A Dui Hua (对话) Standpoint to Multilingual Educational Theorizing

Abstract

New forms of intellectual inequality have become evident with the internationalisation of higher degree researchers (HDRs) education, in particular theoretical dominance and dependency. However, the linguistically and theoretically based inequalities associated with local/global currents of standardized monolingual English HDRs education are gradually opening up to scholarly debates. In the field of education, bilingual HDRs have the potential disposition, and some have the capabilities for multilingual theorizing. Some make use of their knowledge of more than one language to extend the possibilities for theorizing educational phenomena or otherwise naming and making sense of problems. This multilingual theorizing may provide another path to transform the problems with uniformized, Anglophone HDRs education. With this concern, this paper reconsiders the universalisation of Euro-American theories through their embodiment in monolingual English in HDR education. A Dui Hua (对话) standpoint to other languages and theoretical knowledge is outlined and debated to highlight the divergences of languages and thoughts. Thus this paper probes into the possibilities of multilingual educational theorizing, whereby bilingual HDRs generate original conceptual tools that benefit the wider educational research community.

1. Introduction: Theories in English as the Dominant Resources for Educational Research

The way power and theory come together has been questioned by researchers for decades [1,2,3,4,5]. The production and dissemination of theory never occur in a vacuum free of historical, social and economic conditions [6]. It is reasonable to argue that this applies to research in the field of education. The entire educational theorizing process—from the selection of research topics and the search for literature, through the design of research and the collection of data, to the interpretation and explanation of evidence [7,8,9,10]—are all influenced, if not decisively determined, by the current order of the world’s research powers. In effect, Anglophone universities control educational research, and have greater say over what constitutes educational theory [1]. By limiting, if not restricting the theories from Western Europe and North American available in English, the world’s research powers “set up unnecessary and competing hierarchies of thought which re-inscribe the politics of domination by designating [other theoretical] work as either inferior, superior, or more or less worthy of attention” [6] (p. 64). Euro-American theories, philosophies, pedagogies and methodologies dominate educational research and higher degree researchers (HDRs) education [3,4,5]. This expansion of Euro-American educational theories in the English language renews and reshapes their direct rules over the colonized people in African and Asian countries and regions into indirect and covert forms of intellectual inequalities [4]. Intellectual inequalities in the international educational research communities are reinforced, not just reproduced, through the use of the English language as the norm and the demarcation line for intelligence [11,12]. This shapes the current imbalance in the world’s educational research. It divides different educational researchers, languages and theories into the dominated and the marginalized [1,13,14]. This leads to a situation where marginalized researchers rely on the Euro-American theories and ideas in English. More importantly, this undermines the possibilities for original educational theorizing. History indicates that scientific knowledge production is “a global phenomenon whose roots would be not in a single civilization or region, rather in transmission, and/or in the circulation of ideas occurring largely before sixteenth century” [2] (p. 281). Concepts, models, theories and methods have been generated by researchers from multilingual backgrounds and diverse intellectual cultures [15,16].

With the dominance of Euro-American theories, there has been an increased emphasis by government in Anglophone countries in particular on the internationalization of its higher education across the world [17]. English is regarded as the most efficient, if not the only legitimate, language to perform education and educational research [13]. At the same time, researchers in Asia have gained a keen awareness of the linguistically and theoretically based inequalities in the standardized monolingual English higher education and research [1,13,18]. They recognize the underlying monolingual English mindset that is reflected at various levels from educational language policies and planning to actual uses in teaching and publishing [11,12,14,17]. They are, therefore, more willing to develop the linguistic-theoretical capabilities of bilingual HDRs in their research education. They argue that bilingual HDRs are capable of critical thinking and educational theorizing by drawing upon theoretical knowledge from two languages [11,18].

Therefore, this paper argues that regardless of the language(s) used, educational theorizing is a process of asking questions to answer problems of educational policies and practices. In research, bilingual researchers can raise issues that are taken-for-granted and thus undiscussed in a certain educational system by bringing in insights from another one [19]. Bilingual HDRs have the potential, disposition and can develop the capabilities for multilingual educational theorizing [11,18,20]. They make use of their knowledge of metaphors, images and concepts in more than one language to extend the possibilities of theorizing educational phenomena and problems [11,21,22,23]. This is defined as multilingual educational theorizing in this paper. By questioning the monolingual English Euro-American theorizing norm and exploring the alternative multilingual possibility, the author attempts to elaborate why and how multilingual educational theorizing is contextualized. Hence the current monolingual/multilingual debate may be extended in the perspective of bilingual HDRs education and educational research.

To this point, this paper has briefly reviewed the prevalent monolingual Euro-American dominated educational research status quo. Against this, it has pointed to the potential for multilingual educational theorizing and the production of novel linguistic-theoretical knowledge from multiple languages. In the next section, the universalization of Euro-American theories is reconsidered along with its embodiment in monolingual English educational research worldwide. Situated in such monolingual Euro-American theoretical dominated educational research context, a Dui Hua (对话) standpoint to other languages and intellectual cultures is outlined as an alternative path to transform the current problems in uniformized, standardized Anglophone HDR education [19,24]. In line with this concern, the discussion section calls for multilingual educational theorizing to challenge the monolingual theoretical dominance. In summary, this paper probes into the possibilities for multilingual educational theorizing by bilingual HDRs to benefit the entire educational research community.

2. Questioning the Monolingual/Multilingual Divide in Educational Theorizing

Anglophone governments and universities emphasize multi-cultural learning and the internationalization of their higher education to gain greater economic and political influences [25]. However, monolingual educational policies and practices prevail in HDR education at the expense of multilingualism in various forms including language policy planning, classroom teaching, academic assessment and research publication [12,17,25,26]. In Anglophone higher education, there is a tendency of divide between international non-native English speaking and local native English speaking students [23]. This divide starts with and works through the uses of English as the standardized language in education and research to confirm and enhance “the ideology of monolingual states and identities held by privileged communities in the West” [21] (p. 9). Literature has highlighted that bilingual students are inclined to be labelled as deficient both linguistically and cognitively in education, from the primary to the tertiary level, in many English-speaking countries despite their bilingual potentials and behaviors [11,17,21,22,23,25]. In educational research, this linguistically-based inequality is reflected through the dominance, if not the privileged position of Euro-American theories largely expressed in the English language. Consequently, bilingual HDRs and their linguistic-theoretical knowledge in their home language other than English tend to be underestimated in educational theorizing [1,11,13,18,20]. In the wake of post-colonial and/or decolonizing theories, the re-construal of Euro-American theories and English-only monolingualism is gradually gaining attention [1,3,4,13].

2.1. Universalization of Euro-American Theories

Researchers have noted that local, indigenous theories and theorizing in Asia and Africa have been suppressed by Euro-American theories since the European scientific revolutions and the ensuing imperial colonizing expansions in the 17th and 18th centuries [27]. Local knowledge is regarded as of value merely for immediate and/or local uses [28], while the Euro-American theory is considered as superior and universal [4]. Since the colonial era, local, traditional and indigenous theories have been considered as databases or data resources [1,18,27]. This view rationalizes arranging the role of data supplier to indigenous people and theory generator to Euro-Americans. Non-Euro-American people and their theoretical knowledge are excluded from academic theorizing “as being poor in linguistic expression and lacking the capacity for clear conceptualization” [13] (p. 74).

Being labelled as traditional, non-Euro-American theoretical knowledge is relegated to ideologies of the past. This forecloses the prospects for bringing forward and modernizing such concepts. This also denies such theoretical knowledge the potential to be tested to see if it operates across time and space. While people’s intellectual heritage may be preserved, it is also refashioned through inter-generational and socio-historical changes. Non-Euro-American knowledge is “a living past, a living future, and we are the living connection in between [and it] is active on all these levels” [29] (p. 15). However, being regarded as non-systematic, non-Euro-American theoretical knowledge is delegitimized as theory, since it does not fit perfectly into the Western scientific structure [27,30]. It is thus deemed to be inferior to its Euro-American counterparts.

Here, it is important not to fall prey to cultural relativism. The values buried in non-Euro-American theoretical knowledge may or may not confirm “its own rules about processes of knowing, which diverge from the rules of science regarding evidence, repeatability, and quantification” [31] (p. 8). The problem with the relativist standpoint is that it separates and rates cultures and bodies of knowledge. Euro-American theories are considered to be formal and scientific knowledge with the “civilizing mission to replace backward local traditions with more-advanced practices” [13] (p. 84). This reflects a vertical, hierarchical power relation among the Euro-American and non-Euro-American epistemological systems [19,32]. Such an intellectual hierarchy tends to relativize or rate the positions of certain cultures by “treating them as less important values whose absoluteness and ideality could be sacrificed” [19] (p. 140).

In scholarly encounters between different epistemological systems, there are always divergences in terms of content and values. While differences may lead to conflicts, divergences provide opportunities for all parties to explore “the unthought” to go beyond the taken-for-granted viewpoints. With struggles and combats over differences, it seems that a balance between intellectual cultures tends to be reached where a certain body of knowledge establishes a dominant position by asserting its universality [19]. Currently, the Euro-American theory and English have secured a dominant role in the world today. Its epistemological, methodological and theoretical knowledge is proclaimed as universal, or standardized for all humankind through intellectual education [3]. Theories emanating from non-Euro-American knowledge from another intellectual culture, society and ethnic group are not regarded seriously. This is because they are seen as specific or limited to a given intellectual culture [27,30,31,33,34]. The practice of universalizing Euro-American theories has involved categorizing non-Euro-American theories as local knowledge. The use of the term local knowledge implies a constrained and closed system that is detached and isolated from the global context. It also reinforces the tendency to see local knowledge as lacking broader applications and benefits [24,30,31].

According to the pervasive Euro-American criteria, non-Euro-American knowledge is always criticized as lacking “any serious sense [of] theoretical thinking” [24] (p. 210). As a result, indigenous, local and regional concepts of non-Euro-American origin have been excluded, or at least marginalized, as legitimate sources of theory. However, it is dangerous to take for granted that the intellectual culture of a “relatively small number of white people in the North explain[s] the ‘is and ought’ of the world” [3] (p. 7). Against such a hierarchical conception of theories and languages, efforts have been made to validate empirical indigenous, local and regional non-Euro-American theories and languages by employing scientific methods [32]. In this context, non-Euro-American knowledge from the periphery is treated as fertile theoretical tools, abounding with intellectual resources. From these multiple languages, useful analytical concepts can be extracted and fitted into the Euro-American scientific frame [1,33].

The presumed superiority of Euro-American theory is open to question, especially if such theory is assumed to be “acultural, objective, universal, generalizable and ungendered” [32] (p. 363). However, there is also an opposing view that theories and truth may vary “because of the influence of society, class, and group affiliation in society, truth is also a matter of perspectives” [1] (p. 602). Though it is debatable whether truth is absolute, some researchers argue that some concepts generated in Euro-American cultural context may not necessarily be applicable to different educational settings. They may not be effectively relied upon for use in other educational contexts, because they are products of Euro-American histories and societies [13]. They would be better if re-developed with input from non-Euro-American theories. Even in a time of international education, different epistemologies and intellectual cultures have not been blended into a single uniformized theoretical framework. Rather the contacts among intellectual cultures have involved both assimilation and alienation. Different intellectual cultures and theories have always been “brewing and mingling, hybridizing and mutating ceaselessly” [19] (p. 141) to maintain their features in contact with one another. History shows that intellectual knowledge systems exchange and co-prosper [2,15,16]. There is no one body of theoretical knowledge that has not been reconstructed without reference to the others, or exists alone without any intellectual exchanges. Theorizing occurs along a continuum of flux between intellectual cultures where bodies of theoretical knowledge are positioned.

There is the counter-claim holds that non-Euro-American theories can also be rational and scientific. They can be generated “through methods that are empirical, experimental, and systematic, whereas Western science, by contrast, may be seen as narrow and naïve in the way it considers and defines questions” [31] (p. 5). Such a view, however, is not really helpful. Opposition to the taken-for-granted universality of Euro-American theories is “giving, if not hope, at least affected rage at the injustices that the modern brought down on them and their people, while promising so much” [4] (p. 15). Rage is not helpful, unless it can be directed to the challenging task of theorizing. However, by placing these troubles and problems in the spotlight with such polemical language, there may be more opportunities to attract attention, if not do the hard work to seek answers and solutions. Good educational theories and theorizing are “the art and science of the exile, the stranger, the wanderer, the unsettled, and the displaced” [4] (p. 16). Bilingual international HDRs fall into this category and some may have the disposition to develop their capabilities for multilingual theorizing. Standing on this ground, bilingual educational HDRs may reconsider the monolingual/multilingual divide embodied in the dichotomy of Euro-American/non-Euro-American theories.

2.2. Critique of the Dichotomy of Euro-American/Non-Euro-American Knowledge

There is an argument, questionable though it is, for the incommensurability of theoretical knowledge that focuses on the irreconcilable contradictions and discrepancies between Euro-American and non-Euro-American knowledge [31,32]. This dichotomy between the West and the rest has been increasingly problematized in post-colonial decolonization theories [3,4,35].

Simply opposing the West and the non-West leads to “a competition between different forms of universalism, a battle over which version has greater moral legitimacy and is less complicit in the expansion of colonialism” [13] (p. 90). Further, it exacerbates the uniformizing practices of the dominant West and arouses resentment among the marginalized non-West. The concept ‘the West’, in effect, is very problematic in various senses. For instance, the uses of the term the West may lead to negligence of its diverse and heterogeneous nature for it refers to a cluster of different nations, cultures and ethnic groups. Further, the uses of notions such as the West and the Rest tend to draw a dividing line between these two, leading to a simplistic dichotomy. Moreover, the uses of the concepts of the West and the Western frequently involve a Eurocentric bias, describing the West/Rest in master/slave and superior/inferior narratives. Conscious of these controversies, the terms such as the West, the Western, the Euro-American and the non-Western are used in this paper in a sense to describe “the fact that they are all different from the Rest [and on the other hand,] the Rest, though different among themselves, are represented as the same in the sense that they are all different from the West” [26] (p. 189).

Another reason to use terms of the West and the Western here in this paper is to underscore their pervasive presence in educational research discourse and to question the underlying linguistically and theoretically based inequalities attached to these concepts. To deconstruct the dichotomy of West/non-West, credit needs to be given to non-Euro-American theory where it is rational and rigorous. Researchers are now arguing that indigenous, local and regional knowledge that is non-Euro-American is a critical form of theoretical knowledge that co-exists with and in some instances constitutes Euro-Western theoretical knowledge [13,30,31,32]. That is, Euro-American theoretical knowledge is one among numerous forms of knowledge [1,32]. Those who support this proposition reject taking the Euro-American theoretical knowledge as the universal standards or the only way of knowing. Instead, they argue for a multi-dimensional knowledge production that draws upon linguistic-theoretical resources from more than one language [34].

3. Adopting a Dui Hua (对话) Standpoint to Educational Theorizing

There are increasingly intensified exchanges and interactions among researchers with various languages and from diverse intellectual cultures. The relationship among divergent languages and intellectual cultures is being renegotiated and remolded in line with changes in international education. Encouraging dialogues between intellectual cultures prevails in both government and educational policies as a panacea to all cultural conflicts and tensions. However, hidden in this single-answer-to-all-problems lies the ambition for Anglo-American hegemony. In the competition to secure the top position in power relations, the non-Euro-American languages and theories are marginalized [2,13,19]. To interrupt the dominance of Euro-American theories, bilingual HDRs may develop their theorizing capabilities using other languages. Rather than worship established theories in monolingual English, more innovation in educational theorizing might be possible using a larger linguistic repertoire. Further, to mediate, if not mitigate the excesses of the uniformization of Euro-American theories, a standpoint that values multilingual theorizing may be adopted to produce a more intellectually balanced and diverse educational milieu where multilingual educational theorizing is the norm [11]. For these reasons, the possibilities of multilingual educational theorizing with a Dui Hua (对话) standpoint will be proposed and considered in this section.

3.1. Shared Intelligence

An intellectual culture is always defined with reference to others. No intellectual culture exists only by itself; rather coexists with others [1,16,19]. Languages, intellectual cultures and theoretical knowledge are always “in a process at once of homogenizing and heterogenizing [themselves], of confounding and demarcating, of dis-identifying and re-identifying, of conforming and resisting, of imposing (dominating) and entering into dissidence” [19] (p. 142). This applies equally to Anglophone and Chinese intellectual cultures for instance. Anglophone and Chinese intellectual cultures are inter-related and do not stand alone without connection to each other and to others [2,15,16,19,35]. The Euro-American theoretical knowledge is developed with continuous inputs from other sources including the non-Western, and vice versa [16].

Abrogation of limits and demarcation are ironically elements of all intellectual culture and bodies of theoretical knowledge. It is the tension between these two tendencies that makes human knowledge dynamic and transformative across all times. Theoretical knowledge is foremost and essentially dynamic [19]. An intellectual culture would be a dead one if it positions itself as singular for instance in terms of language, without any relation to the other intellectual cultures or languages. Based on this standpoint to knowledge, Jullien argues for the shared intelligence among intellectual cultures [19].

Shared intelligence among intellectual cultures views “each of the parties compromising, each taking a step back, in a spirit of concession, by seeking conciliation so as to avoid excesses” [19] (p. 141). Each intellectual culture, either the dominant or the marginalized, needs to respect the intellectual equality of other cultures and seek mutual exchanges of theoretical knowledge among them. This mutual respect may be realized by “being opening out, being finally instigated on both sides intelligently as something face-to-face made from the various possibilities engaged in by thought” [19] (p. 141). Shared intelligence or equality of intellectual cultures, leads to a two-way process of knowledge production instead of one-way knowledge transfer. This is the premise for pedagogical efforts and actions to disrupt the prevailing hierarchical academic order. Otherwise, what we will get would be merely “an extraordinarily resigned, dispassionate, consensual, and at same the time [sic] boring, conception of culture” [19] (p. 141) and of international education. By starting with the presupposition of the shared intelligence among intellectual cultures, a common ground of understanding may make possible new theoretical insights. The divergences of languages open up a new basis of equality.

On the one hand, dialogues promoted by dominant Anglo-American interests are criticized as being a compromise to the uproar created by non-Euro-American critique. They are considered to be a “more cunning way, a covert means of passing on their universalism” [19] (p. 157). Anglo-American interests seem to be losing absolute controlling powers of the world’s economy, politics and intellectual cultures, involving their “inability to grasp the inherited multiplicities of the [previous] colonial worlds, the resilience of non-Western knowledges to homogenization, the resistance against cognitive annihilation of subaltern standpoints, and unleash the transformative potential of different histories and alternative conceptualizations” [15] (p. 2). On the other hand, dialogues advocated by the marginalized non-Euro-American researchers tend to re-affirm its once glorious history and immutable, incomparable traditions, lurking to re-gain their dominant controls from their Euro-American counterparts [16,19]. Mindful of the hostility and confrontations in such dialogues, a Dui Hua (对话) standpoint is argued for in this paper, to reconfigure the West/non-West intellectual relation. This Dui Hua (对话) standpoint is neither a concession to Westerners who strive for a hegemonic, controlling, universalizing or uniformizing discourse [12], nor a revitalization of once glorious Chinese, Indian or Egyptian civilization. Instead, openness to others in terms of intellectual equality is emphasized.

Though always translated as dialogue, there are more implications buried within the Chinese word Dui Hua (对话). This concept is composed of two characters which have poly-semantic origins and explanations. Dui (对 duì) originally meant holding a burning candle in one hand. It now refers to various meanings, including face-to-face positioning, facing in a given direction, as well as a couplet and dividing into halves. Its core meaning is being correct, as opposed to being wrong. It can be used as a verb to mean answering, replying, responding and coping with something. Dui (对) also has connotations of treating, comparing and opposing. Hua (话 huà) means a word, speech, saying, remark or idea that is openly expressed. Thus, here in this paper, Dui Hua (对话) is construed to mean the mutual exchange of ideas in a way that is oriented to produce knowledge premised on a common ground of understanding and to use divergences within and between languages to create complementarity. Dui Hua (对话) values the creation of ideas to be initiated with the common ground of understanding and based on divergences in languages. This positions both English and Chinese as equal to the task of theorizing. A Dui Hua (对话) standpoint approaches the West/non-West intellectual relations to emphasize creating a common ground of inter-cultural understanding, as well as the value of divergences for producing alternative possibilities. These two stances are the premises for multilingual educational theorizing which draws on multi-linguistic-theoretical resources through this pedagogical innovation. Thus, the divide and distinction between the West and the rest is questioned through this Dui Hua (对话) standpoint.

3.2. Common Ground of Understanding

Intellectual cultures share certain commonalities, which provide a foundation for common understandings and furthering the co-production of theoretical knowledge. All intellectual cultures and bodies of theoretical knowledge point to a shared equal intelligence. They maintain “a provisional communicability and that everything, concerning the cultural, is intelligible, without loss or residue” [19] (p. 160). A common ground of understandings between intellectual cultures based on commonalities comes first, before exploring divergences.

Sometimes researchers may be too hasty to ascribe the differences among cultures as essential and dividing. These differences may not be natural, but created by the categories used by the researchers themselves. Differences in method do not necessarily lead to differences in theories of the world. In an exploration of African modes of theorizing, in relation to Euro-American theory, Horton highlights two causes for the misinterpretation of the forms by Anglophone anthropologists, namely their unfamiliarity with theorizing in another language and their misinterpretation of divergences between intellectual cultures [24]. According to Horton, divergences of languages, or “unfamiliar idioms”, are misjudged as absolute differences from features of theorizing between intellectual cultures. This misjudgment brings critiques of non-Euro-American theoretical knowledge [24]. Local indigenous knowledge is seen as incommensurable and irreconcilable with the prevailing “scientific” Euro-American theory.

Against this agenda, it is necessary to establish a common ground of understanding by unveiling linguistic and methodological blind points. Focusing on creating points of theoretical commonality between two intellectual cultures is necessary, and so much so that a prerequisite to identifying the gains to be made through exploring divergences. This sequence, where establishing commonalities comes first, does not suggest sameness of intellectual cultures or license the universality of grand theories. Rather, the formation of intellectual commonalities is to establish a common ground of understanding to seek co-production of theoretical knowledge. Only by working towards a shared common ground of understanding, are we “less likely to mistake differences of idiom for differences of substance, and more likely to end up identifying those features which really do distinguish one kind of thought from the other” [24] (p. 208). The focus then turns to identifying divergences in theorizing.

3.3. Divergence of Languages for Original Theorizing

Referring to intellectual cultures, Jullien makes a distinction between “difference” and “divergence”. “Difference” is a standpoint that emphasizes the distinctions among intellectual cultures. Difference is used to categorize various intellectual cultures in a descriptive way, often in an atmosphere of antagonism between cultures [19]. On the other hand, “divergence” means opening up the distance between intellectual cultures. The emphasis is on exploring the possibilities of new theoretical thoughts rather than the expected, the conventional, the known and the predictable by probing into divergences [19]. All theoretical knowledge is expressed through one language or another. Language is an unavoidable tool for theorizing and language itself has to be probed to discover divergences among intellectual cultures.

Divergence of languages questions the normative, taken-for-granted perspective that non-native English speaking students passively follow the standardized monolingual English and Euro-American way of educational theorizing [1,14,18]. Rather, it suggests that bilingual HDRs take on their languages and intellectual cultures to open up possibilities for theoretical innovation. It is argued that these divergences highlighted within and between languages are valuable resources for educational theorizing [19]. In other words, bilingual researchers who attend to the divergences in their languages may generate novel resources for theorizing. People in an intellectual culture tend to only reflect and exploit the “principal options, or prejudices, in the capacity his own language articulated so as to express the world” [19] (p. 149). Therefore, looking at another language for its divergences, and looking beyond the familiar may help bilingual HDRs to reconsider the taken-for-granted, ostensibly puzzle free or just issues [24]. By unfolding the unthought and the neglected, bilingual HDRs can question the familiar conceptualization of the world, locating divergence of thoughts [19]. These divergences of thought are likely to lead to new paths and possibilities for theorizing. Such theorizing has to be tested for its strengths in certain areas, since “according to the possibilities it exploits, [it may be] more or less fertile; according to the veins followed, it may go more or less far in one direction or another” [19] (p. 153). Thus, as in the past [2,15,16], different languages may offer various theoretical resources to interpret the world. It should be noted that it is not language itself that makes the world different. Words and expressions in a language function in the same way to describe the world. What make the divergence of languages powerful in opening up new paths to conceptualize the world are the theoretical engagements involved in the encounters and confrontations of languages [24]. Using the theoretical resources generated through exploring the divergences within and across languages may bring unnoticed or seemingly self-evident ideas to the spotlight of debate for better explanations or solutions [19].

By considering the divergence of languages, the aim is not to list the differences and distinctions in linguistic forms. Rather, the goal is to probe the new possibilities of educational theorizing by highlighting the taken-for-granted issues and bringing in new perspectives from another language and intellectual culture [19]. The divergence stance positions Euro-American theories as one important theoretical resource among many other potentially useful theoretical resources [13]. This means that research educators and bilingual HDRs can acknowledge and value all languages and intellectual cultures as sources of linguistic, conceptual and theoretical knowledge for educational theorizing. In other words, the pedagogical focus is the possibilities of innovative and novel ways of theorizing using other languages and intellectual cultures.

4. Discussion: Multilingual Educational Theorizing Challenges Monolingual Euro-American Theoretical Dominance

In sum, Euro-American theories have prevailed in educational research for many decades. Theories currently taught to internationalize higher education and used for educational research follow the Euro-American norms [1,18,20,28]. The English language is offered as the only scientific way for exploring and understanding the world [12,17,26]. The emphasis on the Euro-American theories and the marginalization of non-Euro-American theorizing establishes a vertical, hierarchical power relation between these two. This intellectual hierarchy is “implicated in the connection between science and imperialism, colonialism and industrial capitalism” [32] (p. 362). It is likely that in such situations, bilingual HDRs and researchers who are not native English speaking and/or of Euro-American ancestry tend to feel excluded by the uses of standardized monolingual English and Euro-American theories [5,12,14,17,18]. They are always othered and treated as outsiders both as students and researchers. Through the dominance of Euro-American theories in educational research, this privileged theoretical knowledge is expressed in theorizing processes and the exclusive uses of the English language.

Consequently, researchers and HDRs from non-Euro-American backgrounds may fail to recognize the potential of their own languages and intellectual cultures for educational theorizing [1,18,24]. Their preference for collecting data from their homeland and analyzing them using Euro-American theory gives expression to, and reflects the global division of intellectual labor. They are data generators and Euro-Americans are theory generators. There are at least two reasons for this. First, it is due to the captive mind of non-Euro-American researchers. This captive mind leads to an unequal scholarly dialogue, directed by the world’s Anglophone educational powers [1]. Second, there is the idea that the dominant Euro-American theories are better. Euro-American researchers consolidate their dominating position by excluding their counterparts from theorizing. They do so by acting as the gatekeepers to set the criteria for the language and theoretical system to be used for education and educational research [1,12,17,18,24].

In response to this hierarchical, unidirectional model of research education and educational research, the Dui Hua (对话) standpoint emphasizes the joint search for common intellectual grounds of understanding based on shared intelligence. This lays the foundation for multilingual educational theorizing. Here, multilingual educational theorizing refers to the use of multilingual and intercultural knowledge to theorize educational issues. The Dui Hua (对话) standpoint may help bring the marginalized intellectual cultures and theoretical knowledge forward, into a position that is equal, rather than opposed to being dominated or neglected. This may also help to cultivate a shared intelligence among intellectual cultures, whereby “each person renders the values of the other intelligible in their own language and, consequently, becomes able to reflect upon the basis they have established” [19] (p. 141). More importantly, bringing non-European languages and theoretical knowledge to the foreground means recognizing the theoretical potentials and contributions of the non-Euro-American researchers and HDRs for original educational theorizing [1,13,18,28]. Thus bilingual HDRs would have the opportunity to mobilize their diverse linguistic-theoretical knowledge to interpret and understand educational phenomena. The non-Euro-American concepts that bilingual HDRs have access to can be reconstructed as theoretical tools that may provide alternative and/or deeper understandings of the educational issues under investigation [18].

One intellectual culture may be better understood and comprehended in relation to another. Being indulged in the traditions and routines of one intellectual culture—despite its inherent diversity—means that we are constrained and confined by it and its language. It is hard to question seemingly self-evident knowledge until awakened from the outside by knowledge expressed in a different language. It is through encounters with another intellectual culture that a researcher

becomes aware of the culture ‘from which one comes’, in which one has been raised—that’s to say, through which a subject is each time awakened. And it is even only by emerging from our own culture that we take into account how much we do not know about the culture we so peremptorily (possessively) consider to be our own.

[12] (p. 143)

Observing and conceptualizing one intellectual culture from the outside in relation to another one is likely to provide innovative resources for theorizing. These insights into various ideas open up to re-considerations the familiar, taken-for-granted and sometimes buried content and value in one’s own knowledge [10,19]. These buried or taken-for-granted ideas may be self-evident in one intellectual culture. For Jullien, translation could bring the divergence in two languages and intellectual cultures into tension. By translation, the values and thoughts expressed in both languages can be unfolded and explored, leading to common understanding of novel conceptualizations. Translation encourages careful contemplation of one or more concepts within a body of knowledge represented in a given language. It also compels the elaboration of their meanings in terms of the knowledge in another language. Translation pushes bilingual HDRs to reconsider and re-construe the unthought aspects in one epistemology by foregrounding the divergences within and between languages [19]. The dominating meaning/reading of concepts in one language interposes its pre-established, prescribed and pre-imposed expectations and values on bilingual HDRs. The uncovering and rediscovering of the unexpected and the unconventional in these ideas means highlighting the divergences within the language. This approach to theorizing cannot be realized under the rule of one standardized language, English in current global intellectual milieu. Therefore, knowing two languages and intellectual cultures, bilingual HDRs may provide the innovative and transformative potential to reinterpret and reconfigure educational issues. They may crack and escape the universalized and uniformalized Euro-American theoretical frameworks. This is the focus and significance of constructing, exploring and calling for multilingual educational theorizing with a Dui Hua (对话) standpoint.

5. Conclusions: Potential of Multilingual Educational Theorizing

Taking into account the ambitions of universalization evident in the internationalization of Anglophone education and efforts to revitalize non-Western theorizing, multilingual educational theorizing may provide an alternative path to the current divide created by English-only monolingualism. Dui Hua (对话) takes the position of a common ground for understanding as its starting point, and then seeks original thoughts through divergences within and across languages. It builds bilingual HDRs’ theorizing capabilities by having them use concepts from their two or more languages to do so. Through multilingual theorizing, bilingual HDRs can make use of their knowledge of two or more languages to extend the possibilities for theorizing educational phenomena. Moreover, by pushing the boundaries between languages and intellectual cultures with their bilingual behaviors and actions, bilingual HDRs may escape the imprisonment of the captive mind generate new theories. They could conduct relevant educational research which is original; informed by local educational realities; attached to the real world educational needs; and accessible to the public [1]. The value of using multilingual knowledge for educational theorizing is that it may offer us alternative horizons, perspectives and scenarios.

For bilingual HDRs, their knowledge of more than one language and intellectual culture offers them new opportunities to recognize and re-elaborate educational issues and problems that are frequently debated as well as those that are taken-for-granted and otherwise neglected. They can use two or more languages as linguistic-theoretical resources for interpreting and making sense of educational policies and practices. Undertaking research from “another angle on (and engagement with) what is unthought [in one language]” [19] (p. 168) is the essence of multilingual educational theorizing. If this is the case, then further research may be conducted to outline and work out feasible schemes and ways to perform multilingual educational theorizing in education and research. As suggested by Jullien with his preference for translation, insights may be drawn from studies into multilingualism such as translanguaging [11,21,22]. Further, direct evidence from bilingual HDRs and researchers may be conducive to not only testing the theoretical inquiry in this paper but also formulating a workable pedagogy for multilingual educational theorizing.