passages were interpreted “through the overall context of the interview” (Rosenthal 2010, 53) and against the background of sociopolitical and institutional conditions. While biographical case reconstruction includes a reconstruction of an individual’s whole life story (as published in Thoma 2018), the article at hand focuses on interviewees’ experiences with language ideologies in their teacher education program. The analytical focus on “subject-context relations” (Dausien, Rothe, and Schwendowius 2016) allows us to see student teachers not as isolated individuals but as actors within a heavily regulated educational setting. Social and institutional conditions can not, however, be reduced to abstract “factors” but should instead be seen as concrete phenomena and contexts that are given meaning by individuals.

Biographical narrations

In the following sections, the excerpts of three biographical interviews are analyzed as illustrative examples. The excerpts were chosen in order to reconstruct different language ideologies as experienced by student teachers. The excerpts were chosen because they show different facets of linguistic minorization related to different language ideologies in the context of teacher education: Ece Erbay,⁴ a student teacher who wears a headscarf, is regularly identified and addressed as linguistically “Other”. In contrast to her, Katharina Peck, the only non-migrant student teacher in the sample, unquestionably belongs in Austria yet experiences exclusion at university because her Austrian dialect is often read as uneducated. Milan Pavic’s familial migration history usually remains “unrecognized” until his name, which in his narration becomes an index of non-belonging, is revealed. The first of the following subsection will examine the reflections of Ece and Katharina who describe experiences with language ideologies when interacting with teachers and students. The second subsection will analyze the reflections of Milan, highlighting his involvement in the reproduction of language ideologies.

Language ideologies and processes of exclusion in teacher education

This section focuses on student teachers’ experiences with language ideologies in the teacher education program. Two excerpts which illustrate the challenges that linguistically marginalized student teachers face in their program are discussed.

At the time of the interview, Ece Erbay was about to graduate. Throughout her biographical narration (length: 104 minutes), she positioned herself as a Muslim student: Islam and her religious belonging were a prominent topic. During her narrative on experiences with anti-Muslim racism in the public space she started crying and the interview was briefly interrupted. In her answer to the interviewer’s question on experiences at the university, she reports on several experiences that she had on the basis of assumptions about her linguistic competence based on her headscarf.

Excerpt 1:⁵

Es gibt aber auch wiederum Lehrer, die (atmet aus) irgendetwas vorne vortragen und mir dann in die Augen schauen und sagen „Haben Sie eh alles verstanden?“ Ah, ja, manchmal find ich’s lustig (lacht) manchmal denk ich mir, „Ja ok vielleicht hat halt der oder die andere Erfahrungen gemacht und es wird dann halt vielleicht die Zeit sein, wo ich der Person zeigen kann – es is nicht immer so, es muss nicht immer so sein “(6/46-7/2)⁶

But there are also teachers who (exhales) recite something in front and then look straight into my eyes and say “Did you get all that?” Ah, yes, sometimes I think it’s funny (laughs), sometimes I think, “Yes OK maybe this or that person just had some experiences and the time will come when I can show the person - it’s not always like that, it doesn’t have to be like that”. (6/46-7/2)

Ece reports that during lectures she often feels directly addressed and that this form of address has a physical dimension. She is singled out of the anonymous group and simultaneously assigned to a typified group whose ability to follow German academic discourse is constructed as limited. Behind this raciolinguistic ideology (Flores and Rosa 2015), there is also a biographical typification which attributes to Ece a language biography outside the Austrian norm resulting in deficient language skills (see also Thoma 2022). Ece explains this typification by pointing to the possible ‘experiences’ of her teachers. Besides trying to dismiss such interactions, regarding them as ‘funny’, she implicitly positions herself as responsible for revealing the raciolinguistic ideologies which do not correspond to her biographical reality in saying that “there will be the time when I can show”. Ece also talks about experiences with group work:

Excerpt 2:

Ece: Aja und letztes Mal in einem Seminar […] sagt die eine aus der Gruppe zu mir: „Boah du redest eigentlich so gut Deutsch, das wundert mich schon!“ Hab ich zu ihr gesagt: „Mich wundert’s grad, dass es dich so sehr wundert, dass, äh, ich so gut Deutsch sprechen kann, weil wir sitzen hier in einem Seminar aus dem zweiten Abschnitt“ und also, ja, es hat mich (seufzt) einfach wirklich gewundert, dass sie, dazu kommen konnte, dass ich im zweiten, also in einem Seminar aus dem zweiten Abschnitt sitze an der Uni A-Stadt, und dass sie damit rechnet, dass ich nur irgendwie Deutsch spreche. Verstehst du was ich mein?

Int: Mhm.

Ece: Und, ah, ja (1) dann denk ich mir - entweder - mh, hat sie keinen Kontakt zu Menschen, die anders ausschauen, die ein Kopftuch tragen, andere Muttersprachen haben oder sie bezweifelt die Qualität der Uni A-Stadt - äh, indem sie eben vermutet, dass sogar Leute äh Seminare vom zweiten Abschnitt besuchen können, die kein Deutsch können, also, (1) ich weiß nicht. (9/18-33)

Ece: Yes, and last time […] one of the group members said to me: “Wow, you speak such good German, I’m surprised!” I said to her: “I’m just surprised that you’re so surprised that, uh, I can speak German so well, because we’re sitting in a course from the second part of the study program”, and so, yes, I was just really surprised that she could come to the conclusion that I’m sitting in the second part [of the degree/diploma programme], in a course from the second part, at the University of City A, and that she expects me to speak German only somewhat. Do you understand what I mean?

Int: Mhm.

Ece: And, ah, yes (1) then I think to myself - either - mh, she has no contact with people who look different, who wear headscarves, have different mother tongues or she doubts the quality of the University City A - uh, by assuming that even people from the second part can attend seminars who don’t speak German, so, (1) I don’t know. (9/18-33)

The reconstruction of a conversation within a group work setting reveals how raciolinguistic ideologies and biographical norm conceptions are relevant for positioning activities within peer conversations at the university. In this reported interaction, however, Ece shows herself to be resistant. She responds to the astonishment of her colleague by stating that a student without sufficient German skills could hardly enter the second phase of a German studies program and thus positions herself as a legitimate member of the monolingually conceptualized study program. In contrast to the previously reported exchange with teachers where “some experiences” was given as an explanation for how the teacher positioned her, here Ece constructs a lack of contact with minoritized persons as a significant contributing factor in student teachers’ unrealistic assessments of colleagues.

Another facet of language ideologies can be found in the interview with Katharina Peck. At the time of the interview, Katharina was enrolled both in a master’s program for linguistics and in one for teachers of German as a foreign and second language. Throughout her biographical narration (length: 96 minutes), she positioned herself as a dialect speaker from an Austrian rural working-class family who was the first family member to attend university where she was often positioned as less linguistically competent due to assumptions made based on her language variety. In an informal meeting before the interview she emphasized the relationship she had to her Austrian dialect and spoke very enthusiastically about research projects on dialect in which she was involved. She also used her dialect during the interview, thus also performatively embodying the language. In her main narrative, Katharina contextualizes her move to a university town, describing her first experience of being surrounded by people who did not understand her dialect, as well as her successive appropriation of standard German for communication in everyday situations. She summarizes her experiences in university settings by saying that speaking dialect at a university is “not so well received” (16/9-10). She attributes experiences of being smirked at to the low prestige of dialects:

Excerpt 3

Ma wird äh ma wird daun irgendwie sou a bissl belächelt, so auf die Oat wia jo hm, also es is hoid leida so dass an Dialakt wenig Prestige haftet und (1) dass ma iagendwia davo ausgeht dass de daun weniger gebildet san (16/11-13)

You’re, uh, you’re kind of smiled at a little bit, kind of like, well, it’s just unfortunate that a dialect doesn’t have a lot of prestige and (1) that you kind of assume that they [dialect speakers] are less educated (16/11-13).

This lower prestige goes hand in hand with presumptions about lower levels of formal education among dialect speakers. More specifically, she reports experiences of infantilization and exoticization in connection with her dialect, and she says that standard speakers sometimes avoided group work with her. However, she positions herself as a ‘proud’ dialect speaker and explains that she has never wanted to adapt her language to that of the majority, a desire which is partly related to seeing herself as a “counter-example” for the negative stereotypes surrounding dialect speakers. As an example of ‘really bad things’ Katharina experienced in the course of her studies, she reports on having her dialect downgraded by teachers who are experts in the field of multilingualism. She says:

Excerpt 4

Grod in so an, i sog imma/(schmunzelnd) „sprach_ sprachsensiblen Master“/, dir wird des gelernt dass du auf sowos ned so reagierst oiso (2) dir wird des eingetrichtert, dass dass du sensibl auf… ah… „Interkulturalität“ i sogs jetzt amol obwul i des Wort ned mog wal i find jo es/(lacht) gibt ned so/vü also ma suit des ned so Ernst nehman so Untaschiede. Ahm, und ebm (2) ma muaß, also es wird da eingetrichtert dassd mit Mehrsprachigkeit umgeh muaßt, dass scheißegal is wo de Leid jetzt hea san und wias redn und wöchan Akzent das hom oda wöche sprachliche äh Ausprägung wos hom, und daun kemma owa sölche Mödungen, so auf die Oat wie „wennst an Dialekt redst, kaunst nid untarrichtn, oda wannst an Akzent host deafst ned untarrichtn“ und des is hoid daun scho… hm. Mua es is, san Einzlfälle owa es kummt vor und i finds schlimm eigentlich dass dass so is (2) jo. (21/29-39)

Especially in such a, I always say/(smiling) “language-sensitive master’s degree”, you are taught that you ought not to react to something like that, so (2) you are taught that you have to be sensitive to… ah… “interculturality”, I use the word now, although I don’t like it, because I think/(laughing) there aren’t that many/, so you shouldn’t take it so seriously, such differences. Um, and (2) you have to, you are taught that you have to deal with multilingualism, that it doesn’t matter where people are from now and how they speak and what accent they have or what linguistic characteristics they have, and then such messages come, like “If you speak dialect, you can’t teach, or if you have an accent, you can’t teach”, and that’s just that… hm. I mean, it is, are individual cases, but it happens and I find it terrible actually that it is like that (2) yes. (21/29-39)

By using the term “language-sensitive master’s degree”, Katharina does not refer to the title and intended content of the program, but to the language ideologies she is experiencing there. She relates ‘language-sensitivity’ to the term “interculturality” and argues that “such differences” should not be taken too seriously, rejecting the notion that race and cultural racism are relevant. The German term ‘eingetrichtert’ for ‘taught’, which is used twice, suggests a rather automated absorption of content without the participation of the learners, whose active involvement is not required. Thus, Katharina does not criticize only the terminology used in the study program and the related content but also its didactic implementation. She then repeats arguments she has heard from teachers in reported speech and criticizes the fact that she and other dialect speakers are denied the ability to teach because of language ideologies that place their dialect, or dialect-related accents, hierarchically below the standard.

Katharina’s account reveals that in the study program, a standard language ideology and an ideology of linguistic purity (Milroy 2001) are enacted and that dialects are constructed as something that is naturally attached to a person and not as a facet of a biographically acquired linguistic repertoire used in specific situations (Busch 2017). She uses the biographical interview to critically position herself against language ideologies that devalue her biographically acquired linguistic repertoire.

Language ideologies and professionalization in teacher education

In contrast to the previous section about ideologies in teacher education and acts of positioning by the narrated self and by narrated others, this section shows how a student positions himself in relation to other students.

Excerpt 5 is taken from the interview with Milan Pavić, another student teacher. During the interview (length: 98.5 minutes), he strongly emphasizes his biographical relationship with Austria and the German language and distances himself to some extent from Serbia, the country of origin of his parents, which he describes as a vacation destination. In the interview situation, Milan positioned himself as a student with a critical view of teaching:

Excerpt 5

Mil: Manche, Professoren, und Professorinnen, v_ verlangen dass man angibt, ob man – also quasi (1,5) (lacht leise)/(lachend) (jetz wären wir wieder beim Begriff)/, Zweitsprachler sind.

[…]

Mil: (Weil wenn man,) anscheinend Zweitsprachler is wird man, wahrscheinlich nicht so schwer, oder nicht, so, mit den gleichen, Kriterien beurteilt. Vielleicht. Was Rechtschreibung und sowas betrifft. (1) Ich weiß es nicht. (1) Aber manche verlangen dass man das ebm dazu gibt ob man Muttersprachler ist! Ja?

Int: Mhm

Mil: Deutsch-Muttersprachler. (1) Das is witzig!=Was geb ich jetz an?

Int: [(lacht)]

Mil: [(lacht)]/(lachend) ( )/, ja? – Ja.

-

Int: Was gibst du an?

Mil: Ähmm – ich = ich bin Mutter_ also ich = ich, schreib gar nichts (zusätzlich) „Ich bin, Muttersprachler.“= [Oder] – Bildungssprachler oder (Erst[sprachler] oder_ Wie

Int: [Mhm] [Mhm]

Mil: auch immer.)

Int: Aha! Das heißt wenn man – Muttersprachler, is, ([dann sonst] gibt man nichts

Mil:   [(Genau. Dann_ Ja.)]

Int: [an.]

Mil: [Gen]au.

Int: Okay. Mhm

Mil: Genau.(26/21-46)

Mil: Some, professors, r_ require that you indicate whether you are - so to speak (1.5) (laughs softly)/(laughing) (now we’re back to the term)/, second language speakers.

[…]

Mil: (Because if you are,) apparently, a second language speaker you are, probably, not graded as hard, or not, as, with the same, criteria. Maybe. Concerning spelling and stuff. (1) I don’t know. (1) But some teachers ask you to add if you are native speaker! Yes?

Int: Mhm

Mil: German native speaker. (1) That’s funny! =What do I state now?

Int: [(laughs)]

Mil: [(laughs)]/(laughing) ()/, yes? - Yes.

-

Int: What do you state?

Mil: Umm - I = I am native so I = I, don’t write anything (in addition) “I am, native speaker.”= [Or] – academic language speaker⁷ or (first[language] or_ However.

Int: [Mhm]    [Mhm]

Int: I see! That is, if you are - native speaker, ([then otherwise,] you don’t specify

Mil:   [(Exactly. Then_ Yes.)]

Int: anything.

Mil: Exactly.

Int: Okay. Mhm

Mil: Exactly. (26/21-46)

In the passage presented here, Milan criticizes the fact that some professors ask students to indicate whether they are “second language speakers” or “native speakers” in written assignments. Earlier in the interview, he criticizes these terms as problematic and disadvantageous, since they construct a hierarchy along (ascribed) linguistic repertoires. Milan suspects that the distinction between native and second language speakers leads to different assessments. After a rhetorical question towards the interviewer of what he is supposed to tick, he responds to her question, saying that he does not tick anything since he perceives himself to be a ‘native speaker’. At the same time, he offers alternative descriptions of his language, such as “Bildungssprachler” and “first language speaker”. In Milan’s interpretation, the differentiation between students in terms of their ‘(non-) nativeness’ shows the teachers’ well-intentioned goal of not discriminating against non-native speakers. Immediately afterwards (27/5-6), Milan adds that “accents […] evoke something specific”. When asked by the interviewer if he can remember a certain situation in which this was the case, he answers:

Excerpt 6

Ma ertappt sich immer selbst find ich! (28/14)

You always catch yourself, I think! (28/14)

The tendency to “catch” oneself again and again is a kind of preamble for the confessional dimension of what is yet to come. Milan sees himself as guilty of reproducing stereotypes or prejudicial views of accents, which he sees as unacceptable in a university setting, and possibly also in the context of a research interview. The ‘catching oneself’ also fits the stimulus-response model behind the idea that accents ‘cause’ something. This suggests that what is evoked is unconscious and thus beyond one’s control. At the same time, the depersonalized formulation “you” suggests a level of remove, and Milan is not visible as the subject behind the lawfulness or regularity of the self-discovery that he describes. However, through this self-reflection he positions himself as a critic person who does not fully identify with what he considers to be a widely held view.

Excerpt 7

Also wenn jemand, mit einem Akzent spricht, also hm, ich nehm jetz einfach mal, weil ich, jetz grad an einen konkreten Fall denke den ungarischen Akzent - ahm - spricht, fließend Deutsch, super Deutsch - eins_ also, man kann nichts sagen, aber hat einen Un_ Ungarischen Akzent, und man hat dann immer so ‘Na, fast! Fast! Fast würd es reichen’, ja? (lacht) (28/14-19)

So if someone speaks with an accent, well, I’ll just take - because I’m thinking about a concrete case - the Hungarian accent - um - speaks fluent German, great German - you_ you can’t say anything, but has a Hu_ Hungarian accent, and you’re always like, ‘Well, almost! Almost! It would almost be enough’, right? (laughs) (28/14-19)

Milan chooses the Hungarian accent as an illustrative example for a general tendency to judge non-German accents. His judgment calls to mind an evaluation sheet on which only positive linguistic skills can be ticked, leaving negative aspects to be evaluated unofficially. However, the very high assessment of linguistic competence (“speaks fluent German, great German”) is followed by an emphatic “but”. This conjunction introduces the disclaimer:⁸ the positive assessment of the first part is suspended at a specific point and the German of the fictitious person is downgraded. This suggests an assessment of German spoken with a Hungarian accent based on language ideologies. Thus, at the level of language mastery which Milan has in mind, the very fine nuances of speech can make people vulnerable and mark them as non-native speakers. From Milan’s perspective, a Hungarian accent poses a problem in the context of a master’s program in German studies. At the same time, in excerpt 7, he positions himself as a person who can judge linguistic competences from a neutral perspective. Thus, in excerpt 7, he implicitly positions himself higher in the linguistic hierarchy. In addition, the passage can be read as a (self-)ironic revelation of normative expectations if Milan’s laughter at the end of the passage is taken into account. He continues:

Excerpt 8

Und, man = man, behaftet das dann ein bisschen (1) n_ negativ quasi. Man = man sieht sich dann irgendwie (1) also äh jetz muss ichs wirklich selber leider zugebm dass man sich - am Anfang einfach s_ so sieht als ob man drüberstehn würde, ja? Also man, sieht sich dann einfach in der, Rangliste höher. (28/19-22)

And, you = you, affirm this then a bit (1) n_ negatively, so to speak. You = you then somehow see yourself (1) so uh, now I really have to admit that you - at the beginning you just see yourself as if you were standing over it, right? So you just see yourself as higher in the ranking. (28/19-22)

In excerpt 8, Milan implicitly distances himself from native speakerism by using the generalizing pronoun “you”, and he states that he finds the evaluation of language practices in terms of accents troublesome. Although he seems to understand the social order which underlies the attribution of linguistic deficiency, he is nevertheless entangled in its reproduction. His evaluation of a very elaborate form of language practices, in which the phonetic realization is critically examined, puts him in a higher position as a speaker of an unmarked variety.

Excerpt 9

Total - irrsinnig und total, ähh rassistisch/(leicht lachend) eigntlich/aber, ahm - es is halt dieses erste Ding ‘Ah okay, Ungarn, okay, kann nicht so gut, (kann n_ jetz kann nicht) kann nicht akzentfrei sprechen.’ (2) Ja. - Kommt halt nicht so_ Also ein Akzent kommt, leider nicht so gut an! Ja? Weil Akzente sind halt so eine, so eine Sache. Sind irrsinnig schön find ich - ähmm (1) aber, sie kommen glaub ich allgemein nicht gut an. (2,5) Ja. (28/22-29)

Totally - insane and totally, uhh racist/(slightly laughing) actually/but, um - it’s just this first thing ‘Ah okay, Hungary, okay, can’t do so well, (can n_ now can’t) can’t speak accent-free.’ (2) Yes – it’s just not received like_ So an accent isn’t so well received, unfortunately! Yes? Because accents are just such a thing. I think they’re insanely beautiful - um (1) but, I don’t think they are well received in general. (2,5) Yes. (28/22-29)

With the evaluation of his own feeling of superiority as “insane” and “racist” and by adding light laughter, Milan once again distances himself from the hierarchy he has just built up and positions himself as a person who has changed to a morally more valuable level (see also Deppermann 2015, 379) and academically more accepted stance. Here again, the ambivalence is revealed in a disclaimer, the first part of which ends with the vague “actually”. The second part is introduced by a “but” and again refers to this obviously inexplicable “first thing” upon hearing the accent. At this point, the idea of the location of the language in a national space (“Hungary, okay, cannot […] speak without an accent”) comes to light, and linguistic competence in German is metonymically extended to the general linguistic competence. Milan’s evaluation of accents reveals both exoticization (“insanely beautiful”) and devaluation (not “well received in general”).

Excerpt 10

M_ Man bil_ man macht sich halt ein Bild. Jemand, also jemand der einen Akzent hat - kann halt nicht, perfekt, Deutsch. Wobei das, natürlich (1) ein Blödsinn ist. Weil was ist, ‘perfektes Deutsch’? (28/32-37)

Y_ You just ma_ make an image for yourself. Someone, someone with an accent - just can’t, perfect, German. Whereby that, of course (1) is nonsense. Because what is ‘perfect German’? (28/32-37)

In Milan’s comments, two perspectives stand side by side: The first involves biographically acquired linguistic evaluation patterns which are based on monoglossic language ideologies and native speakerism, and the second comprises a linguistically informed and critical perspective that Milan encountered during the course of his academic studies about which he spoke in detail and with enthusiasm before the interview. He presents the former type of arguments with caution. The critical and non-deprecating perspective is summarized in the concluding rhetorical question, which indicates that Milan is aware that ‘perfect German’ is a construction. Overall, Milan’s argumentation has the character of a confession which reveals a process of cognition and self-disciplining for which he can expect recognition from the interviewer. Moreover, the explicit naming of a hierarchizing view of accents as racist can be read as an aspect of professionalization in teacher education which is permeated by many ambivalences, such as when he refers to the difficult attempt to ‘get rid’ of what has already been recognized as racist.

Summarizing remarks on the biographical narrations

The starting point of the analysis was the question of how linguistically minoritized student teachers make sense of and position themselves against language ideologies experienced in teacher education. This was framed by the concept of a “multilingual turn” (May 2013) and its implications in light of language ideology-based processes of inclusion and exclusion in teacher education.

The biographical approach has revealed that language ideologies are embedded in the teacher training program, and that student teachers are aware of the conflicting ideologies and are impacted by them. The ideologies revealed in the data presume a natural connection between language, biography, and professionalism. Such ideologies are integral to discourses of teacher education and lead to processes of exclusion among linguistically minoritized student teachers and to a continuous monitoring of their own and others’ linguistic repertoires.

The analysis has also shown that different language ideologies, such as native speakerism (in the case of Milan), the standard language ideology (in the case of Katharina), and raciolinguistic ideologies (in the case of Ece), are at work in teacher education programs and that students are affected by them. At the same time, Milan’s case shows that academic knowledge about language ideologies, such as native speakerism, are not automatically transferred into the evaluation of linguistic repertoires of others, and instead can rub up against biographically acquired language ideologies. Other research has shown that educational institutions are a site where biography and institutionalized knowledge can interact and where experiences can be biographically processed (Dausien, Rothe, and Schwendowius 2016; Inowlocki, Herrera Vivar, and Herrschaft 2004). Anticipating a “multilingual turn” in teacher education, it would be useful to further investigate how student teachers make sense of the language ideologies they encounter in teacher education program with a view to their future profession.

Conclusion

This article has shown that a biographical perspective on language ideologies in (language) teacher education allows for a deeper understanding of the connections between context-specific and biographical dimensions of language ideologies (see also Thoma 2020) and is an ideal way to meet the educational need “to negotiate and engage more fully with what it means to be a multilingual speaker” (van Avermaet et al. 2018, 2). The analysis suggests that the increasing heterogeneity of students’ transnational histories, educational biographies, and references to the world in which they live require educational institutions and professionals to reflect on their own language-related knowledge and to “disinvent” language ideologies (Knappik 2016).

From a biographical point of view, it would be useful to open spaces for student teachers to reflect upon and discuss their own and others’ biographical experiences with multilingualism and language ideologies and to link their biographical knowledge on language-related societal hierarchies with institutionalized knowledge about multilingualism. Such an educational perspective would allow for a revaluation of multilingualism and a deeper understanding of the connection between language biographies and language ideologies, thus transforming diverse learning spaces into “more inhabitable, more equitable and more efficiently organised spaces” (van Avermaet et al. 2018, 2). In addition, such spaces for biographical reflection could provide the basis for more critical and multi-dimensional discussion of theoretical issues.

The connection between biography and language ideologies among linguistically minoritized student teachers preparing for professional careers has yet to be studied exhaustively, and the issues and concerns facing student teachers and educators continue to change. Future research in this area could focus on the role of respective dominant languages and related language ideologies in different geographical contexts and on the relevance of multilingualism and language ideologies in biographies of linguistically minoritized student teachers in a range of study programs. Scholars might also further explore how universities produce images of language teachers and how such production is connected to language ideologies. In addition, future research could more critically examine the place that institutionalized forms of knowledge about multilingualism in relation to idealized language teachers have in the construction of biographies and how biographical narratives perpetuate, disrupt, and/or transform dominant discourses.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 For a comprehensive reconstruction of the language biographies see Thoma 2018.

2 A term commonly used in Austria for minoritized individuals and communities.

3 The research participants were between the ages of 23 and 29; 10 self-identified as women and 2 as men.

4 All personal names, places and institutions were anonymized.

5 See the transcript conventions in the appendix.

6 The numbers refer to the page and lines in the transcript. All the excerpts have been translated from German into English. For transcript conventions, see the appendix.

7 For German discourses on ‘Bildungssprache’ (‘academic language’) and ‘Bildungssprachler’ (‘academic language speaker’) see Lange (2020) and Mecheril & Quehl (2015).

8 A disclaimer is “a semantic move that aims at avoiding a bad impression when saying negative things about Others”, for instance “I have nothing against Blacks, but…” (van Dijk 1997, 32).

 

Appendix: Transcription conventions

Table

no, I swear	Emphasized words or phrases
/(whispered) maybe/	Passages with special modulation or prosody
(laughes) (inhales)	Paraverbal utterances
/(laughing) yes and then we went on/	Passage accompanied by paraverbal utterances
(2)	Pauses of one second or more (seconds in brackets)
–	Short pause, less than a second
Hu_ Hungarian accent	Word or sentence break
She said: “Wow, you speak such good German!”	Staged or direct speech, quotes
And would [you]    [Of course] I understood	simultaneous/overlapping speech