Participative Multilingual Identity Construction in Higher Education: Challenging Monolingual Ideologies and Practices

This theoretical paper builds on the authors’ existing scholarship exploring the value of incorporating multilingual identity-focused pedagogical practice into language learning at the secondary school level, by establishing the rationale for extending such practices to the tertiary level, both in language learning specifically and in tertiary education more generally. We previously reconceptualised multilingualism as an all-encompassing concept that one can lay claim to, regardless of proficiency levels in multiple languages, dialects, and other communicative modes, and outlined a pedagogical framework for “participative construction of multilingual identity in the language classroom”. In establishing a rationale for applying this framework and its underpinning conceptualisation of multilingual identity to the (increasingly linguistically diverse) tertiary education sector, this current paper critically examines the literature on attitudes towards multilingualism in higher education; and on evidence for the value of identity-focused pedagogies. We outline approaches to embedding awareness-raising of multilingual identities, and related identity-focused pedagogical approaches. At a time when the English language remains powerful at the tertiary level, these proposals are deemed important for challenging the ongoing dominance of monolingual ideals in higher education, especially in Anglophone contexts, where increasing numbers of international students with varied multilingual identities and repertoires are perceived as deficient when judged against monolingual, native-speaker norms. Finally, the next steps in the research agenda are recommended.