Language biographical schemas, response modalities and L2-strategies: a sociolinguistic approach to language biographies

Abstract In the context of sociolinguistic approaches to migration and multilingualism, language biographies have gained increasing prominence, particularly over the past fifteen years. Their significance in the field of migration linguistics lies, among other aspects, in their openness – both as a research method and as a research subject. This article addresses the question of how to appropriately evaluate language biographical data, a topic that has received relatively little scholarly attention to date. The proposed evaluation criteria focus on both content-related units of analysis (language biographical schemas) and linguistic units of analysis (L2 strategies, response modalities). In this context, language biographical interviews with young refugees from Afghanistan, Iran, and Syria serve as the empirical data source.