WHAT ROLE WILL ENGLISH PLAY IN OUR MULTILINGUAL REALITY?

In this article I will briefly introduce the British Council’s Future of English programme and then discuss one of its themes, multilingualism and its role in our lives today.

The British Council’s ‘Future of English’ programme is a long-term research agenda that aims to identify key trends that will define the role of English as a global language in the coming decade, and the issues and opportunities for countries around the world in achieving their goals for the use of English in their contexts. The programme will provide insights for language policy and education reform interventions and generate evidence and data to inform those decisions and evaluate their impact.

In April 2023, we published Future of English: Global Perspectives which summarises the programme to date and details the eight thematic areas of interest that we have concluded are likely to have a major impact on the future of English. The themes are posed as questions. We realised early on in our analysis that there are still many questions to be answered and our work so far is only the beginning of a much bigger conversation.

THE EIGHT THEMATIC QUESTIONS ARE:

I appreciate that in Brazil, bilingual education is an established approach that is recognised as appropriate for this context. One of the tenets of the Future of English programme is that age-appropriate and contextual learning is always the most effective. My intention here is not to advocate any one form of education over another but simply to discuss multilingualism as a relevant linguistic and global phenomenon that was one of the findings in our initial research.

Multilingualism is the use of multiple languages by individuals or societies and it is the norm in most contexts around the world. People from all over the world find themselves living in communities or societies where multiple languages are used. Exploration, colonialisation, migration, and globalisation have all contributed to today’s multilingual world.

The Council of Europe defines multilingualism as, “the presence in a geographical area, large or small, of more than one ‘variety of language’, i.e. the mode of speaking of a social group, whether it is formally recognised as a language or not; in such an area individuals may be monolingual, speaking only their own variety.” (2007, p. 8) Brazil itself has many, many languages both indigenous and non-indigenous working together.

It is also interesting to consider the broadest definition of multilingualism which includes thinking about the different ‘ways’ we speak within one language. For example, the language you use to write an academic paper is not the same language you use to write an email which is not the same as the language you use to write a WhatsApp message. So, multilingualism is about different languages, including sign language and using different ‘literacies’ within the same language or between different languages, making it fluid and organic.

English is often one of the languages used in multilingual situations. There are many different types of English used all over the world. People who have English as their first and only language are very much in the minority. It can be argued that the way English is changing and being shaped is more as a result of people speaking it as a second, third or fourth language.

For the majority of people, speaking English as it is spoken in the UK or the US is not the goal. The standards of British or American English are becoming obsolete, particularly in relation to pronunciation but also vocabulary. Varieties of English around the world have their own sets of vocabulary items that are used by English speakers in that context. For example, since the Pandemic in Brazil, the phrase, ‘doing home-office’ is widely used. A phrase which means working remotely from home. To my knowledge this phrase isn’t used anywhere else in the world but it is English and it is relevant and comprehensible by Brazilians (and now by me 😊).

The important point is that whoever is speaking English (or indeed any other language), wherever they are, the main aim is communication – to understand and be understood. Everyday communication is managed by individuals using their ‘plurilingual competence’ – their full range of languages. This might be the range of different actual languages they speak, or the range of the different ways they use one language. (Buendgens-Kosten & Elsner, 2018; Cenoz & Gorter, 2011)

LET’S TAKE ME AS AN EXAMPLE.

My context: I live in England with my mother and older brother. We speak English and Gujrati at home. My husband and children live in Malaysia. They speak English, Chinese and Bahasa Melayu. Most of the time I work remotely.

A typical day for me in England: At the start of my day, I wish my husband ‘good morning’ in English on Whatsapp. I then go into the kitchen and wish my mother the same but in Gujrati. After making myself a cup of coffee I turn on my laptop. While this is happening, I’m still having a Whatsapp conversation with my husband – emojis included (add them here – coffee cup, heart, LoL.) My inbox is bursting with messages from all around the world. The register is mostly formal, this is work, but the varieties of English are rich with localisation and culture. The way I reply to these emails is different to the way I talk to my colleagues in China and Japan for my first meeting of the day. In the middle of the meeting my mother comes in, seemingly not caring that I am in a meeting with my camera on, to offer me a snack because I’ve missed breakfast. So, I turn around and have a quick exchange with her in a mixture of English and Gujrati. By the end of my meeting, my daughter has sent me umpteen Whatsapp videos of my grandson who, at the age of three, doesn’t understand that he’s mixing English with Chinese with Bahasa Melayu. In the afternoon, will speak to colleagues in Colombia, Brazil and Mexico. And so my day goes on…..

You get the picture. Depending on who I am communicating with and how, I use a multitude of Englishes and other languages in any one day. Social, professional and educational contexts bring different languages and cultures together and technology has enabled us to communicate multi-modally and simultaneously in rich, interesting and various ways.

Classrooms often mirror the multilingual social reality in which they are situated, with teachers and learners using the languages available to them to enable effective learning. In an English lesson, learners move in and out different languages but also within those languages, moving in and out of different types of language use: informal, formal, academic, etc.

Similarly, many teachers working in the English language teaching classroom will use the learners’ first language to help them understand what they are learning – in Brazil teachers might naturally switch between English and Portuguese or another language to explain a grammar point. A speaking activity is done in English, but the feedback is given in Portuguese to make sure the students understand. And the emphasis on the feedback is communicating effectively, not the accuracy of the grammar. The objective is to communicate successfully in specific situations.

Perhaps in that class there are students who speak other languages too. If the teacher is able, she might use three or four different languages to communicate with her students in a single lesson. If the teacher doesn’t have several languages at her disposal, then she needs to ensure careful linguistic management of the lesson to ensure that some students are not excluded or feel left out.

Shifting seamlessly between languages is sometimes referred to as translanguaging. Translanguaging means we are using all of the linguistic resources that we have available to us – this is how we communicate naturally, and how, in some contexts, teachers and their students are communicating in the English language classroom. (Leung & Jenkins, 2020). In a language classroom, translanguaging is a stepping stone, scaffolding to support the learning of the target language, whatever that language may be.

In some contexts, this classroom-based translanguaging is not aligned with national education policy, which may, for example, mandate the use of one particular language. Therefore, another consideration in multilingual classrooms is assessment. Which language or languages are the learners being assessed in? Learners need to know from the very beginning the role of translanguaging in the classroom and the role of assessment and the language of assessment within this.

There is an increasing awareness, based on an expanding body of research (Mazzaferro, 2018) of the benefits of using translanguaging in education, but for these benefits to become more widespread in future, two major changes are needed:

(I) education policies will need to adapt further to include multilingualism and translanguaging as integral components in language learning– with clear definitions about what this looks like in the classroom;
(II) teachers will need training and ongoing professional development to help them deliver a curriculum that supports the simultaneous use of multiple languages in the classroom to aid learning.

These are big considerations and not easy to realise. Attempting to unpack them, is another paper altogether!

Regardless of whether our learners will stay in Brazil or venture further afield, it is important for them to be aware of other languages and the important role they play in society and education. Multilingualism speaks directly to the inclusion agenda and inclusive classrooms are fertile learning spaces, they promote different perspectives and open up horizons of learning that may not otherwise be considered. To this end, the British Council has developed lesson plans, at three levels, for teenage learners to help them understand and appreciate the value that multiple languages bring to society and our lives.

Obrigado por ler este artigo e espero que você aproveite ao máximo os espaços multilíngues em que atua diariamente.

REFERENCES

• Buendgens-Kosten, J., & Elsner, D. (2018). Multilingual CALL: Introduction. In J. Buendgens-Kosten & D. Elsner (Eds.), Multilingual computer assisted language learning, xi–xxiv. Multilingual Matters. https://doi.org/10.21832/9781788921497-002
• Cenoz, J., & Gorter, D. (2011). A holistic approach to multilingual education: Introduction. The Modern Language Journal, 95(3), 339–43. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.2011.01204.x
• Council of Europe. (2020). Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, teaching, assessment. Companion volume. https://rm.coe.int/common-european-framework-of-reference-for-languages-learning-teaching/16809ea0d4
• Leung, C., & Jenkins, J. (2020). Mediating communication – ELF and flexible multilingualism perspectives on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. Australian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 3(1), 26–41. https://doi.org/10.29140/ajal.v3n1.285
• Patel, M., Solly, M. and Copeland, S. (2023). The Future of English: Global Perspectives, Barry O’Sullivan and Yan Jin (eds). London: British Council