This paper analyses the motivations behind the implementation of bilingual education in the Dutch preschool system and relates this to the status of Dutch in the Dutch educational system. Based on the analysis of policy documents and questionnaires filled in by parents and teachers, this study reveals two different underlying ideologies that the…

Through Q methodology, this study explores teachers' understanding of the importance of their students' mother tongue(s) in ensuring meaningful, effective learning in Qatar's international English-medium primary schools. It considers the extent to which teachers believe that their students' linguistic backgrounds are affirmed and promoted. The…

This article explores Yugoslav education policy in Vojvodina (Serbia), one of the most multilingual regions of the country, which was implemented in the period between the 1960s and 1980s through the school subject the 'Language of social environment' (LSE). Based on archival and field research, this case study is devoted to the school subject…

One of the products of globalization in sociolinguistics is the emergence of transnational regimes in language policy, in which power is exercised across boundaries of traditional nation states. This paper engages with audit culture, a transnational policy mechanism which involves the continuous evaluation of nation states' performance through the…

This paper investigates the language ideologies held by a group of international students in an English medium instruction (EMI) university in multilingual Hong Kong. The findings indicate that the participants' beliefs about English extend beyond its role as an instructional medium and encompass its use as a lingua franca and as a means of social…

Drawing on semi-structured interviews with six Chinese migrant families with children aged 12-15 years old, this qualitative study uses a Bourdieusian lens to probe how the historically lived and migration experiences of Chinese internal migrant parents construct their paradoxical beliefs in children's English learning and informs their family…

This article compares the immersion-education systems in Brittany and Wales. The number of Welsh speakers is growing thanks to its well-developed immersion-education system. Brittany has a much less well-developed system and the number of Breton speakers is falling dramatically. Urgent action is needed if Breton is to survive. Using an approach…

This study investigates language attitudes expressed by public university students in India at various layers of agentive "positionality" as an integral part of their dynamic language ecologies. This is achieved through the qualitative analysis of three focus group interviews conducted at three public universities in India with the…

This article focuses upon the Japanese government's decision in 2009 to direct an 'English-only' strategy for English language education in senior high schools from 2013. In the "Course of Study 2009," and more recently again in the "Course of Study 2018," the Japanese government implicitly blames the local grammar-translation…

Despite the predominant position of global English, teaching and learning of languages other than English (LOTEs) are gaining increasing attention in foreign language planning in China. This study aims to showcase the development of an elective Arabic language program in a Chinese university through the lens of agency as a spatial, temporal, and…

This qualitative study investigates the process of family language policy and planning among a group of immigrant mothers with south Asian backgrounds in Hong Kong, and explores the underlying cultural, socio-political and ideological reasons. Moving beyond a discrete analysis of family language policy within the home context to incorporate…

The study is underpinned by the public sphere paradigm, which emphasizes that language policy and planning (LPP) should be studied from the actual practices of local stakeholders/agents and communities within the local sites. This approach allows researchers to understand the complex, multilayered, and dynamic process of policy interpretation,…

Language policy and planning in Nepal has been contested due to the co-existence of multiple contradictory discourses concerning teaching and learning of local, national, foreign, and international languages. Recently a multilingual policy was issued to create space for the once-banned ethnic/indigenous languages in public schooling, further…

The medium of instruction (MOI) has been a contested issue in multilingual polities globally, as English medium of instruction (EMI) has seen unprecedented growth, threatening the use and sometimes very survival of local/indigenous and even national languages. While the struggles to address related issues have been well researched, how and why…

Increasing societal and linguistic diversity poses significant challenges to formative categories of language policies. We make this point via an examination of Singapore's management of its most linguistically diverse ethnic group, the Indians. While heterogeneity has always been Singapore's defining feature, the nature and scale of recent…