Is it just ‘black’ or ‘white’? Multilingual collaborative research seen through the practices of an international research team

ABSTRACT

In this contribution, the self-reported linguistic practices of researchers engaged in an international research project are analysed and discussed. These researchers constitute a community of practice of intercomprehension, using mostly romance languages to communicate and, at the same time, also researching the phenomena. The data was collected by means of a questionnaire intended to perceive the linguistic profile of the team, as well as their choices in terms of publication, communication in scientific contexts and daily academic life. The data points towards complex multilingual practices, dependent on the context and the intentions of researchers, making a case for characterising them as agentive, and displaying investment in practices in different languages, according to perceived advantages, in terms of target audiences, disseminating results, and dialogue with other colleagues. Not only do researchers have “complex social history and multiple desires” (Norton, 2000), but these desires can be, or become contradictory and clash. Some signs of tensions in the management of the linguistic resources, and of “linguistic resentment” were observed related to English, but researchers balance this aspect with the acknowledgment that the language is useful to attain certain academic goals. This contribution thus displays the complexity of researchers’ linguistic practices and aspirations.

KEYWORDS:

• Intercomprehension
• multilingual co-construction of knowledge
• community of practice
• English

Disclosure statement

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

Notes on contributor

Sílvia Melo-Pfeifer is Associate Professor in the Department of Education, at the University of Hamburg (Germany). She is also a member of CIDTFF (Research Center for Didactics and Technology in the Education of Teachers, Portugal). Under Camões – IP, she coordinated the language department of the Portuguese Embassy in Berlin, between 2010 and 2013. Among her research interests are multilingual and intercultural interaction, pluralistic approaches to teaching and learning of foreign languages and heritage language education.

Notes

1 To a very pertinent review on burdens attached to publish in English, disrespect of which disciplinary field researchers are engaged in, and that can be enlarged to other second and foreign languages, see Hanauer, Sheridan, and Englander (2019).

2 EVAL-IC: Evaluation of competences in intercomprehension (http://evalic.eu/leprojet). EVAL-IC was an Erasmus Plus Project, KA2 – Cooperation for Innovation and the Exchange of Good Practices/Strategic Partnerships for higher education (Project number 2016-1-FR01-KA203-024155), under the coordination of Ch. Ollivier, from the University of La Réunion (France).