Special Issue "Multidisciplinary Approaches to Multilingual Sustainability"

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 September 2021.

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Mirta Vernice
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Humanities, University of Urbino, Italy
Interests: psycholinguistics; language acquisition; sentence processing; applied linguistics; literacy development; multilingualism

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Multilingualism, either at the individual or at community level, has a profound impact on our society. However, many countries still find it difficult to manage linguistic diversity as a positive element from cultural, social, educational, and economic points of view. Additionally, when considering indicators of sustainable development, those related to language rights in a linguistically diverse context hardly play a role (the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations provide a striking example in this respect).

In the light of the above considerations, the challenges posed by a multilingual society involve the need for enacting scientifically motivated support actions within different contexts, such as education and healthcare, in order to make multilingualism central in the sustainability debate.

To this purpose, the Special Issue aims to collect empirical and theoretical contributions related to the study of multilingualism from a multidisciplinary perspective. Studies might address the implications of multilingualism at the individual (e.g., cognitive, and psychological effects across the lifespan), clinical (e.g., implications for clinical interventions), educational (e.g., impact on educational practices) and social levels (e.g., language policies).

Research topics include but are not exclusive to cognitive effects of bi-multilingualism, biliteracy, bilingual education, social aspects of multilingualism, heritage language, and minority languages, language policy.

References:

Berthoud, A.C., Grin, F., and Lüdi, G. (2013). Exploring the dynamics of multilingualism: The DYLAN project. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Bialystok, E., Luk, G., & Kwan, E. (2009). Bilingualism, biliteracy, and learning to read: Interactions among languages and writing systems. Scientific Studies of Reading, 9(1), 43-61.

Kohnert, K. (2010). Bilingual Children with Primary Language Impairment: Issues, Evidence and Implications for Clinical Actions. Journal of Communication Disorders, 43, 456-473.

Bialystok E., Abutalebi J., Bak T. H., Burke D. M., Kroll J. F. (2016). Aging in two languages: implications for public health. Ageing Research Review, 27, 56–60.

Gazzola, M, and Bengt-Arne W. (2016). The Economics of Language Policy. Cambridge (MA): MIT Press.

Gorter, D., & Cenoz, J. (2011). Multilingual education for European minority languages: The Basque country and Friesland. International Review of Education, 57, 651-666.

MacSwan, J., (2017). A multilingual perspective on translanguaging. American Educational Research Journal, 54 (1),167–201.

May, S. and Hornberger, N. H. (2008). Language Policy and Political Issues in Education. New York: Springer.

Romaine, S. (2000). Language in society. An introduction to sociolinguistics (2nd [1994]). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Prof. Dr. Mirta Vernice
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All papers will be peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • multilingualism
  • multilingual development
  • multilingual education
  • minority languages
  • heritage languages
  • language policies

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

Article
Educating Language Minority Students in South Korea: Multilingual Sustainability and Linguistic Human Rights
Sustainability 2021, 13(6), 3122; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13063122 - 12 Mar 2021
Viewed by 459
Abstract
In the context of globalization, the landscape of language in Korea has changed dramatically in the last three decades because of the influx of marriage migrants and foreign workers. The growing number of immigrant and international marriages has led to the emergence of [...] Read more.
In the context of globalization, the landscape of language in Korea has changed dramatically in the last three decades because of the influx of marriage migrants and foreign workers. The growing number of immigrant and international marriages has led to the emergence of new linguistic minorities in Korea who have multicultural and multilingual backgrounds, and they challenge Korea’s long-lasting tradition of linguistic homogeneity and purity. Language related education for this newly emerging group of language minority students, whose number has increased dramatically since the late-1990s, has become a salient issue. This paper critically analyzes the current education policies and programs designed for the newly emerging group of language minority students, and examines the prospects for sustainable development of these students in Korea. In particular, it focuses on the underlying ideology of linguistic nationalism and assimilationist integration regime embedded in various education policy initiatives and reforms, which require language minority students to forgo their multilingual background and forcibly embrace linguistic homogeneity. The paper elaborates on alternative educational programs that could enable language minority students to achieve sustainable development and progress. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Multidisciplinary Approaches to Multilingual Sustainability)
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