In the introduction to the special issue 'Elite Multilingualism: Discourses, practices, and debates', we focus on 'elite multilingualism' as a means to provide a window into the complex layers and nuances of today's multilingual, mobile and global society. Our aims here are to provide an empirical and conceptual discussion of a growing…

This article explores Indigenous Mexican mothers' perspectives on multilingualism and Indigenous language maintenance in their children's lives. Drawing on interview data from a larger qualitative study of language and ideology among multilingual children in Los Angeles, California, the article examines the perspectives of four Zapotec mothers who…

Urban schools across the country have been identified as having far lower rates of students that are prepared to graduate into STEM college programs and/or begin STEM careers. Issues with urban high school's drop-out rate and below average performance on STEM courses, in concurrence with the increasing demand for STEM occupations across the United…

Positioning reading as a site of meaning negotiation, this article provides a detailed account of one multilingual, transnational student's literacy practices for personal, academic, and disciplinary purposes across spaces. Drawing on the notion of "disconnect," I examine the tensions and fissures that disrupt the flow of literacies…

Despite some recent criticism, the idea of language interpreting in anthropological (among others) field research seems still firmly rooted in classical anthropology where the interpreter was an obstacle and necessary evil rather than aid. We surveyed anthropologists conducting field research in Arab League countries to describe their practices…

New challenges in education, stemming from the forces of globalization and the continued diversification of the student body, illuminate the need for a reexamination of the role of language in curriculum studies. Through a discussion of the issues around multilingualism and translanguaging and the shift in perspective that these topics have…

In this article, Christine Donahue describes how her experiences as a scholar, a member of multi-country European research projects, university research laboratories, and as an invited professor in multiple institutions, have transformed her life and her approach to writing research. Donahue notes that human instinct when encountering the new, the…

This article makes the case for conducting ethnographic research of a multi-scalar nature that links language policy processes and ideologies of language with everyday practices, on the ground, in local schools and classrooms. As with other researchers engaged in the ethnography of language policy (e.g. McCarty, 2011; Johnson, 2013), my concern is…

This column traces the evolution of electronic resources for language learning over the past 25 years, focusing on the arrival and transformation of the "world wide web", the dramatic changes in mobile technologies, and the movement towards commercial and all-in-one solutions to online learning. In the choice and use of learning…

This article takes the plurilingual repertoires of foreign language teachers -- and thus the teachers' linguistic diversity -- as a starting point for exploratory research into the potential of visual methods in teacher education for changing mind-sets. Describing and reflecting on the ubiquitous manifestation of a monolingual habitus in foreign…

This article undertakes a textual analysis of an autobiographically informed novel, "American Street," to analyze the process of identity formation of a Black Haitian immigrant youth in the United States. Black immigrant youth remain an understudied demographic in literacy research compared with their Latinx and Asian immigrant…

The Scottish Government's ambitious 1 + 2 Language Strategy has refocused attention on language education policy (LEP) and the provision for learning additional languages in Scottish schools. However, the maintenance of community languages continues to be the responsibility of minoritised parents and their complementary schools. This article…

This article is aimed to demonstrate how language policy at the local school level may create space for translanguaging. Focus is on a Mother Tongue (MT) classroom for Somali in a primary school in Sweden by way of an analysis of layers of language policy, with focus on spatial aspects. The empirical material consists of policy documents,…

Questions asked as part of phenomenographic research are used to critically synthesize findings from the case studies in this issue of English-medium instruction (EMI) in transnational higher education (TNHE). With respect to whether EMI in TNHE can be considered a phenomenon, it is suggested that the phenomenon is more discursive than empirical.…

This article takes the inquiry into semiotic repertoires beyond their classifications and inventories to analyse their interactions with each other and the way they gain indexicality in situated communication. As previous theorisation suggests that semiotic repertoires are deployed by agentive individuals, this article draws from New Materialism…