From Expectation to Strategy: Plurilingual Publishing Practices and Intellectual Footprint in Early‐Career Scholarship

Abstract This qualitative study focuses on early‐career scholars working in francophone institutions in Canada as they negotiate plurilingual research publication practices. Data from four early‐career scholars, collected across two interview rounds over a two‐year period, show how language choice in publishing is a complex process which cannot be understood simply through the lens of linguistic proficiency. Instead, the participants' trajectories reflect strategic and agentive decisions shaped by audience, institutional context, and evolving professional identities. While English was initially viewed as a pathway to scholarly legitimacy, participants increasingly mobilized French, thereby expanding their engagement across communities. The findings also highlight the role of access to resources and geographic positioning in enabling plurilingual publishing practices, alongside a shift toward greater agency in publication decision‐making over time. By documenting how early‐career scholars move from aligning with dominant publishing norms to actively shaping their own dissemination practices, this study contributes to research on English for Research Publication Purposes while foregrounding the importance of plurilingual approaches to scholarly communication. More broadly, the findings position plurilingual publishing as central to promoting more inclusive and context‐responsive knowledge production in the field of language education and applied linguistics. This Abstract is available in French in the .