Language Ideologies and Multilingual Practices of Post-Soviet Migrants in Western Europe from a Translanguaging Perspective (original) (raw)
Related papers
Russian Journal of Linguistics, 2021
Based on this multilateral perspective on migrants’ languages and identities, this special issue addresses the following questions: Sociolinguistic portraits: who transmits or does not transmit their languages to the second generation? How Russian and other post-Soviet heritage languages are perceived? Social visibility of languages: how are these languages included in different spheres of language use (linguistic landscape)? Cognition and attitudes: what do post-Soviet immigrants and repatriates believe about their heritage languages and how do their beliefs influence their vitality? Cognition, society and language system: how do all these sociolinguistic and cognitive processes influence the transformation of the language systems of Russian and other post-Soviet languages as heritage languages in constellation with their contact languages?
Are Models of Multilingualism Transferable from Western to Central/Eastern European Contexts?
Kalbotyra 56 (2006), 66-74.
The study of multilingualism is becoming ever more urgent as the ongoing rise inthe rate of migration into and across Europe increasingly adds to existing levelsof language diversity and contact in Europe. Critically examining the divergingsociolinguistic settings in Western and Central/Eastern Europe this paperdiscusses issues pertaining to the transferability of models of multilingualism. It argues that language management practices need to involve critical analyses of language in society that take into account the historic conditions of language ideological contexts.
Multilingualism in Post‐Soviet Countries edited by Aneta Pavlenko
World Englishes, 2010
The main focus of this book is on linguistic structure, in particular on the linguistic forms characteristic of new varieties of English, and on ways of describing and understanding them. In this, the book makes an extremely useful contribution to the field. It is less successful in its attempt to cover and explain current trends in the spread of English, which is the aim of the final chapter.
Translanguaging space and translanguaging practices in multilingual Russian-speaking families
Russian Journal of Linguistics, 2021
Translanguaging is seen both as a threat and as an opportunity for minority language development and transmission. While the theme of translanguaging has been explored especially in a context of migration, the novelty of this study lies in its investigation of the multiple contexts in which translanguaging is examined. In order to understand the nature of translanguaging, we adopt a novel interdisciplinary approach and view it in all its complexity, including liminal spaces of linguistic landscape. Family language policy affects the home linguistic environment. Our purpose is to investigate language choices by multilingual Russian-speakers in Cyprus, Sweden and Estonia, immigrant and minority settings, and try to understand how they are reflected in the multilingual interaction of the families. Using ethnographic participant observations and oral spontaneous multilingual production, our study attempts to describe how communication is managed through translanguaging practices among multilingual Russian-speaking families' members in the cultural and linguistic environments of the three countries. By looking closely at the complexities of translanguaging space, it is our ambition to gain new insights about how it is organised and how translanguaging becomes a valuable linguistic resource in multilingual families. Our results indicate that translanguaging practices can be used in family conversational contexts and contribute to the creation of a rich and positive family repertoire. A new norm of Russian has been developed in all the three settings. A language shift can happen more quickly than expected, and, thus, it is important for parents to provide many opportunities for practising Russian as the L1.
Zeitschrift für Slawistik, 67(4), 501–510, 2022
The essays in this thematic issue explore an important but often overlooked legacy of European multilingualism and the various power asymmetries and ideological values that characterize it, namely the multilingual practices of ethno-linguistic groups on Europe's southeastern periphery. Although the European Union has in the past twenty years adopted legislation that explicitly celebrates and supports multilingualism, linguistic diversity and minority language rights, its language policy has received criticism for tending to rely on and embolden national standardizing language regimes. Indeed, the European focus on the protection of language diversity and language rights appears to reaffirm a static model of language in that it relies upon "the idea of a European polity based on the cooperation of distinct nation states" and upon related codified languages which can be traced back to ideologies of Romantic authenticity and Enlightenment universality. Scholars of the EU's language and multilingualism policy found that the official discourses oscillate between highlighting traditional cultural values like diversity and the right to education in the speakers' first language on the one hand, and promoting economic values and ideologies on the other hand. Accordingly, the "ideal" European citizen is portrayed as a multilingual person whose linguistic repertoire comprises of at least one language intended "for business" (instrumental/universal value) and one language as mother tongue, used "for pleasure" (authenticity). As such, EU language policy does not facilitate newly emerging in-between or translingual modes and directions of communication. Moreover, it does not recognize multilingual individuals whose linguistic repertoire does not match the imagined polarising axis of authenticity and instrumentality. At the same time, scholars have pointed to the relevance of the Habsburg legacy for some of the issues that EU language policy is struggling with, not necessarily as a model to be emulated but in terms of past practices, experiences and legislative efforts with lessons for the present. By placing our emphasis on this imperial legacy in contemporary South-Eastern and Central Europe,1 we argue that it crucially influenced the demographic composition, language policy, ideologies and practices of the region. Moreover, at the time of the Habsburg Monarchy, the basis of a modern institutional and class order, education, public sphere, mass media networks and extensive (written) literary production in vernacular languages was established. In our opinion, the consequent state regimes – composite nation-states, communist states, other nation-states, and so on – need to be examined in terms of the continuities and discontinuities they established with the discursive order, values, and ideologies of the Habsburg imperial legacy, given that their policies were created through a continuous tacit and explicit dialogue with it. Briefly, the change of power relations in these (post-)imperial contact zones throughout history left a material, cultural and psychological legacy that must be taken into account when language use and ideology is discussed.
Linguistic biographies & communities of language of Russian speakers in Great Britain
2016
In migration, language undergoes crucial changes. Not only are the linguistic practices of migrants reshaped in the new environment, but migrant displacement has a major effect on the way language users see and talk about language as such, especially in relation to linguistic varieties they encounter or acquire as part of their migrant experiences. Migrants’ transforming attitudes to language also interfere with other, non-linguistic areas of their lives – family relationships, career pathways, networking with fellow migrants, and daily interactions with the host environment. The way a layperson considers ‘their’ language in relation to the language of ‘others’ plays a crucial role in their identity construction – both as a factor and a domain for expression. The sociolinguistic context of a new culture is a defining factor in the transformation of one’s metalinguistic thinking. This thesis focuses on post-Soviet Russian-speaking migrants in the UK and explores their linguistic prac...
US-China Foreign Language
The current linguistic situation in the former Soviet Union over the past decade requires the development of new approaches to cultural and language issues, a new methodological framework for the research and theoretical generalization of cultural, linguistic, socio-linguistic, and ethno-linguistic processes. The Republic of Kazakhstan is multinational and multireligious region. This situation has evolved over several centuries, and is inextricably linked to the particular historical development of the country. Kazakhstan is now regarded not only as one of the models of interaction but also interpenetration of different cultures. It is undergoing renovation in the field of international relations. A new area of ethno-cultural interaction were ethnic Kazakhs, who are settling down in the country, increasing the mosaic structure of settlement and creating a new situation in the system of relationships. In this paper, in order to determine the attitude towards Kazakh, Russian, and other languages, linguistic preferences of respondents the questionnaires and interviews were carried out. As immigrants there were selected the Kazakh repatriates, immigrants from China, Mongolia, Russia, and other countries. The research results reflected that interiorization of language identity of immigrant respondents is a complicated and ambiguous process due to the linguistic, social and historical, psychological, and cultural peculiarities.
Interculturality in the Modern Russian Linguistic Landscape
Philological Class, 2021
The purpose of this article is to give a quick overview of intercultural tendencies in certain Russian regions’ modern linguistic landscapes: where they can be found, why languages other than Russian are used, what the purpose of their use is, and who uses them. The material for this study includes several thousand photos taken between 2010 and 2018 in different regions of Russia, representing advertising material and signboards where different languages and cultures meet. Methodologically, the photos were classified and analyzed according to the types of code-switching and hybrid structures appearing in and on them. Some history is given on the cities studied, as well as the state of the languages that are part of their linguistic repertory. A few particular situations are scrutinized, involving national republics and other areas where linguistic minorities exist (major cities, provinces, villages). A strong tendency for the use of foreign culture was evident in the findings all ov...