Linguistic Diversity as a Problem and a Resource — Multilingualism in European and Finnish Policy Documents

Constructions of bilingualism in Finnish Government programmes and a newspaper discussion site debate

“…In his public disclosure Lipponen will only make sure the tarnishing of his own image and the final defeat of the Social Democrats. All in all, societal bilingualism in Finland presents an example of what Heller (1999; has termed "parallel monolingualism", where languages are used in their own spheres (see also Nikula et al 2012;Boyd & Palviainen, in press). …”

“…In the 2000s, the Constitution has become a practical tool for managing (Nikula et al 2012) official bilingualism. Its spirit, especially its chapter 2 on basic rights and liberties and the section 6 on equality is echoed in discourses of egalitarianism 2 in the Government programmes: guaranteeing, protecting, maintaining and developing language rights for all citizens, as in the following example:…”

English-Medium Instruction in European Higher Education

“…Additionally, we looked specifically into references to "English" and the (ideological) connotations attached to the language. We approach ideologies as sets of beliefs about the position of a language or its speakers in a society (Woolard and Schieffelin 1994), which, in turn, may turn into political hierarchizations about the (political, cultural and social) value of the language and its speakers (see Nikula et al 2012;). …”

“…In non-English dominant contexts, this tends to equate with "Englishization", i.e. an increased use of English (Piller and Cho 2013;Saarinen and Nikula 2012;Phillipson 2009). Englishization affects all or most communicative activities associated with universities: research dissemination, preparation of funding bids, teaching and supervision, internal and external communication Haberland, Lønsmann, and Preisler 2013;Grenall 2012;Llurda, Cots and Armengol 2014;Ljosland 2014).…”

“…At one end of the spectrum we find strategic decisions to offer courses and programmes in English to tap into the lucrative non-EU student market (Hultgren 2014b), at the other we find those decisions where no-one seems to have contemplated or predicted the vast linguistic implications. It has often been pointed out, for instance, that the Bologna Declaration did not devote a single word to language-related issues, despite the undeniably huge linguistic consequences engendered by promoting mobility within the European higher education area (Phillipson 2006;Ljosland 2005;Saarinen and Nikula 2012). Often, it is the case that drivers of Englishization come in the guise of objectives to excel and being world-class.…”