Contesting the monolingual mindset

Abstract

This paper focuses on the day-to-day practices of service providers working with multilingual immigrants. It reports on 74 video recorded conversations between service providers and immigrant mothers, drawing on ethnographic fieldwork atKind en Gezin, the organization that monitors childcare for the Flemish authorities in Belgium. In discussing the findings, we focus on two principal themes: First, we demonstrate what the language requirements enshrined in Belgium’s language policies entail for the day-to-day practices of service providers working with multilingual clients. Secondly, we argue that, in superdiverse contexts, the growing need is towards delegitimizing language policy makers’ protectionist claim that the national language should be the only language used in public service encounters.

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