SLA and the Study of Equitable Multilingualism

Abstract

The Douglas Fir Group (2016) sought to articulate a transdisciplinary agenda for SLA but said little about multilingualism specifically. Moreover, many multilinguals are under siege in a worrisome world where threats to human difference have risen to the mainstream in the aftermath of Brexit and the 2016 U.S. presidential election. I argue that considering multilingualism as the central object of inquiry and embracing social justice as an explicit disciplinary goal are two moves necessary to provide sustainable support for the kind of transdisciplinary SLA that the Douglas Fir Group (2016) envisioned. I examine some missing pieces of the puzzle of transdisciplinary transformation that may make it possible for SLA researchers, and particularly those who investigate linguistic–cognitive dimensions of language learning, to contribute knowledge about the human capacity for language while supporting equitable multilingualism for all.

Exploring the Dynamic Nature of Second Language Listeners’ Perceived Fluency: A Mixed‐Methods Approach

“…The negative comments associated with low‐level fluency were contrasted in the data against nativelikeness which, in turn, is associated with the notion of high social status and advanced proficiency in the target language. Based on this, it is possible to hypothesize that L2 speakers might be more sensitive to monolingual views of bilingualism rooted in essentialist ontologies of language that relegate nonnative speakers to a deficit model (Ortega, ). Our L2 listeners might have experienced linguistic insecurity, which is still extant among multilinguals.…”

The Study of Heritage Language Development From a Bilingualism and Social Justice Perspective

“…Accordingly, a social justice lens reveals that relevant for HL bilingual learners is not only that their access to mature HL speakers and rich HL input is impacted numerically negatively. It is also that their multilingual learning is inequitable, that is, it proceeds with little choice and much hostility (Ortega, , p. 27), under harmful experiences stemming from systemic marginalization. Inequitable multilingualism, precisely, is what the experiences of indigeneity, colonialism, migration, and Deaf–hearing world dialectics have in common, when it comes to the HLD.…”

The Douglas Fir Group Framework as a Resource Map for Language Teacher Education

“…Even more important, by reducing the complex reality of multilingual competence to dichotomies like native and nonnative, monolingual and bilingual, they inflict additional, deeply disturbing insecurities beyond those that are already part of the complex endeavor of language learning and language use—and do so for both the multilingual learners as well as their teachers (cf. Ortega, , this issue).…”

“…The collection of studies in this issue can be approached from different perspectives, but as a language teacher educator I believe that they highlight at least four challenges for teacher educators in the preparation of language teachers: (a) the deficit discourses about language learners associated with the monolingualism bias in SLA research (Ortega, , this issue), (b) integrating a broadened theorization of cognition in teaching (Ellis, , this issue), (c) taking a usage‐based approach to linguistics to inform pedagogical decisions (Hall, , this issue; LaScotte & Tarone, , this issue), and (d) becoming fully empowered agents in the pedagogical process (Larsen–Freeman, , this issue). The first three challenges raise critical questions about why language teachers teach, how language learners learn (and hence how language can be taught), and what is to be taught.…”