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Disrupting Dual Monolingualisms? Language Ideological Ordering in an Internationalizing Swedish University

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Language Perceptions and Practices in Multilingual Universities

Abstract

This chapter investigates the ways in which various discursive processes within and about Swedish Higher Education (HE) are rendering some value-laden linguistic practices and processes invisible. Previous studies in the field of Language Policy and Panning (LPP) have focused on the ‘internationalisation’ of HE with a pre-occupation for opposing linguistic systems, for example Swedish and English. However, this study reveals how such dualistic thinking can (re)produce essentializing and highly ideologized monolingual and monocultural categories, over-simplifying what is understood by the ‘international’ and ‘national’ in contemporary HE. Drawing on data from an interview-based study carried out in a sciences department at a major Swedish university, this chapter demonstrates the potential in taking a multilingual approach when seeking to better understand the affordances and constraints of internationalization.

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my doctoral supervisors, Caroline Kerfoot and Linus Salö, as well as Niina Hynninen, Maria Kuteeva and an anonymous reviewer for reading drafts and offering valuable comments and suggestions at various stages of the writing process. I would also like to thank Fredrik Bissinger, Anette Jansson, Adam Jaworski, Kathrin Kaufhold, Ekaterina Malik, Henrike Messer, Natalia Volvach, Lasse Vuorsola and Beatrice Zuaro for their generous feedback and comments given in response to presentations of this work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Swedish Language and Multilingualism, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

    Luke Holmes

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  1. Luke Holmes
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Correspondence to Luke Holmes .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of English, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

    Maria Kuteeva

  2. Department of English, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

    Kathrin Kaufhold

  3. Department of Languages, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland

    Niina Hynninen

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Holmes, L. (2020). Disrupting Dual Monolingualisms? Language Ideological Ordering in an Internationalizing Swedish University. In: Kuteeva, M., Kaufhold, K., Hynninen, N. (eds) Language Perceptions and Practices in Multilingual Universities. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38755-6_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38755-6_11

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-38754-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-38755-6

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