Aspiring multilinguals or contented bilinguals? University students negotiating their multilingual and professional identities
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Hillamaria Pirhonen
Abstract
An increasingly multilingual working life expects university graduates to possess multilingual competences, but at the same time many European students study fewer languages than before. As they learn about field-specific linguistic practices and contemplate their future, university students negotiate their identities as language learners and future professionals. Supporting them in acquiring a multilingual identity would be beneficial as it is a strengthening factor in language learning. Since they study towards a profession, it is likely that students examine language learning from the viewpoint of a working life. From these premises, Finnish social science students were interviewed as a part of a course that supported their readiness to work in multilingual environments. The purpose was to investigate how they negotiated their multilingual and professional identities and how these negotiations intersect. The data was examined from a poststructural perspective, analysing identity negotiations by means of positioning theory. The results show that the students constructed their linguistic identities primarily in relation to English competences, often positioning themselves as “contentedly bilingual”. The data also revealed an “aspiring multilingual” identity negotiation which, however, echoed societal ideologies on language learning rather than describing the students’ internalised beliefs. Students’ certainty of their future profession was often connected to a confidence in speaking English and a critical stance towards the need for multilingual competences. Multilingual identity negotiation was hence connected to prevailing discourses and professional aspirations. The study provides new perspectives on university students’ multilingual and professional identities and suggests pedagogical solutions that can support their development in Higher Education language teaching.
Original quotations in Finnish
| kyl mä osasin oottaa et täällä sitä enkkuu tarvii paljon enemmän ja mä preppasinkin itteeni siihen jonkin verran että vähän kertailin niit hommii (S4¶49) |
| mä oon aika semmonen, sanotaan niinku kielissä semmonen mukavuudenhalunen … minuu turhauttaa jos mie en ymmärrä heti kaikkea, ja sit mie oon sillee, no ihan sama (S10¶19) |
| koen että oon monikielinen sen takia että vaikka mulla ei oo monen kielen niinku semmosia, öö, tosi hyviä taitoja, niin kun mulla on kuitenkin ns aina mahollisuus avata se ovi (S9¶45) |
| elämässä kyllä hyötyy kielistä aina (S6¶143) |
| joskushan ne hirveesti varotteli että jos haluais jossain Euroopan unionissa ni siellä sit puhutaan ranskaa ni mitä mä en kyllä usko todellakaan (S7¶117) |
| oon enemmänkin kaksikielinen … ei mun ruotsi oo kuitenkaan vielä sillä tasolla et mä voisin sanoa et mä (S2¶27) |
| jos monikielisyys määriteltäs näin … niin mun mielestä sillon tällaselta käsitteeltä häviää niinkun merkitys (S5¶37) |
| englanti ja suomi on molemmat sillai koko ajan läsnä arjessa … Molemmat tuntuu niinku ikään kuin luontevilta kieliltä niinku käyttää, jos haluu kuvata tunteita tai, niin se onnistuu parhaiten miksauksella (S8¶3) |
| moni meistä opiskelijoista on jotenkin tottunu siihen perinteiseen suomalaiseen opetustyyliin että opetellaan ne kieliopit ja sitte vasta kun sä osaat täydellisesti ne kieliopit niin sitten voidaan puhua (S6¶83) |
| Joskus … tapahtuu näitä että siellä on just joku vaikka roottinnen ärrä jossain väärässä kohin (S7¶75) |
| mun mielestä [YouTube-videot] on niinku sillee helppoja tai siis se on kumminki semmosta basic-englantia yleensä mitä niissä on silleen et ei oo mitään semmosia ihan älyttömän vaikeita (S6¶13) |
| tämmösellä tieteenalalla niin sitten kirjotetaan englanniks koska ei sitä oo, suomalaiselle yleisölle kannata kirjottaa vaan kannattaa kirjottaa koko maailman yleisölle (S5¶77) |
| mä haluaisin kuitenkin osallistua jollain tavalla siihen et miten tää yhteiskunta toimii … ja muuta (S8¶116) |
| pitäis olla kauheen isot, tai semmoset suuret suunnitelmat jos kysytään et mitä sä teet isona (S6¶95) |
| mua vähän pelottaa että se on niin isot vaatimukset. Mä en tiedä että täytänkö mä niitä. Että mä osaisin puhua neljää kieltä, tai käyttää sitä työelämässä neljää kieltä ni se vaikuttaa aika massiiviselta (S9¶201) |
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© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- The fascinating world of language teaching and learning varieties
- Research Articles
- Aspiring multilinguals or contented bilinguals? University students negotiating their multilingual and professional identities
- The (im)possibility of breaking the cycle of rippling circularities affecting Australian language education programs: a Queensland example
- Lernen mit LMOOCs im universitären Deutschunterricht: Entscheidungshilfen für Deutschlehrende
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- Gamification and learning Spanish as a modern language: student perceptions in the university context
- Seeing innovation from different prisms: university students’ and instructors’ perspectives on flipping the Spanish language classroom
- Investigating syntactic complexity and language-related error patterns in EFL students’ writing: corpus-based and epistemic network analyses
- Using Google Docs for guided Academic Writing assessments: students’ perspectives
- Digital storytelling as practice-based participatory pedagogy for English for specific purposes
- Is individual competition in translator training compatible with collaborative learning? The case of the MTIE Translation Award
- Tackling the elephant in the language classroom: introducing machine translation literacy in a Swiss language centre
- Institutionalised autonomisation of language learning in a French language centre
- The story of becoming an autonomous learner: a case study of a student’s learning management
- The effect of collaborative activities on tertiary-level EFL students’ learner autonomy in the Turkish context
- Learner autonomy and English achievement in Chinese EFL undergraduates: the mediating role of ambiguity tolerance and foreign language classroom anxiety
- Activity Reports
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- The fascinating world of language teaching and learning varieties
- Research Articles
- Aspiring multilinguals or contented bilinguals? University students negotiating their multilingual and professional identities
- The (im)possibility of breaking the cycle of rippling circularities affecting Australian language education programs: a Queensland example
- Lernen mit LMOOCs im universitären Deutschunterricht: Entscheidungshilfen für Deutschlehrende
- Enhance sustainability and environmental protection awareness: agency in Chinese informal video learning
- Gamification and learning Spanish as a modern language: student perceptions in the university context
- Seeing innovation from different prisms: university students’ and instructors’ perspectives on flipping the Spanish language classroom
- Investigating syntactic complexity and language-related error patterns in EFL students’ writing: corpus-based and epistemic network analyses
- Using Google Docs for guided Academic Writing assessments: students’ perspectives
- Digital storytelling as practice-based participatory pedagogy for English for specific purposes
- Is individual competition in translator training compatible with collaborative learning? The case of the MTIE Translation Award
- Tackling the elephant in the language classroom: introducing machine translation literacy in a Swiss language centre
- Institutionalised autonomisation of language learning in a French language centre
- The story of becoming an autonomous learner: a case study of a student’s learning management
- The effect of collaborative activities on tertiary-level EFL students’ learner autonomy in the Turkish context
- Learner autonomy and English achievement in Chinese EFL undergraduates: the mediating role of ambiguity tolerance and foreign language classroom anxiety
- Activity Reports
- Lehre am Sprachenzentrum der UZH und der ETH Zürich: Positionspapier
- Communication course for future engineers – effective data presentation and its interpretation during LSP courses
- Dialogic co-creation in English language teaching and learning: a personal experience
