Multiculturalism and the Lingua Franca in Language Teaching

Sònia Prats i Carreras

Servei de Llengües, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), Catalonia, Spain

Edifici M1, Campus de la UAB, 08193 Cerdanyola del Vallès, Barcelona.
Sonia.Prats@uab.cat

Sònia Prats holds a BA in English Language and Literature, an MA in Teaching EFL and an MA in Language-Teaching Methodology, all awarded by the UAB. She has worked with the university language service since 1992, where she is currently Director of Studies. She also lectures in English language at the UAB Faculty of Education.  

Multiculturalism and the Lingua Franca in Language Teaching

It is a truism of teaching, and not just language teaching, that an overly student-centred approach runs the risk of becoming—paradoxically—an overly teacher-centred approach. How so? Because, by facilitating our students with the methodological benefits of the professional consensus as regards students’ best interests, we may actually run the risk of imposing assumptions of learner requirements on those very students that perhaps do not coincide, fully or even at all, with their real-life expectations. We may choose to call their expectations less enlightened, less informed or less experienced than our own; we may even choose to term them more conservative than the flexible, liberal views that we would like to think infuse our own teaching. But sooner or later, we need to face up to this discrepancy, one which stalks our classrooms, take account of the challenges it represents and do something about it.

And what is true about general teaching methodology is, it seems to me, remarkably similar to aspects of multilingualism in modern-language teaching, at least in the area of my concern and experience, which is the university sector. That is to say that a very common view in certain language-teaching circles, which holds that supporting a lingua franca such as English is basically detrimental to other languages, and is—in effect—simply another form of linguistic imperialism, is an opinion (though one that brings in its wake a formidable series of consequences as regards curricula, materials, teacher training and classroom practice) that does not necessarily coincide with our students’ view of things, and may not be at all in accordance with their own language-learning needs or expectations. 

This then leads me to ask, in terms of linguae francae and multilingualism, just whose agenda is primarily being forwarded in this ambit? Is it that of the academic and teaching community, or that of our students? It may of course be argued that these agendas are not at all discrepant, or at least not significantly so, or in all events we might argue that these ‘agendas’ are perfectly combinable. But that is not the view that is generally forwarded in discussions on linguae francae, which, instead, tend to hold an antagonistic view of English as an article of faith. What I maintain is that, in spite of the undeniable need—entirely unquestioned from my perspective—to take our opportunities as language-teaching practitioners to foster and support approaches that enhance multilingualism in education (and here I speak as non-native user of English and a mother-tongue user of a relatively small language, Catalan), it is short sighted and even academically arrogant of us as a professional sector to disregard the opinions and requirements of our client base. And these opinions and requirements, I argue, demand that language education provide greater communicative ability in a single lingua franca that will facilitate professional and personal language use in a broad range of contexts and, critically, over an essentially global geographical area. I hope that this article will provoke an open and honest debate.  

Keywords: lingua franca; multilingualism; student and teacher expectations.
One for All and All for One?

On the face of it, linguae francae would appear to provide advantages all round; they facilitate communication, help overcome cultural barriers and enable greater efficiency in a broad range of human endeavour. But not everyone is convinced of their wholly benign nature. 

In professional language circles, for example, there seems to be something of an agreement that linguae francae, on the one hand, and multilingualism, on the other, are at best antagonistic and are sometimes even mutually incompatible. Put rather broadly, the lingua franca (LF) is often thought of as destroying multilingualism as a valid channel for communication. From the outset, I would like to make it clear that I entirely endorse what the European Commission has set out in a range of documents, that “improving language learning [i.e., more than just English] in the European Union is a key factor…[and] an essential building block of almost all aspects involved, from economic efficiency to mobility, from the creation of more and better jobs to social inclusion and cohesion”. It is essential for all European citizens to recognise the value of our different linguistic and cultural backgrounds and to promote diversity within our European framework. It is even more essential to be able to communicate effectively with people from different backgrounds in order to develop as European citizens endowed with equal opportunities. 

Yet it is widely accepted that shared use of at least one language is basic in communicating with people from a wide variety of origins in order to fully integrate within professional and academic circles. My view, in accordance I would say with millions of others, is that English is currently best suited for this LF role, since it is the language that—globally, at least—most people share.

In our academic and professional ambits, it is simply stating the obvious that the most widely used tool to transmit, share and interpret knowledge is English. But it is not the English that I learnt at school and university; it is altogether another kind of English. It is a new language that allows us to interact with people from all over the world, and not simply with the native speakers from the “inner circle”. As an LF, it belongs not to the relatively few speakers for whom it is a first language but to absolutely all of us who need it and use it. Indeed, if we accept that this LF draws on, serves and develops from all its different groups of speakers, then we have to accept that this LF should be dissociated from its roots. It can no longer be said to pertain in exclusivity to its native speakers, nor can they be seen as the final arbiters of correction; all the users of this LF are co-owners, and—very critically—they bring to it the richness of their own diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds.

English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) now has no real need to compete directly with other languages because it can actually take on many aspects of these languages. 

Let me explain myself: if we accept that English is acting as an LF in the worlds of business, trade, tourism, to name only a very few areas, then we can also accept that its speakers, coming from a wide range of L1s, bring to it much of the linguistic and cultural richness of their own languages when using ELF in interaction. As a native speaker of Catalan, for instance, I might translate one of our Catalan expressions in order to illustrate a point when speaking in English, instead of using a native English construction that I am uncomfortable with or my listeners may not even know. This incorporation of “features” from other linguistic/pragmatic/cultural terrain is, I think, a way to enrich this new language, this ELF; it is a way to heighten communication and pluriculturalism, since it is a language with sufficient flexibility to integrate characteristics (such as lexical items, grammatical constructions, pronunciation and prosodic features) from as many cultural and linguistic backgrounds as the speakers that it now has. 

Anna Mauranen, professor of English at the University of Helsinki, a researcher in the area of ELF and director of the ELFA project (English as a Lingua Franca in Academic Settings), emphasises through her research that ELF is, in fact, not a reduced, simplified, more basic form of English but that it is actually more diverse, especially because it shows a broader range of morphological forms. If this lingua franca, English, has evolved and grown more varied because of its non-native speakers or users (I intentionally avoid the term ‘learner’ in this context, carrying—as it does—the notion of someone having imperfect knowledge that can only be improved upon by following teachers—guess who?—in possession of higher levels of ability), then this must surely help to undermine the idea of identifying ELF with “linguistic imperialism”; it must surely undermine the notion that ELF is inextricably dependent on native speakers and is nothing more than a tool of linguistic domination. 

It is of course undeniable that the status of English today has been shaped by the imperialistic past and political, economic and military present of, principally, the UK in the former ambit and the USA in the latter. Certainly, had it not been for the British colonialist past and the current superpower status of the US, a different LF would quite plausibly have appeared in place of English. But this is not the case. There has always been a need for linguae francae at local and regional levels; in our now global context, this need is greater and wider. And the global language that most people seem prepared to use is English (not Catalan or Chinese or German).

I do not believe that to accept this, to accept ‘the power’ of English, is at all to resign ourselves to the subjugation of other languages. But I do believe—perhaps to the disappointment or worse of native English speakers—that we must firmly emphasise that this international language is not inner-circle English but ELF, a new and most necessary language, a new tool, a new technology, with the capacity of integrating speakers, languages and cultures. It is a language that need not transmit or impose anglophone sociocultural models. It is a language primarily for the purposes of communication, which allows us to identify with the large group of speakers who use it and make it theirs; this ELF is the possession of all its users. Its ‘ownership’ has gone beyond its origin boundaries and English now pertains to anyone and everyone who uses it. 

Learning other languages (and about other languages) is more necessary than ever: it raises cultural awareness, it makes us more understanding of cultural differences, more empathic. It is, paradoxically, a unique opportunity to get to know ourselves better, our L1, our individual and group characteristics. But the idea that English will somehow counter this activity with the dead hand of uniformity, and, in the process, will actually kill off the ‘weaker’ languages it comes up against is patently wrong. A research group in Helsinki has recently studied whether English-medium MA programmes are a threat to first languages and linguistic diversity. Their findings suggest that English-medium education makes students understand the nuances of their own language(s) better and that it also increases student sensitivity to linguistic differences and language use. The group found that, as a principal trend, studying in English encourages students to learn even more languages. 

The Situation in Catalonia

Let me now refer to the situation in Catalonia as I see it. Although it seems to be the case that in certain countries, especially within the university sector, English is rapidly changing from being an object of instruction to being the medium of instruction—a process that both facilitates and reflects higher levels of general English—in Catalonia this is still markedly not so. This fact is central to my discussion as, on the one hand, it differs sometimes very significantly from other European contexts in which this has now become a consolidated reality, and, on the other hand, it obviously affects Catalan students’ perceptions of English (for whom it is still much more an object of instruction than a medium) and, consequently, their wish to focus exclusively on that language, unlike many of their peers elsewhere whose English, by the time of entering university, is already sufficiently competent for professional purposes and who therefore are in a position to acquire other languages according to their needs and interests.

 Last year we carried out a test on first-year university students at the UAB to determine their level of English, French, Italian and German (these are the four foreign languages that can be studied at secondary schools in Catalonia; in reality, however, over 90% of all students opt for English). Fewer than 5% took the test in any of the three languages other than English. Of those hundreds who sat the English level test, we found a wide variation of competence (from A1 to C1 on the Common European Framework scale); most students, however, have an awareness and understanding of English only equivalent to B1 in the Framework. This is very low compared to many other European countries. With this level of competence in the language, it is difficult for Catalans to use English as a practical and effective communicative tool in international contexts. 

In my experience, university students are fully aware of the fact that they need to attain a higher level of English to read the necessary bibliography, to attend lectures or conferences and to interact with students or teachers of different origins. For this reason, many of them take English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classes 

outside their curriculums in order to improve their abilities. These extra classes are typically taken at our university language service and also at other private or state language schools in Catalonia. The vast majority of students at the language service where I work attend classes in EFL; only a few choose to study another foreign language such as French, Italian or German. From what I observe and from what students tell me, those who wish to study other languages do so because they have already acquired—or believe that they have acquired—an adequately high level in EFL.

In spite of this over-riding demand for English, I believe that multilingualism may well enhance the usefulness of learning “partial competences” in languages: for instance, for those international students arriving in Catalonia, there may be no need for them to speak in Catalan (especially if they are only staying for one or two terms). We have designed a course for such students to improve their reading and listening skills in Catalan while using other Romance languages that they already know as a springboard. This course is very successful, especially—of course—amongst Erasmus Students from Italy, France or Portugal, and with students from South America. We also offer other courses that work on partial competences, such as conversation courses in Italian and French or even a new course entitled “Reading German from Scratch”. However, I have to say that most of the language courses that we offer other than English are frankly struggling to survive. The reason, as I have already indicated, is that in most cases students’ level of English is just not high enough for them to think it might be useful (or might become a priority) to study other languages while studying for their degrees.

I teach a new subject at the UAB’s Faculty of Education that is curiously titled “Languages and Contexts”: first-year students (about 320) take Catalan, Spanish, English and French in this subject, which is obligatory. At the end of the academic year, in June 2010, student representatives suggested eliminating the French part of the course and, instead, providing more hours of English; their argument was that they felt English is more necessary for their studies and future work as primary-school teachers (more, that is, than simply a smattering of French). Their suggestion was not accepted but the faculty’s governing body has made the decision to teach other subjects in English, in years 2-4, in order to help students develop their abilities in this language. All of which goes to show that, whilst on the one hand we—as language professionals—are actively promoting broader access to and use of a range of languages, on the other hand our students (our ‘client base’, as it were) have ideas that are to no small extent discrepant with our multilingual approach. Of course, this does not mean, ipso facto, that our students are ‘right’ and that we should renounce our ideas on language education without further ado. But at the very least it does mean that there is a significant diversification of criteria at play here. As educators, ignoring what our students perceive as fundamental to their own formation and career prospects would not simply be shortsighted on our part; it would in fact be grossly arrogant.  

Conclusions

An awareness and acceptance of the fact that students generally want English above and beyond any other language is not to give up on multilingualism. It does not imply an ‘either/or’ policy on our part in which we either have English or we have multilingual approaches. In part—as I have been arguing here—the use of English, especially as a medium of instruction rather than as the object, can actively foster greater and more effective interest in other languages. And in part, where we may feel that other languages are being squeezed, it is clearly an inadequate and rather unimaginative response to therefore limit English (which, as I have also been arguing, would run directly counter to our students’ requirements and to those of the marketplace); instead, it falls to us as language professionals to plan and carry out teaching, training and developmental initiatives depending on our specific contexts, ambits of interest and specialisation that provide an arena for other languages to be studied, to be used and to be supported. All of which of course is quite another—if related—discussion.         

So this brings me to the rather controversial question of just whose needs are being taken most fully into account in language education, at least in the sector in which I am involved and, even more relevantly, in Catalonia and the rest of Spain. My own position, which is probably quite clear by now, is that—by imposing a multilingual approach to language learning—the academic community is in danger of forwarding its own beliefs (however liberal, democratic and inclusive) over the more pragmatic requirements of our students who increasingly feel the need, above all, to be suitably qualified for a highly competitive world which will demand of them a considerable level of communicative ability in English, that is, in the lingua franca that, for the time being at least, will dominate practically any of the sectors in which they may wish to work. If we refuse to recognise this and fail to act in consequence, there can be no doubt that we will also be failing to adequately prepare our students for the challenges and demands of their increasingly globalised future.   

References    

European Commission Directorate-General for Education and Culture. Summary of 	the First report on the activities of the working group on languages 
	(July 2002 – June 2003). Brussels, 01/12/2003.
Mauranen, Anna. 2007. ‘Hybrid Voices: English as the Lingua Franca of Academics’. 	In Fløttum, Kjersti, Dahl, Trine and Kinn, Torodd. Language and Discipline 	Perspectives on Academic Discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Press, 	244-259.
Mauranen, Anna and Ranta, E. (eds) 2009. English as a Lingua Franca: Studies and 	Findings. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.