Oskar Kokoschka 1937, Self-Portrait of a Degenerate Artist Amedeo Modigliani 1917, Jeanne Hébuterne (au chapeau)
Porosity of multilingual spaces
Amsterdam, August 2014
Master thesis Carmen Pérez del Pulgar Frowein (10863060)
Supervisor: Virginie Mamadouh
Second reader: Nesrin El Ayadi
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To my participants,
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1. INTRODUCTION ...... 5
1.1 Introduction and preliminary research question ...... 6
1.2 Language ideologies ...... 10
1.2.1 Conceptions of language and multilingualism ...... 13
1.2.2 Language and Culture ...... 17
1.2.3 Language and Identity ...... 20
1.2.4 Language and Space ...... 23
1.3 Aim of Research and Research Question ...... 26
2. METHODS...... 29
2.1 Research design ...... 29
2.2 Case selection ...... 30
2.3 Operationalisation ...... 33
2.4 Secondary data collection for the context ...... 35
2.5 Linguistic biography and mental mapping ...... 36
2.5.1 Recruitment of respondents for linguistic biography interview ...... 38
2.5.2 Data analysis method ...... 45
2.6 Limitations and external validity ...... 46
2.7 Ethical considerations ...... 48
3. CONTEXTUAL DOMINANT LANGUAGE IDEOLOGIES ...... 50
3.1 Cities and Countries of residence ...... 50
3.1.1 Madrid and Spain ...... 50
3.1.2 Amsterdam and the Netherlands ...... 58
3.2 Countries of origin ...... 64
3.2.1 France ...... 64
3.2.2 Germany ...... 68
4. POROSITY OF PRIVATE SPACES ...... 73
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5. IMPORTANCE OF MOTHER TONGUE ...... 89
6. REPRODUCTION OF DOMINANT LINGUISTIC IDEOLOGIES ...... 98
6.1 Source of the norm and negotiation of linguistic rules ...... 98
6.2 Hegemony of dominant language ideology ...... 103
7. POROSITY OF PUBLIC SPACES ...... 107
8. LANGUAGE AND INTEGRATION ...... 116
9. CONCLUSION ...... 122
10. BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 132
11. ANNEX 1 ...... 136
12. ANNEX 2. TRANSLATIONS ...... 137
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1. INTRODUCTION
Increased migration flows have resulted in an ‘intensifying cultural contact such that linguistic diversity increasingly characterises both local and global contexts’ (Valentine et al. 2008: 384). This tendency is presumably challenging the long assumed Western imagined landscape of discrete monolingual, monocultural and monoidentitarian political spatial units - predominantly the ones of the nation states. This imagined homogeneity within the states regarding the language, culture and identity of its population will be analysed here by using the concept of language ideology, originally used in the field of Linguistic Anthropology (Bauman and Griggs 2003, Ahearn 2012). Language ideologies are ‘cultural presuppositions and metalinguistic notions that name, frame and evaluate linguistic practices, linking them to the political, moral and aesthetic positions of the speakers, and to the institutions that support those positions and practices’ (Gal 2006:163). Whether it is framed as a novel circumstance prompted by globalisation and increased migration flows or as a revival of an old phenomenon of ‘rampant multilingualism and inveterate hybridity in traditional communities, before European modernity suppressed this knowledge in order to develop systems of commonality based on categorisation, classification and codification’ (Canagarajah’s in Otsuji and Pennycook 2010:246) the dominant language ideology of the states is understood to be challenged by the actual heterogeneous practices of multilingual speakers. In any event, it can be agreed that ‘the ideological assertion that one language equals one culture or one nation ignores the complexity of multilingual societies’ (Blackledge and Pavlenko 2001:253).
It becomes more complex if the different approaches to language that are being deployed at diverse scales are acknowledged. At the international and national scales, the dominant language ideology seems to prevail, very often also in multilingual states. This means that the underlying representation of each nation is still very much linked to the claim and adscription of an idiosyncratic language, culture and identity, elements which in turn are meant to be univocally related. This is not always reproduced at the smaller scales of the city. Some cities’ linguistic landscape is becoming linguistically more varied due to the multilingual populations inhabiting in them; the impact these transformation have of the managerial spheres of the city is nevertheless dubious and most of the times varied. There are nevertheless some institutional practices which are committed with the
5 commodification of multilingualism as an asset to attract international tourism, investment and high skilled workers.
The supranational case of the European Union is characterised by the promotion and tolerance of multilingualism, although the link between language, culture, identity, and national territory is still addressing these practices. Language seems to be still very much territorialized (one language, one territory) across all these different administrative and political scales and the adaptation to an ever increasing multilingual world seems to be trapped; not really knowing if and how to transform its institutions from a monolingual paradigm to a multilingual one. At most, parallel monolingual systems have been put into place (e.g. European Union) but a considerable shift away from the modern state has not been jet been taken.
Language ideologies are, as its name indicates, ideologies. Which in turn are deployed to legitimate very different social and political enterprises. In this case it is argued that the described dominant language ideologies are still determining the lenses through which both, the phenomena of multilingualism and the challenge it poses to the traditional arrangement of political units, are being analysed and managed. Blackledge and Pavlenko (2001:97) state in this line that ‘ideologies of language are therefore not about language alone, but are always socially situated and tied to questions of identity and power in societies’. Far from being reduced to the realm of linguistics, the way persons think about language seems to be surprisingly political.
In this chapter an introduction to the topic of language ideologies and the literature on the topic will be developed and a preliminary research question will be explained. Also the term language ideology and its main components will be analysed.
1.1 Introduction and preliminary research question
As has been mentioned, despite – or rather because of – the growing (or awakening) multilingualism of people and places the naturalisation of monolingual spaces and people and their allegiances to a particular state on this basis is still very much present in the current discourses and practices of the nation states, in its institutions and in its assumption that this monolingual norm is being reproduced by its ‘people’. Far from
6 adapting to the existent multilingualism, nation states seem to be somehow reversing the situation and are increasingly framing the growing migrant multilingual population as posing a threat to the viability and identity of the nation state. Of course, it is posing a threat to the traditional modern idea of the monolingual state but the question remains; who has to adapt? The ball seems to be in migrant’s court and migrants are increasingly forced to learn the language of the country of residence. Some states have implemented language and culture test as part of their naturalisation rules and/or applications for residency. Whilst the justification of these policies is varied, they rely on the common assumption that there is a national language (and culture) that all citizens have to master in order to be able to belong and participate in society without threatening the cohesion of the state. It is straightforward to observe how this requisite is anchored in the dominant language ideology which in is based on both, egalitarian liberal values advocating for having a common language that enables everybody to participate in a Habermasian ideal public sphere and the Herderian idea that ‘it is the possession of its own distinctive language that constitutes the touchstone of a people or Volk the sine qua non of its national identity and spirit’ (Bauman and Griggs 2003:169, italics in original). This old discourse which was key in the conformation of the modern nation states is now being mobilised with somehow new ideological purposes that today, as in the past, create structures of inequality and exclusion from the public domain (Cameron 2013, Bauman and Griggs 2003, Wodak and Boukala 2015).
Against this backdrop, this research aims to contribute to the existent body of work that assumes that ‘globalisation results in a reshuffling of sociolinguistic and language ideological patterns to a degree hitherto not fully recognized’ (Collins and Slembrouck 2005:109). At the centre of this body of work is the exploration of alternative understandings of language and of the role these play in the conformation of socio-spatial relations. These works (e.g. Auer 2005, Blackledge and Pavlenko 2001, Busch 2013, Collins and Slembrouck 2005, Gal 2006, Koefoed and Simonsen 2011, Otsuji and Pennycook 2010, Pietikäinen and Kelly-Holmes 2013, Ricento 2014) try to reconsider the assumed isomorphic relation between one language, one culture, one identity and one territory at the core of the ‘imagined communities’ presented by Anderson (1983).
The contribution of this research is not focused on reconsidering the dominant language ideologies per se or on abstractly suggesting theoretical alternatives. Rather, its focus is posed on understanding how migrants managing a multilingual life and experiencing very
7 much in person the effects of these language ideologies do rethink or take an alternative look at language and its relation to territory, identity and culture. Particularly the impact of two variables in the conformation of migrant’s language ideologies will be observed. These are first, the dominant language ideologies (both, the ones from their states of origin and the ones of the state/city of residence) and second, the experience of undergoing a migration.
This research is a study of the above mentioned characteristics which will be limited to the study of French and German migrants living in the cities of Amsterdam and Madrid. French and Germans are defined as persons born and raised in the mentioned countries.
Data will be collected through the conduction of linguistic biographies, supported by the development of a mental map, and a literature and policy review. The first is to find out the actual language practices and ideologies of participants across scales. Also the ‘important events in life’ that suggest a major shift in participant’s way of thinking about language will be explored during the interviews. The policy and literature review will be aiming at a greater understanding of the dominant language ideologies of the single states and cities in order to be able to identify possible connections with migrant’s reported linguistic ideologies.
If alternative language ideologies are being conformed in the reported linguistic practices and ideologies of this sample of migrants, these will imply different conceptions of language and its link to culture, territory and space. The interesting fact lies in the hypothesis that, if alternative language ideologies are emerging and being performed by some persons (in the case here, French and Germans living in Madrid and Amsterdam) the hegemony of the dominant language ideology of the state is already diminishing and new ways of thinking about language and managing a territory are already on the horizon. Whether this is the case or not, it seems relevant in any event try to understand which factors affect both, the reproduction of dominant language ideologies and the ‘creation’ of alternative ones.
This research is considered to be academically relevant for being deep seated in current literature and debates about language, territoriality, social identity and citizenship. It is in turn regarded as geographically significant for its cause –globalisation – and the very object of inquiry –language and language ideologies – are considered to be so. The
8 apparent challenge to hegemonic language ideologies has been assumed to be triggered by globalisation, ‘a spatial process in which geographical and institutional relations of scale (e.g. local, regional, national, and transnational) are central to understanding the social order’ (Collins and Slembrouck 2005:191)). With regards to language, the perspective taken here acknowledges the spatial dimensions of language and language ideologies. For not only (spoken) language always happens in space but furthermore – following Raffestin’s relational approach of territoriality ‘as a set of relationships rooted in ties to the material environment and other people or groups, and mediated by existing techniques and representations’ (Murphy, 2012:162) – we understand language and language ideologies as one of these ties, mediated techniques and representations which produce and are produced by space.
It is also regarded as socially relevant, given the effects that the different language ideologies have on persons – and especially migrant’s – lives. The dominant monolingual, monocultural language ideology of the state, ‘encourages the stereotyping of individuals based on putative membership in definable collectives with ascribed characteristics; this process can then result in classification schemes that place individuals into categories that reduce them to monolingual members of monocultures’ (Ricento, 2014:365). This affects in turn their negotiation of identity, their perceived competences – ‘immigrants are not multilinguals, they are perpetual language learners’ (Collins and Slembrouck, 2005:192) – and inclusion in the society. Certain language ideologies imply diverse normative understandings of people’s and groups rights of belonging. Therefore they radically affect the notions of membership, citizenship and sense of belonging. In sum, the conditions of exclusion and inclusion: ‘a dominant ideology of homogeneity in heterogeneous societies raises questions of social justice, as such an ideology potentially excludes and discriminates against those who are either unable or unwilling to fit the norm’ (Blackledge and Pavlenko, 2001:243)
The response to these questions can also provide some insights regarding policy developments in relation to these issues. The challenge posed to the hegemonic language ideology is not happening merely in migrant’s perceptions and representations. It is experienced also by locals and institutions on a daily basis. As Bloomaert et al. (2005:201) explain, it ‘not only affects the multilingual repertoires of the immigrants (confronted with the task of acquiring the communicative resources of the autochthonous population), but also those of the autochthonous population (confronted with linguistic-
9 communicative processes and resources previously alien to their environment) and of local and national institutions (now facing administrative subjects with widely varying degrees of competence in the required communicative skills for administrative practice). It affects, in sum, the sociolinguistic economy of the place. Inspired by Bauman (2002: 104) statement that ‘the carrying power of a bridge is not the average strength of the pillars, but the strength of the weakest pillar’ (own translation) it can be assumed that by trying to find ways to include a greater tolerance of linguistic diversity into the ‘sociolinguistic economy of the place, not only of the individuals living in or using it’ (Bloomaert et al. 2005: 201), not only migrants, but the whole of the society inhabiting this spaces will be better off.
1.2 Language ideologies
Following the literature review, language ideologies have been here conceptualised as having four basic components which are closely intertwined and reinforcing. First, they entail a conception of the nature of language. As will be explored bellow, the understandings of the nature of language range from considering it a fixed and static set of grammatical rules and vocabulary – which for some is situated somewhere outside of human interaction – to consider language as a practice in constant flux, a pure tool of communication in which the importance is posed on the know how to do (Collins and Slembrouck 2005).
This in turn points to the second and third elements, which are the extent to which language is conceived to determine and/or express the identity and the worldview/ culture and thought of its speakers. With regards to culture, language ideologies imply a greater or lesser influence of a language – considering both its fixed/structural and fluid/perfomative elements – on one’s culture, worldview or even mental structure. Some advocate that language is determinant for the conformation of mental structures and others consider that language does not shape the culture and thought of its speaker. The relation between language and identity refers to the role that language is assumed to have in both, self-identification and identification by or of others. It fluctuates between suggestions that persons are what they talk; that is: subjects’ identity is expressed in how and in what language they use; and ideas of the relation between language use and negotiation of identity which are not that straightforward.
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The last constituent of a language ideology is its understanding of the relation between space and language. We will review the interplay between spatial determinations and agency in language use.
Disaggregating the language ideologies into these elements will render the analysis of them easier, as these are at the core of the perceived disconnection between the dominant language ideologies and what is assumed to be ‘really’ experienced by persons. When Valentine et al. (2008:384) state that ‘while monolingual societies like the UK tend to assume that monolingualism is a natural state of affairs, to stigmatise second language users and to perceive bilingualism as exotic or unusual, young persons appear to perceive language diversity as a normal part of everyday life’, or when Collins and Slembrouck (2005) affirm that ‘there is a wide gap between commonly voiced representations of language, person and place and actual practices of language use, identity assertion, and spatial occupation’ (2005: 189), what seems to be essential to this perceived divergence is the tolerance/intolerance of difference with regards to language, identity and culture within a given (political) territory and in turn, the different notions of language combined with the understanding of the conformation of the culture, identity and spatial provenience and adequacy of its speakers.
It seems pertinent then to try to comprehend the origin of this hegemonic, and for some mislead, understanding of the relation between language, identity, culture and territory. Ahearn (2012: 126) explains that ‘the myth – a very powerful language ideology – of the necessity of “one nation, one language” goes back at least several hundred years to German philosophers such as Johann Gottfried Herder, but it is belied by the reality of so many multilingual nations and multilinguals around the world’. This dominant ideology is then situated at the core of the construction of European modernity (Auer, 2005). Nevertheless it would be difficult to make sense of the powerful reach of this ideology if only the ‘cultural nationalism’ of Herder is taken into account. As Mamadouh (2002:338) reminds, ‘nationalism and its motto “one language, one nation, one state” have much to do with egalitarianism in an ‘imagined community’. In this line it is helpful to consider Bauman and Griggs (2003) reading of the role of language in the construction of modernity. They argue that is was precisely the combination of Locke’s rationalisation and purification of a standard language –detached from culture, language and identity – which would enable the conformation of a universal and rational public discourse and Herder’s defence of vernacular languages as Volkgeist, ‘their linkage to the worldview
11 and ways of thinking and feeling of a people, and their essential role in maintaining national identity and cohesion’ (2003:191) which was so powerful. Bauman and Griggs (2003:195) conclude that Locke’s and Herder’s ‘respective visions of political community and national interest have in common a principled insistence on linguistic and discursive standardisation and regimes of purification: social and political cohesion demands one language, one metadiscursive order, one voice’. Hence, both philosophical traditions – although seemingly in contradiction – converge in the understanding of language as a fixed system distributed along countries in a discrete fashion. Locke conceived language as a set of signs linked to ideas and positioned it outside of human interaction as a matter of principle. Herder took a quiet different starting point and conceived language as emerging from society –and thus as purely within it – but rapidly advocated for its protection by educated (male) intellectuals (2003:193). This notion of languages as discrete standardised systems is thus based on the – somehow paradoxical – simultaneous claim of authenticity and universalism. The former refers to the claim that each language 'represents the spirit of its speakers in contrast to speakers of other standards’ and the latter refers to the ‘universality that comes from supposedly being the property of all citizens, unbiased because it is no one’s in particular, and hence represents a socially neutral, supposedly anonymous voice’ (Gal 2006: 166).
The dominant language ideology therefore focuses on the construction of one’s people’s identity (‘us’) at the expense of constructing the other (‘them’) as essentially different basing this distinction heavily on the different languages being spoken by each group. The four core elements identified above are present in this conception. This is: a conception of language as a fixed and discrete system; the association of language with identity and culture – as an isomorphic deterministic relation –, and the assignment of one language to one space – in the case of the nation state sometimes even as emerging from its bounded territory. Each nation state has a sui generis version of this ‘standard’ dominant ideology, but the common features described above are to a lesser or greater extend usually expressed. The specific cases of the states of France, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands, will be examined bellow by looking at the specific language ideologies that are being reproduced by these states. The reproduction of a certain language ideology by these nation states can potentially become hegemonic in a Gramscian sense and thus naturalised as the regular order of things. The importance of regarding these resides in part in Blackledge and Pavlenko’s (2001: 254) statement:
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‘Hegemonic ideologies create the conditions for symbolic domination in a range of institutional and everyday practices, including for example education, the workplace, the mass media, the law and politics. In the face of a hegemonic ideology of homogenization which is reproduced in these several contexts, it is not surprising that those who are subject to the “symbolic violence” of the monoglot standardisation appear to comply with their symbolic domination’.
Alternative language ideologies might be emerging from individual’s actual practices. It is worth mentioning that the relation between the four elements described above is not always straightforward. In addition to the intuitive extreme language ideologies ranging from the dominant described above: fixed mono-language, mono-culture, mono-identity and mono-space; to a very loose and fluid conception of language with no deterministic connection to identity, culture and space there are many other possible understandings of this relation (e.g. fixed conceptions of language as a structure that don’t necessarily draw a connection between language identity, culture and space or fluid conceptions of language that nevertheless equate hybrid language with hybrid identity (cf. Auer 2005) , etc.)
In the following sections, what have been understood as being the four components of the language ideologies: notion of language, language and culture, language and identity and language and space will be analysed more in detail.
1.2.1 Conceptions of language and multilingualism
When analysing the different conceptions of language that lie at the heart of diverse language ideologies, the debate is somehow reflected in the difference between ‘influential structuralist linguistic theories that are based on ideas of “languages” as “things” that reside separately and completely self-contained within the mind and/or outside of human interaction’ (Zentz 2015:69) and notions of language as a set of communicative capabilities that configure peoples’ ‘communicative repertoires’ (Zentz 2015:68).
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The first is usually ascribed to the Saussure’s structural linguistics theory that introduced the idea of languages as static systems of interconnected units. Although this structuralism was subsequently challenged by the Chomskian idea of transformational and ‘creative’ grammar, both are limited to the study of languages as systems, with little or no attention to its actual practice. Ahearn (2012: 9) explains that ‘in both the Chomskian and Saussurean approaches, it is the abstract knowledge of a language system (competence or langue) that is of primary, or even sole, interest for a science of language; performance or parole is irrelevant’. This omission of the performance of language and to how language is actually being used as a means of communication has two main consequences for the topic analysed here: first, it clearly discards speaker’s capacity to shape the language through changing patterns of interaction and second, it leads to the implicit imagination of standard monolingual speakers and societies. It thus evokes what Brubaker (1998:274) names a ‘Modiglianesque vision of the social world’ in which the world is composed by ‘internally homogeneous and externally bounded collectivities’ (Brubaker 1998: 292). This metaphor is borrowed from Gellner’s (1983) comparison between the paintings of Kokoschka – representing the ancient1 world with loads of brushstrokes – and Modigliani – representing the modern world with monochromatic, clearly demarcated boundaries –. (Examples of both paintings can be seen in the cover). In this line, Ricento’s observation that
‘the theory of language as an autonomous system and the ‘normal’ ‘native’ speaker possessing an intact named ‘Language’ fit well with the idea of the nation state as a bounded entity unified in large measure by the sharing of a common (standard) national language and culture, even though with about 200 states and around 6-7000 named oral languages, all states are in fact linguistically and culturally diverse’. (Ricento, 2014: 632)
Thus, regarding languages as Modiglianesque fixed and bounded structures does not allows for the comprehension of the sociolinguistic phenomena that are assumed to be present in multilingual societies such as code-switching and code-mixing but as a sort of pathology of the speaker. At most, these theories would enable the consideration of
1 for the case relevant here also contemporary world 14 multilingualism as a patchwork of different discrete languages cohabiting in the same social space. Otsuji and Pennycook (2010:251) note that
‘current approaches to diversity and multilingualism frequently start with the enumerative strategy of counting languages and romanticising a plurality based on these putative language counts, a presupposition that ‘clear borders exist between languages, that they can be counted, catalogued with certainty and that, above all, their vitality can be promoted and their disappearance prevented’ and conclude that
‘by rendering diversity a quantitative question of language enumeration, such approaches overlook the qualitative question of where diversity lies while continuing to support those very language ideologies that we need to supersede’.
An alternative notion of language emerges affirming that ‘current conditions have put to the test the conceptualisations of languages as unified, bounded entities separate from the social world’ (Pietikäinen and Kelly-Holmes 2013). Instead of understanding language primarily as a linguistic structured form or ‘set of labels that can be placed on pre-existing concepts, objects, or relationships’ (Ahearn 2012: 8) language is seen as an inherently social, fluid and open for change repertoire whose main purpose is communication. It is the acknowledgment of this that inspires scholars like Gal (2006) to take a different perspective on language.
‘Instead of named languages as a point of departure, it approaches communication as social practice, encompassing all the linguistic variety in speakers’ linguistic repertoires, including sometimes trivial-seeming features of utterances: accent, intonation, lexical choice, register differences, contrasts in genre or variety. The variegated linguistic forms in any speaker’s linguistic repertoire are seen to work in opposition to forces of standardisation’ (Gal, 2006:165).
Conceiving language as a social practice or repertoire whose primary goal is communication enables the inclusion of hybrid and mixed daily forms of speaking as legitimate languages. Thus, it leaves aside the consideration of official standard language
15 speakers as having ‘greater moral and intellectual worth than speakers of unofficial languages or nonstandard varieties’ (Blackledge and Pavlenko 2001:247).
Whilst referring to discrete standard languages when discussing language is almost inescapable – ‘language labels are essential points of social and political reference’ (Zentz 2015: 70) – an inquiry centred on how language and communication is being actually performed and not so much on what constitutes a standard language is necessary to better grasp what speaking actually does; to what extend it actually contributes to the negotiation of identity, conformation of worldviews and production of space. Most importantly, this notion of language works against the naturalisation of monolingualism and monolingual places. In a sort of reaffirmation of a Kokoschkan vision of the social world, it is perceived that,
‘the language repertoire of individuals living in heteroglossic communities (…) has shown that complex patterns of language mixing and code switching are not unusual, and do not comport with common sense (or some theoretical) views about “normal” linguistic competence. In fact, such “ways of doing language”, rather than aberrations from the “norm”, are widely attested throughout the world’ (Ricento, 2014: 362)
As was mentioned before, these ideas try to escape the framing of multilingualism in quantitative terms as the acquisition of many standard languages that are somehow clearly separated in individual’s minds and usages. Pietikäinen and Kelly-Holmes acknowledge the difficulty of trying to escape from a fixed conception of language when observing that language practices ‘(...) on the one hand, challenge and disregard the centrist ideology and the normativity of parallel monolingualism, whilst, on the other hand, relying on it as a necessary resource’ (2013:2). While the standard languages traditionally studied are understood to be spoken by ideal speakers, multilingual speakers are assumed to perform varieties which go beyond these boundaries, creating new grammars, vocabularies and repertoires of interaction which although mainly fluid and in constant change include some fixed ingredients: pure fluidity would presumably invalidate the very goal of linguistics interaction which is communication. Otsuji and Pennycook (2010: 244) introduce the concept of metrolingualism to include this fluid-fixed conception, suggesting that:
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‘it is important not to construe fixity and fluidity as dichotomous, or even as opposite ends of a spectrum, but rather to view them as symbiotically (re)constituting each other. In talking of metrolingualism, therefore we also intend to address the ways in which any struggle around new language, culture and identity inevitably confronts the fixed traditions of place and being’.
1.2.2 Language and Culture
The concept of culture which will be used here refers to the set of knowledge, lifestyles and traditions from where persons build their interpretative frameworks of reality. It refers to people’s mental structures to interpret life events. In the particular case of language ideologies the interest in culture is limited to the extent to which language is conceived to influence the speaker’s worldview and culture, and the extent to which language and culture are identified as almost being the same thing. These conceptions are connected to but not determined by the different notions of language explained above. Intuitively, a structured and fixed approach to language seems to be more prone to the configuration of deterministic conceptions in which a specific structure and elements of a language are assumed to determine the speaker’s thought and perception of the world. Nevertheless, as will be reviewed bellow there are also fluid conceptions of language that draw strong connections between language and culture as well as fixed notions of language that deny this link.
Processes of standardisation and unification of languages went hand by hand with the nation building process (Anderson 1987). There is an indisputable role of communication and egalitarianism in the unification of a language across a political territory as well as the belief that the bond of a common language helps to create unity, a common imaginary. Nevertheless, there are different ways of assuming this connection. Anderson (1987) assumed that a common language enabled the access to common cultural and social goods, which in turn created a common imaginary. There is another version of this, which relies rather in language per se creating certain mental structures which end up bonding a community. This presumed impact that the operating language has on the structure and worldview of the speakers is explained by Bourdieu (1991) when he describes how this idea was also present in the building of a ‘new’ nation in times of the French Revolution:
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‘The imposition of the legitimate language in opposition to the dialects and patois was an integral part of the political strategies aimed at perpetuating the gains of the Revolution through the production and the reproduction of the “new” man…the conflict between the French of the revolutionary intelligentsia and the dialects or patois was a struggle for symbolic power in which what was at stake was the formation and re-formation of mental structures’ (Bourdieu 1991:47-48).
Salzmann (2004) explains that there are strong and weak versions of this understanding. The former would assume that the ‘grammatical categories of a language determine how its speakers perceive the world around them’ and the latter that ‘there is simply some sort of correlation between a language and its speakers’ worldview (the philosophical dimension of a society’s culture)’ (Salzmann, 2004: 50). Ahearn (2012: 65) states Whorf’s (1956) assertion with regards to the relation between culture and language: ‘in this partnership the nature of the language is the factor that limits free plasticity and rigidifies channels of development in the more automatic way’, and notes that many studies echo this assessment. Also in studies that aim to a broader public, a deterministic vision of language is flourishing. Some of the endless examples are Keith Chen’s research presentation Could your language affect your ability to save money?2 presented in the popular TED talks, Athanasopoulos et al. (2015) study of the impact of different languages on the behaviour of their speakers (2015: 518) which was reviewed in the online journal The Conversation3, Grommen’s article in De Morgen In een andere taal
2 http://www.ted.com/talks/keith_chen_could_your_language_affect_your_ability_to_save_money (last access 16/08/2015), Chen suggests that futureless language speakers, in which there is no different grammatical form for expressing actions in the future, (e.g. Dutch present form: ‘het regent’ and future form: ‘morgen regent het’) are more connected to their future and thus tend to save more than speakers of futured languages (e.g. English present from: ‘it rains’ and future form: ‘it will rain’) that are assumed to have a more distant feeling towards the future and thus show lower saving rates. There is a futured formulation in Dutch (het zal morgen regenen) but it is true that it is not often used. 3 http://theconversation.com/how-the-language-you-speak-changes-your-view-of-the-world-40721 (last access 16/08/2015), Athanasopoulos et al. (2015) conclude that speaking different languages, resulted in different worldviews, for the case of German and English speakers. The findings point that speaking in German prompts speakers to have a more holistic view of the event, whilst doing it in English would incite an on the action focused understandings of the event 18 wordt u ook een ander mens 4 or Johnson’s article in The Economist Do different languages confer different personalities?5. The aim here moves away from discussing these specific researches and is focused on describing the sort of rationales about the impact of language in culture that are available. Despite the growing interest in the kind of arguments presented above which point to a very deterministic vision of language, Ahearn (2012) states that,
‘linguistic anthropologist working in this area maintain that the influence of language on culture and thought is more likely to be predispositional rather than determinative –in other words, the particular language you speak might predispose you to view the world a certain way, but it will not prevent you from challenging that view’ (italics in original). (Ahearn 2012: 65)
A very determinist vision of language on speaker’s worldview implies a challenge to human agency which is certainly difficult to accept and this promotes more moderate views on the power of language to change individual’s way of thinking.
‘Language might facilitate certain types of thinking and could provide a valuable way of understanding unconscious patterns of culture and thought, [Franz] Boas declared, but it would not prevent people from thinking in a way that differed from the categories presented most conveniently in their language’ (Ahearn 2012:67)
Authors like Salzmann (2004) think that the assumption that individuals who speak different languages have different cultures and that ‘therefore the boundaries between different societies coincide with lines separating mutually unintelligible languages’ (2004: 170) is far too simplistic. What determines culture is rather the set of communicative codes and repertoires of a given group (Salzman 2004: 170). This indicates that, not only fixed notions of language establish deterministic or predispositional relations between language and culture: also fluid conception of language as a set of communicative repertoires can lead to a similar conclusion. That is,
4 http://www.demorgen.be/wetenschap/in-een-andere-taal-wordt-u-ook-een-ander-mens-a2302498/ (last access 16/08/2015) 5 http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2013/11/multilingualism last access 16/08/2015 19 the way language is used and embodied might affect, or be informed by speaker’s culture and worldview.
All in all, these different understanding of the relation between language and culture are likely to impact persons prejudices of ‘what categories of person speak what languages and, upon using a given language, what communities they stand for, what kinds of competences non-natives are likely to have and what problems they pose for a normatively monolingual speaker’ (Collins and Slembrouck 2005:192). Social and mental spaces are expected to be (re)produced differently depending on these different perceptions. These perceptions are basically based on stereotypes which are constantly created in order to make sense of the world around us. The interest here relies then in the study of the extent to which these stereotypes are being reproduced and justified by relying on the spoken or native language of a person.
1.2.3 Language and Identity
Social identity will be understood as the features of people or groups that characterize them vis a vis others. The notion taken here is relational, understood as being constantly being made and contested by oneself – ‘reflective positioning’– and others – ‘interactive positioning’ (Blackledge and Pavlenko 2001:249) – through multiple encounters. Koefoed and Simonsen (2011: 335) refer to it as ‘the internal and external moments of the dialectic of identification: how we identify ourselves, how others identify us and the ongoing interplay of these in processes of social identification’.
Blackledge and Pavlenko (2001) question the pillars of traditional approaches to the understanding of the negotiation of identity in linguistic interaction in the field of variationist socio-linguistics and sociopsychological paradigms. The first, for assuming that ‘people are taken to express –rather than negotiate-identities’ (2001: 244) and the second, for the ‘monolingual and monocultural bias underlying sociopsychological approaches’ (2001:244) which renders its use for the study of multilingual societies problematic. If these theories assume that the already existing social structure (of a monolingual society) is simply expressed in talk, the application of these theories to multilingual societies very easily slippers into the assumption of a direct correlation between a world social structure composed by collective representations of national identities which are just reflected in the language of the speaker.
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‘Related to this essential equation of one language with one “people” is an insistence on the significance of the “mother tongue” as the only authentic language of a speaker, as if only the language learned at the mother’s knee could convey the true self of a speaker’ (Blackledge and Pavlenko 2001:246)
In the literature that attempts to analyse the role of language in the negotiation of identities in multilingual contexts, two factors appear to be crucial. First, the limitation of the concept of ‘negotiation’ of identity in some instances has to be taken into account as power relations are into play and it certainly is not always possible for every speaker to choose the preferred language use. Different environments attribute very different levels of agency to multilingual individuals.
‘It is important to recognize the limitations of the notion of “negotiation of identities” and to distinguish between instances of positioning where the power differential is such that resistance is impossible, instances of positioning which evoke resistance, and instances of negotiation where the interlocutors or the negotiating parties may enjoy a relatively equal power balance’. (Blackledge and Pavlenko 2001: 250)
In situations where resistance is impossible, e.g. when the preferably spoken language (variety) of a person cannot be understood by anyone, to study the role that the person’s choice and use of language play in the negotiations of its identity would make little sense. Nevertheless this person might be performing identity in the eyes of its audience. Gal (2006: 165) explains these possible ‘contradictions created by standard ideology for non- elite speakers whose practices diverge from the ideals of standardisation, but who nevertheless find themselves judged by those ideals’. In the case of migrants Ricento (2014:361) notes that ‘throughout life, a person’s social status can be greatly affected when they migrate and relocate to other places, where their identities and linguistic repertoires may lead to recategorisation and often diminution of their personhood in their new environment’. Also specific language use can eventually be interpreted as a contestation or resistance towards a given linguistic homogeneity or as a voluntary way of performing identity and it can be wrongly done so if the power relations and the agency possibilities of the speakers are not taken into account.
The dominant language ideologies assume that persons express identity through talk in a unidirectional and straightforward way: speaking one standard language is the expression
21 of a standard homogeneous identity. By speaking one language or another one is positioned in a certain social category. Ahearn (2012: 125) affirms that
‘in multilingual communities, the languages, dialects, or registers that are spoken are often linked to social hierarchies. In other words, linguistic practices index status, and language ideologies develop as a result’.
There is indeed little negotiation in this statement. As true as this lack of agency might be in some instances where the speaker has apparently no power to decide which language to speak or how to perform it, this hegemony of the dominant language ideology is never absolute or total. In addition there are many instances in which a possibility for resistance or even an almost equal relation may exist between the speakers. A context and place sensitive analysis of the negotiation of identity through language use seems pertinent then in order to make sense of the meaning – both, for the performer and its audience – that patterns like language switching, language omissions or code mixing have in the daily negotiations of identities. Bloomaert et al. (2005: 202) refer to this dynamic with the concept of negotiation and repair, meaning that ‘these should be understood as including the common processes in everyday conversation in which participants adjust what they say in light of expectations and responses.’ This means that both, language use and also identification of others might change after repeated experiences of frustrated communications of identity. Multilinguals that often experience this frustrated negotiation of identity and putative adscription of identity might resist against a traditional way of identifying others when interpreting the identity of third parties.
The second dimension which seems pertinent to acknowledge points to the question: what is exactly expected to have a role in the negotiation of identity? Some authors look at the standard language being deployed (e.g. Valentine et al. 2008) whilst others look at code switching/mixing practice as connected to the production of identity (e.g. Auer 2005), at the conversational structure (e.g. Cashman 2005), or at indexical signals in talk (e.g. Gal 2006). The importance of these different language uses will be highly determined by the context and possibilities offered by the speaker, its audience and the place in which these are situated. In this context Auer (2005: 403) warns us nevertheless against the simplistic switch towards a ‘rash equation of “hybrid” language use with
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“hybrid” social identity; such an equation may be as essentialist as that of nation and language which underlies traditional European language ideologies’.
1.2.4 Language and Space
Space is transversal to the whole analysis undertaken above and a central category when it comes to the analysis of language and language ideologies as ‘every instance of human communication has an intrinsic spatiality to it as well as an intrinsic temporality’ (Bloomaert et al. 2005: 203). First of all, spoken language is inevitably always situated somewhere in space. In turn, every of these locations or spaces generally carry a set of limits with regards to what is possible in terms of linguistic performance within its borders. This linguistic rules and norms are informed by a set of discourses and practices that refer to different scales. In the scales that will be taken into account here, two dimensions have to be considered: the specific linguistic practices that are taking place and are common in a specific place (e.g. a café, a home, etc.) and the discourses, values and judgements attached to these uses of language, that generally are conformed in a bigger scale (e.g. the city, or the nation). Practices and representations at different scales influence each other: ‘the notion of scale precisely emphasizes the idea that spaces are ordered and organized in relation to one another, stratified and layered, with processes belonging to one scale entering processes at another scale’ (Bloomaert et al. 2005:203).
Dominant language ideologies usually generate a monolingual norm in spaces and places, in which by using a different language one would be expected to be ‘out of place’. These rules and norms which build a so called linguistic hegemony of the place (Valentine et al. 2008) are never total and indeed malleable to some extent. Practices of communication can affect these and here is where agency comes into play. Bloomaert et al. (2005: 211) assume that ‘agency results from the interplay between peoples situated intentions and the way the environment imposes particular regimes of language’. By performing a specific language use, new spaces are also created. Space and linguistic practices are thus constantly producing and reinforcing each other. ‘Spaces might shape hegemonic communicative practices but language can also (re)order space’ (Valentine et al. 2008:385). It is worth to notice though, that not all spaces and places are equally flexible and that as a result not all speakers’ linguistic resources are similarly valued in all regimes of language.
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‘People have varying language abilities –repertoires and skills with languages –but (that) the function and value of those repertoires and skills change as the space of language contact changes’ (Bloomaert et al. 2005:211).
These linguistic regimes organised by space potentially generate actual exclusions and inclusions, outsiders and insiders. As Collins and Slembrouck (2005:191) note, ‘grappling with questions of space forces us to confront the obverse of belonging, that of displacedness, of semiotic forms and meaning making practices “out of place”’. This exclusion/inclusion dynamic is not only imposed by space but also by the use of a certain set of communicative practices (including different standard languages, but also code- mixing practices, accents, etc.). Spaces are created by these practices in which certain language habits might be valued and others not.
‘Encounters between embodied others hence involve spatial negotiations around the constitution of spaces of familiarity and strangeness and the boundaries and bridges involved in this constitution’. (Koefoed and Simonsen, 2011:346)
The possibility to be included in spaces where linguistic rules are not flexible requires the possession of and adaptation to the linguistic abilities valued by the linguistic regime at issue: ‘how people use language is strongly influenced by the situation in which they find themselves’ (Bloomaert et al. 2005: 205). Also, how people use language strongly influences the environment in which it is performed.
This points to an approach to the spatiality of language which resembles Raffestin’s relational approach to territoriality viewed as a ‘set of relationships rooted in ties to the material environment and other people or groups, and mediated by existing techniques and representations’ (Murphy 2012: 162). Bordered linguistic spaces emerge as an outcome of these relationships, ‘contacts and practices’ (Collins and Slembrouck 2005: 191) or ‘embodied encounters’ (Koefoed and Simonsen, 2011:346). These approaches to the generation of linguistic borders seem to endow speakers with considerable agency and are extensively useful for the understanding of daily encounters and production of spaces and places. Nevertheless, not all linguistic territories, ‘as a product of social positioning and of sharing representations of space, which results in the construction of territoriality’ (Bush 2013:199) are equally powerful and enduring in time.
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‘Some sociospatial processes have a greater degree of functional and perceptual fixity across time than others. No sociospatial process is ever truly fixed, of course, since fluidity and change are always present. But not all processes are equally fluid or changeable because institutional arrangements promoting fixity develop in their wake constellations of policies, approaches to political economy, and sets of territorial relationships that endure over time and shape the ways processes and events unfold’(Murphy 2012:167)
The nation state is such a perdurable and sticky territory and the imagined monolingualism within it is not easily resisted. A relational approach to the negotiation of the linguistic use within this space would thus often elude the greater hegemony of the statist monolingualism vis a vis other suggested and/ or practiced linguistic practices. It is in this context that Bloomaert et al. (2005:203) stimulate to consider that the context has effects on ‘what people can or cannot do (it legitimizes some forms of behaviours while disqualifying or constraining other forms)’, ‘the value and function of their sociolinguistic repertoires’ and ‘their identities, both self-constructed (inhabited) and ascribed by others’. In hegemonic monolingual contexts agency might be very constrained. In sticky spaces such as the monolingual imagined states, the space rules and norms can impact person’s linguistic practices greatly.
Summing up, whilst a relational approach will be used to analyse the daily micro encounters of multilingual people and its capacity to create spaces, the larger hegemony of the state shall not be omitted. For the scale of the state multilingualism will be conceived as characteristic of the space. That is the possibilities that ‘the environment, as structured determination and interactional emergence, enables and disables them to deploy’ (Bloomaert et al. 2005: 213) rather than a competence of the speaker.
Through the reported practices of the participants it is expected to better understand the different linguistic practices in environments where the presence of the hegemonic linguistic regime of the state is strong, and environments in which its impact is weaker and a greater capacity to determine their preferred language use exists (e.g. sometimes at home). It is interesting to observe whether in these places they reproduce the dominant national monolingual norm or if different rules, norms and practices take place.
The term porosity will be used in order to describe the extent to which languages are conceived and used in these spaces as different and separated systems which should not
25 be used at the same time (non-porosity) or if as opposed to that the space is porous and tolerates less aware uses of language which somehow let go the control of the speaker over using only a single standard code at a time; letting the speaker just deploy its entire linguistic repertoire. Also in non-porous spaces the establishment of connections between one language and a certain mental system or culture is more likely than in porous spaces, where language tends to be conceived as a tool for communication. Taking up the metaphor used by Gellner (1983) again, porous spaces would resemble a Kokoschkan world, while non-porous spaces would be aligned with a Modigliani-like view on the linguistic variety: multilingualism conceived in quantitative terms and languages kept alongside but separated.
The literature reviewed indicates that language performance is informed by the crossover of language ideologies working at different scales which imply different readings and conceptions of what a language is, how it is determined by and determines culture, how it is deployed in the negotiation of identities and how its use is limited by space and in turn delimits spatial arrangements. These different conceptions or ideas contribute to the conformation of a ‘system of thought’ about languages which will be referred to as the discourse. Not only does this discourse informs the linguistic practice of a person, but the very practice has the ability to contribute to the conformation of language ideologies and discourses about languages. This interplay between practice and discourse, was described similarly by Bourdieu (1991) referring to the concept of habitus as a ‘set of dispositions which incline agents to act and react in certain ways. The dispositions generate practices, perceptions and attitudes which are “regular” without being consciously co-ordinated or governed by any “rule”’ (Bourdieu 1991:12). The discourses and practices shaping this habitus will be analysed in order to better understand to what extent the dominant language ideologies are being challenged or reproduced both, in their daily (reported) practices and in their way of understanding the notion and meaning of language.
1.3 Aim of Research and Research Question
The aim of this research is to understand the language ideologies of participants –German and French migrants living in the cities of Madrid and Amsterdam –. That is, how they understand language and its relation to territory, identity and culture. Particularly the
26 impact of two variables in the conformation of migrant’s language ideologies – how they use and think about language – will be analyzed. The first variable is the dominant language ideology of both, their state of origin and the state/city where they are currently living, which have been labelled contextual dominant language ideologies. The second variable is the experience of migration.
In order to be able to answer the research question, migrants language uses and intrinsic rules and norms across scales will be first analyzed and the implicit notions of language, culture, identity and territory across these scales will be considered. Also, the impact of the dominant language idoleogies on the participants language uses will be considered. Finally recurrent episodes in migrant’s lives – in addition to the experience of migration – that are perceived as having a great impact on their language ideologies will be included in the analisis as they emerge form the interviews.
Research Question
To what extent do the contextual dominant language ideologies and the experience of migration inform the language ideologies of the migrants?
Sub-questions
What do migrants report about their language uses across different scales and what implicit assumptions about the relation between language, culture, identity and space do these suggest?
How do the dominant language ideologies of their ‘home’ and ‘host’ countries influence migrants’ actual uses of language?
Are there emerging and recurrent episodes in migrant’s lives – such as the very experience of migration – that are perceived as having a greater impact on their way of thinking about language?
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In the following, the research design and methodology used for this research will be explained in Chapter 2. Chapter 3 will revise the key elements that have been understood to shape the dominant language ideologies of the two cities and two states that have been chosen for this study. In Chapter 4-8 different findings will be presented and analysed. Chapter 4 will draw on the concept of the porosity of spaces and on the factors determining its appearance. Chapter 5 will revise the common importance of the mother tongue among participants and investigate possible explanatory factors. Chapter 6 will study the micro context of the home and the working place and the extent to which participants convey to the dominant language ideology of the state within these spaces. Chapter 7 will focus on the public spaces of the cities of residence and Chapter 8 will focus on the relation between the learning of the language and the integration into a community. Conclusions will be drawn in Chapter 9. The translations of all the quotes from participants are to be found in Annex 2 (Translations).
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2. METHODS
2.1 Research design
This research is a comparative analysis in which the impact on the conformation of migrant’s language ideologies of the dominant language ideologies of the ‘home’ and ‘host’ countries and cities are going to be compared to the impact of the participant’s experience of migration. The case of French and German nationals living in the cities of Amsterdam and Madrid are analysed. (Figure 1 What, Where? And Who?)
Figure 1. Visualisation of research design
In addition to the literature review carried out above, additional secondary and primary data collection needs to be undertaken in order to be able to answer the research questions for the cases of German and French migrants living in the cities of Madrid and Amsterdam.
The dominant language ideologies of the migrant’s countries of origin (Germany and France) as well as the ones of the destinations states (Spain and the Netherlands) and
29 cities (Madrid and Amsterdam) have been analysed through secondary data investigation (Figure 1 How? Secondary Data collection). The aim was to understand the basis of the dominant language ideologies in order to be able to draw connections between these and participant’s uses and notions of language. A clearer vision of these dominant language ideologies enabled the identification of some of its constitutive elements in participant’s narratives.
Also linguistic biographies were undertaken supported by a mental map. The aim was to get a first hand description of the actual practices and notions of language across scales of the selected participants, to see what live events – including the experience of migration – might have determine the most their notions of language and to what extend these notions where informed by the linguistic hegemonies of their countries of origin and their cities/countries of residence (Figure 1 How? Primary data collection).
2.2 Case selection
The sample was defined as German and French individuals, meaning particularly people that were born and raised in Germany or France and that have been living in Madrid or in Amsterdam for at least one and a half years.
The selection of the two cities of current residence of the participants –Madrid and Amsterdam – is based on the coupled assertions of Otsuji and Pennycook (2010:245) that ‘metrolingualism … is a product typically of modern, urban, interaction’ and of Bloomaert et al. (2005) assertion that ‘multilingualism is not what individuals have and don’t have, but the environment, as structured determinations and interactional emergence, enables or disables’ (Bloomaert et al. 2005: 197). The location of study was decided to be a city for the former –metrolingualism is supposed to be an urban phenomenon- and the cities of Madrid and Amsterdam in particular for the latter. Both cities resulted to have a highly multilingual language use in the internet platform ‘Twitter’ in a preliminary study carried out in February 2015 in which the language diversity of geocoded tweets published in the time laps between the 31st of January and the 7th of February 2015 was tracked and mapped (Annex 1). This indicator does not necessarily indicates a similarly high level of multilingual practices in real ‘on site’ life, but as a starting point it points to Madrid and Amsterdam as environments that potentially enable multi or metrolingual practices. The outcome of the map (Annex 1) nevertheless appeared
30 counterintuitive to the researcher’s expectations and thus more interesting. The researcher’s perception is that Amsterdam is a more multilingual – or at least English speaking – city than Madrid and that, while in the first it is possible to get along, interact and participate in the city without learning Dutch, this is not possible in the second without learning Spanish. The researcher’s perceptions are nevertheless just an explanation of an additional reason for finally selecting these cities. Equally relevant are the pragmatic reasons of the selection of these two cities; the researcher residence is Amsterdam and Madrid its city of origin. The convenience of an already established network and background information cannot be dismissed.
Additionally, the states in which the cities of Madrid an Amsterdam are located present also similarities and differences which are expected to have an impact on migrant’s limitations, possibilities and strategies to cope with the host societies, especially with regards to their linguistic practices. Both states are officially multilingual (as opposed to the countries of origin of Germany and France) with the Netherlands recognising Frisian, English and Papiamento as co-official languages recognised in the provinces of Friesland (Frisian), in the special municipalities of Saba and Sint Eustatius in the Dutch Caribbean/ BES Islands (English) and in the special municipality of Bonaire (Papiamento); in addition to Dutch. Spain recognising Catalan, Valencian, Euskera and Galician in the respective autonomous communities of Catalonia, Valencian Community, Basque Country and Galicia, in addition to Castilian (Spanish). Spain is a state of autonomies (a quasi-federal state) and the Netherlands is a decentralised unitary state. Their migration history and migration, linguistic and educational policies differ considerably and this is expected to have effects on migrant’s strategy for coping with the new linguistic practices of the ‘host’ country, the importance of language proficiency in this endeavour and thus the impact of the new context on the (re)conformation of their language ideologies.
The chosen migrant’s states of origin have been selected due to the preliminary assumption –confirmed by the secondary data analysis hereafter – that there are major differences between the respective linguistic uses and dominant ideologies of these states. While both, France and Germany, are officially monolingual states and both have been longstanding immigration countries; their migration, linguistic and educational policies differ considerably. In addition, Germany is a federal state, whilst France is a Unitarian state. Although this does not ensure great differences in their respective dominant 31 language ideologies, a federal system certainly enables greater alterations between the institutionalised linguistic practices across its territory than a Unitarian one. One of the striking differences relates to the educational system and the treatment of dialects and minority languages. Whilst in Germany the Educational System is a competence granted to the Länder, which in turn tend to cultivate and promote linguistic production and permission of regional dialects, in France it is the centralised Ministry of Education who has the competence. Linguistic policy in France posed a strong emphasis on the protection of French linguistic heritage as can be derived from its presence not only in the Constitution but further by the Toubon Law of 1994, prescribing the use of French in most of the public contexts such as advertisements, workplaces, commercial contracts, communications, government financed schools, etc.6 The institutional arrangement differences between France and Germany will be further developed bellow; nevertheless it is important to note that the cases where chosen for considering that these major differences could have an impact on migrants language ideologies in the case that the impact of the national dominant language ideologies proves relevant.
The unit of analysis is going to be the individual migrant given that the focus of the research is on understanding individual language ideologies, uses and feelings/experiences and the extent to which these are informed by contextual dominant language ideologies and the experience of migration. Individual migrants are considered to be an interesting unit of analysis mainly for two reasons: First because of the different context in which they are put in and for the varied dominant contextual language ideologies to which they are exposed. Second because migrants are generally ‘painfully self-conscious of their speech’ (Gal, 2006:196) as they are encountered with different language (varieties) and spatial linguistic regimes whose norms and rules they do not necessarily control upon arrival. This experience of migration is expected to be a major drive of change in their respective language ideologies.
6Source: http://www.culturalpolicies.net, last access 16/08/2015 32
2.3 Operationalisation
Following the research question, the main exploratory aim are the actual language ideology(ies) of the migrants (Table 1). The concept of language ideology has been conceptualised in line with the literature review, disaggregating the concept into its four main characteristics: notion of language, relation between language and culture, relation between language and identity and finally the interplay between language and space. In every exploratory aim the inquiry of the language ideologies and its four constitutive elements will be kept in mind. The second exploratory aim which is described in Table 1 refers to the reported language uses of participants across scales, which is the first sub- question of the research. The language use in relation with the State apparatus, in the public sphere of the city, in participant’s neighbourhoods, working or studying places, social places or homes will be inquired during the linguistic biographies with the support of a mental map. In third place, the episodes in migrant’s lives which might have affected their notions of language will be discussed with the participants. It has been decided to do it sticking to the time dimension as in seems more natural to recall life events in a linear way. The languages uses in the past, present and future will be discussed and, in case of noticing big changes between periods, a deeper discussion of the reasons for the change will follow. Finally, the contextual dominant language ideologies of the states and the cities will be undertaken through secondary data analysis. Three main dimensions will be explored: migration policy, the authorities that define the linguistic norm and the education policy. All are considered key in ‘the construction of power relations between the state and the individual, which pertains to the subjectification of individuals and the construction of their identity as governable “citizens”’ (Löwenheim and Gazit, 2009:147). Educational systems are potential transmitters of the hegemonic notion of language and language ideology of the states which might have had influenced participants. Migration policies entail also notions of who and why someone is enabled to be a citizen of the state, a sort of ‘open window onto the “mind” of the state’ (Löwenheim and Gazit 20009:148) which is very much related to the dominant linguistic ideologies of the states. And finally the official notion of the norm is the content which is transmitted through the mentioned channels of migration and education policy. .
The dimensions and exploratory aims of Table 1 are considered to be sufficient to answer the research question, as they cover thoroughly the main variables.
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Table 1. Operationalisation
DIMENSIONS EXPLORATORY AIM VARIABLES METHOD EXPLORED Fixed. Code-switching Hybrid. Code-mixing Notion of language Fluid. Lack of awareness of language use Determination of language to Lifestyles, costumes and Language and culture behavioural patterns Membership to social group Thought Linguistic Language ideologies Relation of language (use) with biography Expression of identity Language and identity Being identified by others Identifying others Language use Where and why Language and space Adaptation to rule of spaces Creation of rules and norms in spaces State City Language use Linguistic Neighbourhood Authority of the norm biography Practices across scales Work/Study space Agency. Capacity to choose & Social activities Opinion about language tests Mental mapping Online space Home Language use in family and place of origin. Memories Past Language learning experience Experience of migration Language use in different spaces Linguistic Life experience Perception of others uses of biography Present language Feelings. Negotiation of identity. Strategies of adaptation Prospective of language use Future Education election for kids Dominant language Education Notion of language and ideologies multilingualism Secondary data Official linguistic norm (countries of origin and Promotion of monolingualism collection place of residence) Migration /multilingualism
The operationalization can be seen visualised in Figure 2. Life experiences – such as the experience of migration – and the contextual dominant ideologies of the states of origin but also of the cities of residence inform the shape of the language ideologies of the migrants which in turn affect their linguistic practices. The linguistic practices are in the short and midterm a source of experiences which change participant’s preconceptions of
34 language and thus their linguistic ideologies. It should be also noted that in the longue durée these same practices and alternative linguistic ideologies might affect the dominant language ideologies of the states and of the cities.
Figure 2. Visualisation of concepts and operationalization
2.4 Secondary data collection for the context
The enterprise to study the dominant language ideologies of the chosen states; two states of origin -France and Germany- and two cities of current residence – Madrid and Amsterdam –situated in two different countries –Spain and the Netherlands respectively – is based on the assumption that ‘within a broad regime of standard languages, one finds distinct “cultures of standard”’ and that ‘each is maintained by somewhat different social institutions’ (Gal 2006:166). Thus, within the common assumption that in every nation state a sort of hegemonic linguistic regime prevails, differences between these states and between the cities are expected which in turn is the key reason behind the engagement in a comparative study.
It has been considered that the reported linguist experiences and uses of migrants in these cities collected through the accomplishment of linguistic biographies have to be complemented with the study of the institutional arrangements affecting the linguistic representations and practices in the case of both selected cities and the states of Spain, Netherlands, Germany and France through the review of secondary data in order to better
35 understand the possible impact of the municipal and national institutional arrangements on resident’s linguistic representations, performances and feelings. Also the identification of possible influences of these ideologies in migrant’s speech will be enabled by this previous phase of review and study.
The (re)production of a certain ‘culture of the standard’ at the nations and cities mentioned above will be analysed through the review of secondary data. Special attention will be paid to educational language policies and official institutional responses to migration in which language increasingly plays a central role (Collins and Slembrouck, 2005: 192).
2.5 Linguistic biography and mental mapping
The method of linguistic biography with the support of a mental map have been used for the collection of primary data.
The linguistic biography enables to get a deeper understanding of participant’s uses and notions of languages as well as to get a diachronic subjective perspective of how it evolved during time. It permits to get an insight into the actual language ideologies of persons across scales and the prospective of future language uses. The linguistic biography has been undertaken following the methodology of life history interviews that ‘invites the subject to look back in detail across his or her entire life course’. It has been depicted as documenting ‘the inner experience of individuals, how they interpret, understand, and define the world around them’ (Faraday and Plummer in Bryman 2012:489)’.
In order to get these insights, an open interview has been considered to be best although directing the conversation towards the engagement with the topic at hand here: e.g. their linguistic practices, representations of what language stands for, how language defines their culture and identity as well as the one of the others around them, what identities or stereotypes they imagine from others and themselves when hearing and or talking language, etc. The questions have been generally structured around the two dimensions of time and space. First, a chronological narrative of participant’s linguistic experiences is promoted and secondly, emphasis is put on inquiring about the specific scales in which the reported behaviours take place (home, school, work, neighbourhood, city, state, etc.).
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A mental mapping exercise was used in order to support the spatial narratives of participants and better grasp participant’s perception of the spatiality of their language uses. It facilitates the analysis of participant’s ideas about the spatiality of language, culture and identity at different scales. Participants have been given a city map with marked boundaries between districts and asked to express what languages they would expect to hear in the city and where. While the map imposes the district level, participants often sketched neighbourhoods, streets, specific shops, squares and the like on the map. The map works interestingly as a stimulus for interviewees to keep talking and giving directly localized and spatialized information.
The intention has been to emulate a conversation-like interview in which after some initial questions about place of origin, linguistic experiences, or actual event of migration – it very much depends on the person that is being interviewed, the pre-interview chat and introductions – participants talk freely and interact with the interviewer. The purpose of this style is to generate a nice environment in which participants feel comfortable, almost forget that they’re being interviewed and recorded and just talk, in such a way that the topics pop up almost without being asked. This is considered to be an ideal situation, since participants might tend to be more frank about a statement if it hasn’t been directly asked. In the response to a direct question in an interview interviewees expectations of what the interviewer wants to hear or considerations of what the ‘correct’ and ‘wrong’ answers are have a great impact that is expected to decrease when the topic just emerges out of their own initiative. Certainly there have been differences between the interviews, with some interviewees being fluently and freely speaking and touching upon already defined or related variables and others needing a bit more orientation or the constant generation of questions from the part of the interviewer, rendering the session almost a structured interview. In no way does the kind of interview affect the interest of it. Despite the researchers preference for a conversation-like interview described above, the fact that some participants find the topic more attractive than others, or that they have more to say is in most cases already a finding as it might indicate the importance and reflexion that participants devote to the topic of language. People who had clear ideas and opinions about the topic of language, culture and identity and its impact on their lives prior to the interview tended to express them more fluently than participants who were, so to say, encountered for the first time with these kinds of questions. This indicates already the importance that language and language use has on participant’s routines and daily
37 negotiations of identity and already gives some insights into their possible language ideologies.
The interviews lasted from 30 up to 90 minutes and all kinds of interviews – whether short or long, fluent or hesitant –are considered to be equally revealing.
The interviews in Madrid were generally undertaken in Spanish and the interviews in Amsterdam in English. There was only one French participant living in Amsterdam that preferred to talk Spanish. Some code-mixing and switching practices where done with Germans but not with French. With Germans the researcher generally mentioned to the participants that she was able to speak German, and that made people feel freer to mix and switch when necessary. The use of a standard linguistic code was nevertheless predominant during the interviews.
Interviews were undertaken either at the homes of the participants or in a café of their election. Only two participants were interviewed at work during a break. The interviews at home promoted the engagement with some of the objects which were at home related with the topic (e.g. books, movies, etc. in their ‘native languages’) but also interrupted telephone calls or conversation with family members which allowed the researcher to observe a little bit into their actual practices. The cases of the cafes allowed for the same but in the public sphere (e.g. interaction with waiter or other people in the café).
2.5.1 Recruitment of respondents for linguistic biography interview
A total of 33 participants have been interviewed. 29 individual and two coupled interviews7 where undertaken (Table 2 and 3: Participants). 16 participants were interviewed in Amsterdam and 17 in Madrid. Two of the participants being interviewed in Madrid nevertheless didn’t fit the profile. Both ‘additional’ participants were born and raised in Madrid although within a German family8. These two interviews where undertaken and later transcribed. The interviews were interesting and proved insightful,
7 Due to preference of the interviewees. (A mother and his son wanted to be interviewed together, as well a German-French couple) 8 The researcher assumes the whole responsibility for this misunderstanding. The contact with the participants was done by phone and an explanation was given about the research in which the description of the criteria for participation - people born and raised in France or Germany and currently living in Madrid-was given. Nevertheless it was probably not enough emphasised and/or explained. 38 and will thus be taken into account although always being mentioned as ‘out of the sample’.
The 31 remaining interviews were mainly selected with the aim of achieving a balance with regards to the country origin (Germany and France) and city of residence (Amsterdam and Madrid) of the participants. This balance was achieved, with 15 French (eight in Madrid and seven in Amsterdam) and 16 German (seven in Madrid and nine in Amsterdam) participating. A gender balance was considered to be relevant and in turn attained on a general level (17 men and 14 women were interviewed), with regards to the country of origin (eight German women, eight German men, nine French women and six French men), but not so much on the city level as in Madrid there was a considerable higher participation of women (11 women and four men were interviewed in Madrid) and in Amsterdam the opposite happened with more men than women participating (six women and ten men were interviewed in Amsterdam). A balance concerning the length of residence in the selected cities (Madrid and Amsterdam) or countries (Netherlands and Spain) was considered but difficult to achieve. Participation of participants that have been leaving 1.5 – 5 years (nine participants in Amsterdam and three in Madrid) and 5-15 years (seven participants in Amsterdam and three in Madrid) in the city was attained in both cities, but it was not possible to find participants that had been living in Amsterdam for more than 15 years, whilst nine participants were interviewed in Madrid that had been living between 15 and 50 years in Spain or Madrid. This is related to the fact that much younger participants were interviewed in Amsterdam than in Madrid (12 participants between 24-30 years old in Amsterdam and only two in Madrid), and participants older than 41 where only found in Madrid (11 participants between the age of 40 and 73 in Madrid). The age between 30’s and 40’s was equally founded in both cities, with four participants in this range of age in each city.
Even though, these ‘unbalances’ do not necessarily pose a problem for the analysis at stake as it is a qualitative analysis interested in participant’s narratives, rationales and concepts. Thus, rather than on the representativeness of the sample from a statistical point of view the interest of this interview’s analysis will rely of the recurrence and representativeness of the concepts, arguments and experiences being exposed by participants.
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Amsterdam
Nine Germans and Seven French migrants have been interviewed in Amsterdam. The recruitment of participants was mainly achieved through word of mouth and the call for participation in online and on-site spaces. Four out the 16 participants where direct acquaintances of the researcher’s friends, one of which helped in turn with the recruitment of two other participants after being interviewed. Three participants were recruited through the posting on Facebook pages and groups (two through a post on the Amsterdam Mamas Facebook page and one through a post on the French People in Amsterdam Facebook group). One interviewee reacted to a post on the website of the Amsterdam expat community of Internations. One of the interviewees was contacted when picking up his children from school and agreed to do an interview some days after. Finally two participants were contacted through the dating Phone App called Tinder, one of which in turn provided three other participants after being interviewed. This last method of recruitment deserves additional attention as Tinder is a dating App and thus potentially conflictive, for creating false expectations from the part of the participants. The contact was done through a friend’s account of Tinder who frequently uses this App. The App has a messaging service by which the mentioned friend provided all relevant information about this research and clearly stated that the interview had no dating purposes. The interviewees, both female and male, agreed on the conditions of the interview and had a clear idea of the purpose and nature of the interview.
The on-line methods resulted definitely much more successful for the recruitment of participants than the on-site visits which were undertaken – various visits to the Goethe Institut in Amsterdam and the Consulat Général de France à Amsterdam – with unsuccessful responses.
The interviewing language in Amsterdam was mainly English. Only one participant preferred to be interviewed in Spanish.
Madrid
Seven Germans and eight French participants have been interviewed in Madrid. The recruitment of the participants was mainly achieved through word of mouth and the call for participation in on-site spaces. Six out the 17 participants where direct acquaintances
40 of the researcher’s friends and family members, one of which helped in turn with the recruitment of two other participants after being interviewed. Two teachers and one parent of a student of the Drebing German Academy (a private academy for learning German in Madrid) agreed to participate after a visit to the school. In turn the father of one of the teachers of the mentioned academy –also living in Madrid - showed interest in participating and was interviewed. One teacher of the Schweizer Schule Madrid (Swiss private school in Madrid where most of the lessons are taught in High German, with additional language courses in French and English) was interviewed. One teacher of the Goethe Institut in Madrid (German cultural institution) participated. One worker of Alliance Française of Madrid (French cultural institution) participated and finally one teacher and one parent of a student of Saint Louis des Français in Madrid (Private school where some courses are offered in German) where interviewed.
As explained above, two other participants were interviewed in Madrid which nevertheless didn’t fit the description of the sample as they were born and raised in Madrid. The misunderstanding was found out while doing the interview and the researcher decided to continue and finish the interview anyhow, both for respect reasons and for the intuition/possibility that these would eventually be of some interest.
In the city of Madrid the on-line call for participation –e-mail and Facebook pages – resulted far less successful than in Amsterdam whilst the on-site was definitely prosperous. The interviewing language in Madrid was mainly Spanish, with some German interviewees switching often to German when they did know that the researcher speaks German.
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Table 2. Participants Madrid
Name Age Profession Born and raised Residence Length of stay Gender Mia 40 Costume making Germany Madrid 7+3 years Barcelona F Hannah 50 Editor Germany Madrid 17 years F Leon 73 Retired architect Germany Madrid 48 years M Lukas 41 Innovation area Germany Madrid 28 years M Lena 49 Director of German academy Germany Madrid 40 years in Spain F Lea 36 German Teacher Germany Madrid 14 years F Ben 35 German and Math teacher Germany Madrid 10 years M Élodie 72 Retired France Madrid 50 years F Pauline 28 Communication A. Fraçaise France Madrid 4 years F Guillaume 45 CEO France Madrid 8+2 years M Mélanie 30 Singer and music teacher France Madrid 3 years F Camille 69 Retired France Madrid 47 years F Marion 33 Housewife France Madrid 3 years F Sarah 48 French teacher France Madrid 33 years F Chloé 72 Retired France Madrid 42 years F Additional interviews Max 16 Student Spain Madrid Born in Spain M
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Paul 33 German Teacher Spain Madrid Born in Spain M
Table 3. Participants Amsterdam
Name Age Proffession Born and raised Residence Length of stay Gender Laura 40 Informatics Germany Amsterdam 5.5 years F Philipp 24 Student Germany Amsterdam 1.5 years M Jan 30 Musician Germany Amsterdam 9 years M Christian 30 Economist Germany Amsterdam 4+2 years Rotterdam M Jakob 27 Economist Germany Amsterdam 1.5 years M Clara 26 Student Germany Amsterdam 6 years F David 27 Physics PHD Germany Amsterdam 2+ 3 Nijmegen M Emilia 26 Student and head-hunter Germany Amsterdam 1.5+ 3 Maastricht F Johanna 26 Worker NGO Germany Amsterdam 2 years F Marine 40 Unknown France Amsterdam 7 years F Louise 30 Translator France Amsterdam 5 years F Gabriel 26 Economist France Amsterdam 1.5 years M Théo 35 A. Marketing-Research France Amsterdam 8 years M Mathis 36 Institute Français Amsterdam France Amsterdam 11 years M Alexandre 28 Accountant France Amsterdam 2.5 years M
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Hugo 26 Marketing France Amsterdam 2 years M
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2.5.2 Data analysis method
An inductive approach is taken in this thesis, as rather than trying to test an already existing theory or set of hypothesis, the interest relies in trying to identify recurrent categories, concepts and expositions of how participants make sense of their language use across spaces and scales, how they perceive language (i.e. their ‘notion of language’) and the role they think language has in theirs and other’s negotiation of identity and conformation of a specific worldview or culture. Also the factor that determines their language ideologies didn’t want to be imposed and questions about the migration experience or the impact of the dominant language ideologies of the countries they’ve lived in were rarely directly asked. By identifying regularities and differences of emergent concepts referring to the mentioned dimensions the aim is to find out relations of causality between these and two already defined categories: the contextual dominant ideologies of participants and their experience of migration.
In this sense the data analysis and the data collection processes are intertwined, as ‘hypotheses about relationships among categories should be developed and verified as much as possible during the research process’ (Corbin and Strauss 1990: 11). The interviews were initially designed following the literature review and the imagined possible outcomes, relevant concepts and categories. Undoubtedly the theoretically defined categories and patterns did influence the researcher’s interpretation of participants’ narratives, but it has been important to try to keep the analysis open for new patterns to emerge out of migrant’s explanations and incorporate these in the next interviews. As Corbin and Strauss (1990: 9) state, ‘consistency is achieved because, once a concept has "earned" its way into a study through demonstrations of its relationship to the phenomenon under investigation, then its indicators should be sought in all subsequent interviews and observations’. The main approach to migrant’s narratives will seek to be based on listening what they have to say as opposed to try to shoehorn already existing statements and categories. As Corbin and Strauss (1990) defend:
‘This is not to say that data collection is not standardized. Each investigator enters the field with some questions or areas for observation, or will soon generate them. Data will be collected on these matters throughout the research endeavour, unless the questions prove, during analysis, to be irrelevant. In order not to miss anything
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that may be salient, however, the investigator must analyse the first bits of data for cues. All seemingly relevant issues must be incorporated into the next set of interviews and observations’ (Corbin and Strauss 1990: 6)
Once the collection of data was finished, interviews were transcribed and coded with Atlas.ti. Recurrent and persistent concepts were identified in all phases: interviewing, transcribing and coding.
Broader categories have been established out of various concepts and finally the analysis was undertaken by exploring for recurrent and persistent topics throughout different participant’s narratives in order to look for patterns under different scenarios, spaces, contexts, backgrounds and experiences that can be somehow integrated in a coherent understanding of the phenomena at hand, the ‘conditions that give rise to them, how they are expressed through action/interaction, the consequences that result from them, and variations of these qualifiers’ (Corbin and Strauss 1990: 8).
Through the persistence and coherence throughout different participants’ narratives and/or alongside the different cities, countries of origin and live experiences broader generalisations and theory have been advanced.
2.6 Limitations and external validity
The limitations of this research are related to the selected participants, cities of residence and states of origin but also to the selected method and finally to the limitations of the researcher.
With regards to the case selection the most salient characteristic of the sample is its privileged condition when generally compared to the world population and in particular to the world migrants. It should be noticed that the selected participants are high educated participants who have a rather high socio economic status (in any event high for world standards) and who undertook migration voluntarily; not driven by any social, economic or political violent situation. Furthermore only few of the participants were subject to the naturalisation laws of the states (the ones that migrated before the entrance of Spain in the EU) and none of them was subject to the linguistic or cultural tests for the purpose of naturalisation or application for residency. Most importantly all of the interviewed participants are legally living in the selected cities and have the right to work.
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All these characteristics of the participants limit its generalisation to groups of other socio-economic of educational status, migrants who migrated under less comfortable circumstances, that are subject to migration regulations or who are illegally living in a country. A study with a different sample subject to greater stigmatising stereotypes or social, political and economic vulnerability would definitely expose more dimension of the topic at hand. Nevertheless, it is assumed that there are some commonalities with regards to the potential impact of the very experience of migration and living in a multilingual context which could be shared among privileged and somehow less privileged migrants.
With regards to the countries of origin, Germany and France are both European structured national states who deploy a high degree of governmentality. Some states around the world do not have the social institutions in place to do that to such an extended degree and the nationals of other countries might be not as influenced by the dominant language ideology of their states of origin as are the selected cases.
In addition, the selected migrants are not members of any kind of political struggle which takes language as a symbol or as a strong defining element of their identity. There is also no official struggle between the states of origin and the states or cities of residence that could interfere in the relation between the selected migrants and the locals. If this would be the case different results would be expected.
The selected cities of residence are also particular cases, and the place dependency of the linguistic practices and notions cannot be omitted. General conclusion will be drawn, but the phenomenon will be somehow change across different cities.
With regards to the methods, the main limit of this research is the fact that the primary data collection method relies – for time constrain reasons – only on the reported practices of the participants. The actual practices will not be analysed and a gap between what participant say they do, and what they actually do could point to different results.
Finally, this research does not look from nowhere. It is rather looked from a quite personal perspective of the researcher: me. I grew up in a Spanish-German family in Madrid, and studied in a Swiss school in the same city until I went to the public Spanish University. I also lived abroad during several periods in Germany, England, Italy and currently in the
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Netherlands. Particularly the first experience working and studying in English was frustrating. Currently I do have multilingual relations with friends, family and with my partner. I could identify with many of the experiences recalled by participants and I cannot deny that this research did reshuffle my conceptions of language, or at least pushed me to experiment with my own language use in my daily live. I can ensure that the perspective taken here has been very much inquiring about the topic with much more questions than preconceptions. This research thus definitely couples the understanding of the broader and socially significant topic of language notions and practices with a personal set of questions, experiences and thoughts which were up until now never really structured, but just a bunch of thoughts and disorganised, unaware and unconscious language uses and notions. It is needless to say that I do also have traces of language ideologies, exactly in the same way that my participants do. It is important to note that although I really did not find many normative notions of right or wrong language uses I do have a positioning against the enforcement of linguistic tests. Although understanding some of the communicative and integrative goals of these policies, the paternalistic and violent way in which these are implemented is not of my political taste. What might also affect this study is my completely detachment from a national sense of belonging, the concept of nationality or national borders; although I cannot escape the fact that my cultural codes and references are highly informed by the countries of Spain and Germany. All these characteristic will certainly be present across this research.
2.7 Ethical considerations
The contact with participants was transparent, with participants being fully informed about the general purpose, content and output of the study from the onset. Participants were interviewed in a place of their election to ensure privacy and comfort. Their names have been kept confidential in order to avoid the disclosure of personal information. Language uses and notions are a normative topic for many and participants might feel judged about their answers. The aim of this research is not to evaluate right and wrong answers and therefore the different opinions and reports will not be categorised alongside normative lines.
The topics handled in the interviews can potentially interfere with participant’s lives and privacy sometimes encouraging the questioning of one’s values and identities. Linguistic
48 biographies have been designed as open interviews and participants will not be pushed to talk about a topic if they do not come up with the topic itself. When occasionally questions are asked, a specific sensibility for not interfering with too sensible topics participants might not want to talk about will be taken into account.
Finally the study of the impact of the contextual dominant language ideologies might reinforce the idea of the nation state as a homogeneous unit strengthening and creating clichés about its inhabitants. When possible, as much contextual explanations about participants will be given so that the reader knows more than that the participant was a ‘standard’ or ‘typical’ national of a given country in order to avoid the mentioned problematic.
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3. CONTEXTUAL DOMINANT LANGUAGE IDEOLOGIES
Based on the secondary analysis of the context and the recurrent dimensions from the interviews, there are four common elements that proved to be repeatedly relevant in the conformation of participant’s language ideologies. These are the role of language in the naturalisation laws or in participant’s perceptions of integration, the linguistic ‘norm’ (normative regulations of language), the importance of the mother tongue and the language use in public and private spaces.
In this chapter these four dimensions are going to be exposed for the cases of the two states and cities of residence and for the two countries of origin. First a brief demographic review of each country will be presented and a review of their migration and naturalisation policy will be explained with reference to the role that language plays in the process of naturalisation. The regulation of the linguistic norm and the definition of the concept of mother tongue will be reviewed next. Finally the linguistic policies and the arrangement of the linguistic education of the states and cities will be exposed as well as the implications these might have on the language use in public and private spaces. An account of the debates about the concept of mother tongue falls beyond the scope of this thesis and this research will only describe it in the way policy agencies put it to work.
3.1 Cities and Countries of residence
3.1.1 Madrid and Spain
Demographics, Migration and role of language in naturalization law
Spain has been a country of emigration since the nineteenth century and just began to receive substantial immigration since its entry in the European Union in 1985, having the highest rates of migrant arrival in the years between 1998-2008 (González-Enríquez 2015: 340) and a subsequent decrease of net migration down to 15.500 persons in 2012 – ‘at its lowest in at least a decade’ (OECD: 298).
Migration policy in Spain has been conformed basically by 5 laws since 1985 (1985, 2000, 2003, 2004 and 2009) basically marked by the attempt to cope with irregular migration by two different means. First, by trying to stop the inflow of migrants by cooperating with countries of origin and increasingly controlling borders and second by trying to regularize the migrants that were already in the territory as well as set up new 50 legal entrance conditions. In general terms, the first laws aimed primarily at the latter by defining the rights of migrants, introducing the concepts and conditions for residence and working permits and developed the right for family reunification. The law of the year 2000 (BOE12 January 2000) is of particular interest, since it gave ‘irregular immigrants access to state-paid health care under the same terms as Spanish citizens or regular immigrants, and free education at the pre-school, primary and secondary levels’ (González-Enríquez 2015: 338) with the only condition that they had to be registered at the municipality. Just the laws of 2003 (BOE 2 December 2003) and finally 2009 (BOE 12 December 2012) introduced a major emphasis on border control and diminished the right of migrants granted in the law of the year 2000, leaving the actual provision of these health and education services to the discretion of each autonomous community as well as limiting the family reunification right granted to migrants in previous laws.
In any event the ordinary regularisation processes always failed to cope with the actual amount of foreigners in an irregular situation and 5 special regularisation processes had to be implemented in 1991,1995,2000,2001 and finally 2005 in order to cope with this challenge. A total of 1.041.000 where regularized through these extraordinary processes (González-Enríquez 2015: 339).
With regards to naturalisation, Spanish rules express a mix between jus sanguinis and jus soli. The access is thus open for descendants of Spaniards, in some cases to children born9 in Spain and finally nationality can be also acquired by residence. In this last case language plays an important role as naturalisation through residence is ‘subject to some restrictions such as “good civic conduct” and “sufficient integration in Spanish society”’ (González-Enríquez 2015: 344). The meaning of these conditions is open to the interpretation of the judge in charge of the case and ‘the lack of knowledge of the Spanish language is the most common cause of rejection’ (González-Enríquez 2015: 344) which is in turn aligned with the constitutional duty of all nationals to know the language. Thus, although not present in the process of residency and working permit acquisition, language knowledge is often the cause of rejected naturalisation and probably one of the reasons behind the higher amount of South and Central American than of African naturalised
9 Nationality is granted by birth in cases where one of the parents was also born in Spain, in cases where both parents are immigrants but have been living one continuous year legally in Spain, and also to children born in Spain whose parent’s countries of origin don’t give them the nationality 51 citizens – 180.554 (approx. 30% of South and Central American immigrants) and 59. 938 (approx. 14% of African immigrants) in 201310. Of course there are other reasons behind this data, such as a higher proportion of South and Central Americans that can proof some Spanish origin.
The laws outlined above do not affect nationals from countries within the EU which nevertheless summed up half of the foreign residents and 32% of the permanent residents in Spain in 2012 (OECD 2014:298). This leads to Spain having the highest net migration flow of EU nationals after Germany (Vargas-Silva 2012), mostly composed by English and German nationals living in coastal areas.
Linguistic norm and mother tongue
In the case of Spain the regulatory body of the linguistic norm is the ‘Real Academia Española’ [Royal Spanish Academy] which is mainly in charge of maintaining up to date the official Spanish Dictionary ‘Diccionario de la Real Academia Española’, which is in addition a main reference among Spanish people and a must in the Spanish education system when it comes to the definition of the rules and norms of the language. The last edition (2010) was edited with the Association of Spanish Language Academies for the first time. This Association is a partnership of the ‘Real Academia Española’ with other 22 South American Academies of the Spanish Language, established in 1950. This dictionary is called the ‘Pan-Hispanic Dictionary’ and integrated linguistic uses and forms from different geographic areas. The ‘Real Academia Española’ expresses in its charter, its will to comprehend the ‘current Spanish language, considering it as the language that the alive generations use’11. The last reform was not without polemic, and the public opinion was somehow spitted between the ones that would like it to be more conservative (e.g. not include the Anglicism that were introduced in the last edition) and the ones that would like it to change even faster than the society does, eliminating some stigmatizing or gender unfriendly concepts. It is nevertheless still a legitimized reference of the ‘right’ way of speaking and writing the Spanish language.
10 Observatorio Permanente de inmigración http://extranjeros.empleo.gob.es/es/Estadisticas/, last access 13/08/2015 11 http://www.rae.es/, last access 13/08/2015 52
The ‘Real Academia Española’ defines ‘lengua materna’ [mother tongue] as ‘la (lengua) que se habla en un país, respecto de los naturales de él’, [the (language) that is spoken in a country, respect to the naturals of it] 12
Linguistic policy and education. Impact on public and private spaces
Spain experienced a radical change from a highly centralised political system to its actual state of autonomies after the approval of the Spanish democratic constitution in 1978 which also had impact on the acceptance and tolerance of different languages within its realm. With regards to the language regulations, ‘Castilian is the official language of the state. All Spaniards have the duty to know it and the right to use it’ (Article 3.1 Preliminary title to the Spanish Constitution of 1978, own translation). In addition, ‘the rest of the languages are also official in its respective autonomous communities according to its statues’ (Article 3.2 Preliminary title to the Spanish Constitution of 1978, own translation) and the ‘richness of the different linguistic varieties of Spain is a cultural patrimony which will be an object of special respect and protection’ (Article 3.2 Preliminary title to the Spanish Constitution of 1978, own translation). Currently there is an established bilingualism in 4 out of 17 autonomous communities in the Spanish state –Catalonia, Valencian Community, Basque country and Galicia – and official monolingualism in the rest of the autonomous communities as well as de facto in the general institutions of the state13. In this sense, Branchadell and Moles (2001:2) define Spain as a state with a ‘monolingual centre and bilingual regions’ as opposed to the ‘multilingual centre and monolingual regions’ in cases like Belgium, Switzerland or Canada. In a way the multilingualism of the Spanish state is just perceived in the single autonomous communities and is not felt as own in the rest of the territory (Martín Rojo, 2012)
The bilingualism in the autonomous communities of Catalonia, Valencian Community, Galicia and Basque Country is present in all social and political institutions of its autonomies, including the educational ones which are considered in the following, for the understanding that education is a key social institution in the production of language
12 http://lema.rae.es/drae/?val=lengua+materna, last access 13/08/2015 13 There is an increased sensibility to publish legislation and general information in all the recognised languages 53 ideologies. Most of the competences regarding the education system have been progressively granted to all the autonomous communities after 1978 with the central government retaining the ‘competences that safeguard the homogeneity and the substantial unity of the education system and that guarantee the basic conditions of equality of all Spaniards in the exercise of their education and fundamental rights determined by the Constitution’14 and the competences over the education systems of the two autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla. All students in these autonomous communities learn both languages at school to a greater or lesser extent in addition to the general obligation to learn a ‘foreign’ language as a compulsory subject from the age of 9 until the age of 18 (Eurydice 2012: 147). This results in most of the cases to the use of at least 3 languages to teach language or non-language subjects at school (Eurydice 2012: 41). In the cases of the bilingual autonomous communities the two official languages plus at least one foreign language15 –which normally is English – are taught and in other autonomous communities like Madrid, Aragón, Canary Island, Murcia and Galicia16 two foreign languages are compulsory, the first from the age of 9 and the second from the age of 12 (Eurydice 2012: 32). As an outcome 25% of 15 years old students in Spain ‘attend a school where more than 20% of their contemporaries speaks a language at home other than the language of instruction’ (Eurydice 2012: 21), a high percentage for European standards, just surpassed by a 33% of 15 years old students having the same situation in the French and German speaking communities in Belgium and followed by Germany, Bulgaria, and Latvia with a 10-20% (Eurydice 2012: 21). All in all the emphasis put on language learning at Spanish schools is still not reflected in Spanish society as shown by a research of the European Commission of 2012 in which 54% of Spanish citizens said that they are unable to speak any foreign language (Special Eurobarometer 386, 2012:16)
With regards to migrant children, the regulations regarding the support in learning the language of instruction as a second language and/or encouraging the learning of their ‘mother’ tongues is a competence fully granted to the autonomies and highly varied across the Spanish territory. A general trend is nevertheless to prioritise the teaching of the
14Ministry of Education and Culture (MEC), https://www.mecd.gob.es/educacion-mecd/areas- educacion/sistema-educativo/principios-fines/administracion-educativa.html last access 16/08/2015 15 Central regulation from the Ministry of Education and Culture. A foreign language is compulsory at all schools from the age of 9 16 This would point to Galician schools teaching in at least 4 languages (2 co-official languages plus two ‘foreign’ languages) 54 language of instruction at school leaving aside the native languages of these children in the cases in which these do not coincide with the ones included in the linguistic curriculum of the schools.
The constant allusion in policy and reports to (co)official language and foreign language as two very different things is worth mentioning here as, in addition to a different hierarchy or importance of these languages, it points out a specific spatialisation of languages. The common language of the state: Castilian and the co-official languages of the autonomous communities are put on the same level of importance and considered legitimate within the territory of the state, whilst the ‘foreign’ languages are somehow reduced to English, French and sometimes German and considered assets to the educational curricula aiming for the improvement and excellence of the Spanish education system. These ‘foreign’ languages are imagined to belong to an outer space and ‘foreign’ languages other than English, French and German -to a lesser extend- are in one way or another considered to be either private languages or something to surpass by its speaking population by learning both, the (co)official languages17 and the ‘top’ ‘foreign’ languages. In any case neither the idea of the inclusion of the main languages of some migrant communities, nor the rationale of teaching languages other than the mentioned ones are present in policy and public discourse.
This is also the case of the autonomous community of Madrid where almost a 12% of the pupils matriculated alongside the different public education paths are foreigners (including foreigners whose home language is Spanish and excluding nationals whose home language is not Spanish). In the community of Madrid, the emphasis on the idea of a bilingual education of excellence has been on the top of the agenda since 2004 by promoting Spanish-English bilingual primary and secondary schools of ‘excellence’ with the motto ‘Madrid Comunidad Bilingüe’ -Madrid, bilingual community - (Consejería de Educación, Juventud y Deporte de la Comunidad de Madrid 2014). In 2014 there were 8% of pupils enrolled in public bilingual schools in Madrid, a considerable increase
17 In every autonomous community there are special programmes for migrant (adults and kids) that support this activity 55 against the 0.12% that were undertaken bilingual education in 2004 but still a minority of pupils.
The support for migrant students is conducted in Madrid as well as in many other autonomous communities by a special centre called Centro de Participación e Integración (CEPI) [Centre for participation and integration] where in addition to free Spanish courses some auxiliary school and job-seeking related activities are undertaken for both adults and children. These are not included in the regular schooling structure. The municipality of Madrid also delivers free Spanish courses and other services of translation, orientation to its municipal services and labour related activities to migrants.
It can be thus stated that the management of the varied linguistic practices introduced by the arrival of migrants is expected to be nuanced one directionally by the migrant integrating the ‘culture of the standard’ of the place of arrival: Madrid. The institutions organised for this aim are somehow disconnected from the rest of the social institutions, which seem to progress parallel to these developments.
Spain has no linguistic laws regulating the language of the public space. There is only one constitutional obligation of communicating with citizens in the official language (Castilian, Catalan, Basque or Galician) required by them (Article 54 of the Spanish Constitution). In the case of Madrid the official language of the city and the autonomous community is Castilian. Madrid is aiming at turning more monolingual in spaces directed to tourist, but the residents multilingual competences remain highly concentrated in private spaces. The public services and spaces remain highly monolingual, living in parallel to multilingual populations. There is also no regulation with regards to the language to be spoken in shops, working places or homes in the city of Madrid.
Madrid, a multilingual city?
The city of Madrid, within the autonomous community of Madrid is one of the main destinations of migrants coming to Spain (González-Enríquez 2015). In the Strategic
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International Positioning Plan of the city of Madrid (2012-2015) 18 of the outgoing conservative government of the Partido Popular (PP) there is the stated goal of developing Madrid as a multilingual city, following the example of other main European capitals. The mentioned report is mainly concerned at making Madrid ‘appealing’ for international investments by generating an international and multilingual-friendly environment. There are nevertheless additional dimensions in which Madrid has been for the last decade working on promoting multilingualism. As mentioned above, there has been a bilingual education programme going on for the last 11 years in which mainly English, but also French and German language immersion programmes at primary and secondary schools have been promoted. Also at the University level Madrid has promoted different mobility programmes within the frame of the European Union (Erasmus and Leonardo programmes) but also frequently with South America, Asia and Africa. The autonomous community of Madrid has currently seven public and eight private universities which attract an always increasing amount of international students and, both, the community and the municipality encourage that by promoting bilingual education in Universities and delivering orientation and information sessions for foreign students to come.19
Also a lot of effort is devoted to render Madrid more multilingual for tourist. This is visible in the tourist website of the city of Madrid20 available in 9 languages, but also in the translation of the main indications of the tourist hotspots into the main European languages. In the audio-visual project ‘Lenguas pa’ la citi’ 21 developed by Luisa Martín Rojo and her anthropology students of the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid the outcomes explore how the service and tourist services in Madrid is highly multilingual, whilst other social and health institutions of the city remain very monolingual in highly multilingual neighbourhoods and thus ‘out of place in this environment’. The same project develops a linguistic landscape of the city of Madrid, showing how messages, job vacancies, store signs and so on are emerging in the fabric of the city in very multilingual and hybrid linguistic forms which are not being included in the formal communication practices of the main institutions of the city.
18 Estratégico de Posicionamiento Internacional de la Ciudad de Madrid (2012 – 2015 http://www.madrid.es/UnidadesDescentralizadas/RelacionesInternacionales/MadridInternacional/publicac iones/resumen%20estrategia1.pdf, last access 15/08/2015 19 http://www.emes.es/Sistemauniversitario/Universidades/tabid/215/Default.aspx last access 16/08/2015 20 http://www.esmadrid.com/ last access 16/08/2015 21 https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=175&v=xqzubnfFr9w (with English subtitles) last access 16/08/2015 57
In addition to the on-going project ‘Lenguas pa la citi’, Martín Rojo (2012) did a detailed study of the emergence and inclusion of a variety of languages, in both standard and hybrid forms, during the Indignados Movement (mainly called 15M in Spain) of 2011. She exposes how messages like ‘People of Europe rise up’, ‘We D’Hondt like this voting Martín Rojo) ال ثورة system’22, ‘Bois pas, pensé’, ‘Italiani svegliatevi anche voi, dai!’ or 2012: 289) where not only used to give the movement an international dimension but also for internal communication purposes –as when guidelines about not drinking alcohol or being careful with the sun to prevent heatstroke where given in various languages23; which means that the expected recipients of the message where actually in the Sol Square24. By including this other languages the speakers of these languages where automatically made a legitimate part of the movement, no matter their length of stay in the country and most importantly disregarding whether they talked or not Spanish. In this moment to be Spanish one didn’t need to speak Spanish.
Martín Rojo (2012: 291) defends that these language varieties –which also included different uses of the Spanish language (often the feminine form was used by default in speeches and identified with a feminist inclusive way of talking) –where not originated during the Indignados movement, but already embedded in the environment in which this movement emerged: a multilingual Madrid.
3.1.2 Amsterdam and the Netherlands
Demographics, Migration and role of language in naturalization law
The importance given to the Dutch language is very much present in the immigration management policies and framed as an essential element of Dutch society and thus compulsory competence for integration and participation.
The Netherlands has a long history of immigration that began with the inflow of Indonesian and Surinamese after the independence of these former colonies in 1950 and 1970 respectively. Also in the 1960’s and 70’s a considerable amount of Moroccan and Turkish individuals migrated to the Netherlands to work. These groups in addition to the
22 referring to the actual D’Hont method used in Spain to allocate seats in Parliament 23 Own memories of the researcher 24 Base camp of the protesters movement 58 extensive amount of German migrants historically living in the Netherlands are still the main country of origin of Dutch immigrants (Bonjour and Scholten 2014: 267). The inflow of migrants in in the years 1999-2000 increased due to the refugees coming from former Yugoslavia and has been overall steadily increasing since 1995, basically due to labour immigration for EU countries – Especially Polish nationals since 2004 and Southern Europeans since 2008 – and relatives of current residents that enter through family reunification policies.
Although ‘in the late 1990s, the Netherlands still enjoyed an international reputation as an open and pluralist country’ the migration policy developments in the last decades had the result that ‘today, the “multiculturalist” model is rejected perhaps more fiercely in the Netherlands than anywhere else’ (Bonjour and Scholten 2014: 263). This turn in politics and public opinion was possibly most accentuated in the early 2000 with the emergence of ‘new right-wing populist parties and movements like Trots op Netherland (Proud of The Netherlands) and the Partij voor de Vrijheid (Freedom Party) were successful in promoting a political agenda of forced cultural integration and even assimilation of ethnic minorities’ (Boomkens 2010:308). Indeed, Bonjour and Scholten (2014:269) explain how the association between immigration and integration has been very much present since the 1990s, although with changing roles. While in the early 1990s the discourse emphasised the limitation of immigration in order to allow for a better integration of the migrants already living in the Netherlands, already in 2000’s integration per se was used to limit immigration by means of civic integration tests to migrants wanting to apply for the permanent residence and for the relatives of residents entering through family migration (Wet Inburgering [Dutch Civic Integration Act] 2006), as requirement for naturalisation (Wet Inburgering 2010) and in case of dependency on welfare state benefits (Wet Inburgering 2012). Applicants for residence which are not currently in the Netherlands have to take the exam prior to entering the country in the embassy or consulate of their respective countries.25 Although since 1998 ‘there had already been an obligation to participate in civic integration courses’ (Bonjour and Scholten 2014: 269) it was not until 2006 that it was compulsory also to pass them and since 2012 self-finance them. ‘The civic integration test consist of a practical part
25 http://www.government.nl/issues/new-in-the-netherlands/integration-of-newcomers last access 16/08/2015 59
(proving language proficiency and familiarity with Dutch society in real life situations) and a theoretical part (proving basic knowledge of Dutch society and A2 level proficiency in Dutch’ (Bonjour and Scholten 2014: 269). Language (and culture) knowledge is thus at the core of Dutch migration policy and integration rationale. As can be read in the Government of Netherlands website:
‘Compulsory integration and learning Dutch: If you come to live in the Netherlands for a longer period of time from outside the EEA, Switzerland and Turkey, and are between 18 and state pension age, you are obliged to learn Dutch. This rule also applies to clerics, such as imams and pastors. Learning the language is part of the compulsory integration process. Foreign nationals from the EEA, Switzerland or Turkey are not obliged by law to integrate but it is just as important that they learn Dutch.’26(Own underline)
This understanding is increasingly also held with regards to EU – especially central European migrants (Bonjour and Scholten 2014) –, ‘however, the means for addressing these concerns are very limited, largely because CEE migrants are EU citizens and cannot be obliged to take part in civic integration programmes’ (Bonjour and Scholten 2014: 272) so far.
Linguistic norm and mother tongue
In the Netherlands the ‘Nederlandse Taalunie’ [Dutch Language Union] is in charge of the regulation of the Standard Dutch as well as the conservation of the Dutch language heritage. It is a Union between the Dutch, Flemish and Surinamese governments. They also revise the Van Dale dictionary, whose last version was 2005. The official grammar and spelling is not compiled there but in the ‘groene boekje’ or ‘Woordenlijst Nederlandse Taal’ [Dutch Lexicon] which is laid out like a dictionary, but with the grammar, forms and spelling of the words instead of the word definitions.27 The rules of the ‘groene boekje’ are reference and rule in the educational system as well as in governmental official reports and communications. The last release of the ‘groene boekje’ in 2005 caused some polemic among a sector of the population who did not agree on the changes.
26 Idem 27 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_Language_Union#Dictionary, last access 13/08/2015 60
The ‘witte boekje’ was published by some of its opponents as an alternative which is widely used by mainstream media in the Netherlands and at the current moments both grammars continue to be used.28
The ‘Van Dale’ dictionary describes ‘moedertaal’ [mothertongue] as ‘taal van het land waar iem. geboren is’ [language of the country where somebody is born].29
Linguistic policy and education. Impact on public and private spaces
The official language of the Netherlands is Dutch. Frisian, English and Papiamento are also recognised as co-official languages recognised in the province of Friesland (Frisian), in the special municipalities of Saba and Sint Eustatius in the Dutch Caribbean/ BES Islands (English) and in the special municipality of Bonaire (Papiamento).
Also the municipality of Amsterdam recognizes English as an official language of communication of the municipality since 200930; Dutch nevertheless remains the main language of publications, meetings and administration.31
In addition two varieties of Dutch have the status of regional language –Low Saxon and Limburgish, but cannot be used neither at school as language of instruction nor in official documents or in court (Kuiken and Linden 2013:4).
The educational system in the Netherlands is decentralised and its management is coordinated between the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, the provincial authority, the locality and the educational institutions. The central government has the overall responsibility for the education system but only lays down some requirements for the primary, secondary and higher education, retaining full control over the adult secondary education32. Therefore, the education system is generally very decentralised,
28 http://www.goedmettekst.nl/het-groene-boekje-het-witte-boekje/, last access 13/08/2015 29 http://www.vandale.nl/opzoeken?pattern=moedertaal&lang=nn#.Vczmq7Ltmko, last access 13/08/02015 30 http://www.telegraaf.nl/binnenland/article20477295.ece, last access 15/08/2009 31 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caribbean_special_municipalities_of_the_Netherlands, last access 15/08/2015 32 https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/fpfis/mwikis/eurydice/index.php/Netherlands:Overview last access 16/08/2015 61 with the Ministry of Education determining up to the 70% of the curriculum of the primary education (Eurydice 2012: 65) and leaving gradually a greater freedom to decide the offered courses as the level of education increases in the three different secondary education streams –VMBO, HAVO and VWO – in the University of applied science (MBO) and in the University of higher education (WO). The great autonomy given to localities and single educational institutions renders the exposition of general trends in linguistic education complicated.
Generally Dutch is the vehicular or instruction language in most of the schools in the Netherlands, with some schools in Friesland teaching also non-language courses in Frisian as well as English in the BES Islands and Papiamento in of Bonaire. As a general rule ‘all students have to start learning English between the ages of 6 and 12’ (Eurydice 2012: 149). Afterwards, in some secondary education paths pupils have to learn up to three foreign languages but a second foreign language is not compulsory for all students in general (Eurydice 2012: 29), making up an average of 2.2 languages being learned by Dutch students in the year 2012 (Eurydice 2012: 65). This is somehow reflected in the broader Dutch society, with 94% of people in the Netherlands stating to be able to speak at least one language in addition to their mother tongue (Special Eurobarometer 386 2012: 5). Given the mentioned decentralisation, some schools and some educational paths put more emphasis on language learning than others. Schools have been increasingly implementing Spanish, Italian, Russian, Chinese and ‘the (immigrant) languages Arabic and Turkish’ with a ‘firm status as examination subjects’ (Extra & Yağmur, 2012 in Kuiken and Linden 2013:6). Thus, in addition to Dutch, Frisian, English or Papiamento as a first language and English, French and German as the preferred second and third languages, there seem to be some adaptation to the pupil’s home languages at school. Nevertheless, this was more accentuated until 2004, when for ‘mainly political and financial reasons, the facilitation of minority language teaching was put to an end in 2004’ (Kuiken and Linden 2013:7). Other reasons where the increased debate about the low level of Dutch language among pupils both from ethnic minority groups and some native Dutch speakers. ‘Results from the PIRLS- and PISA-surveys have shown that children of native speakers of Dutch experience difficulties as well, especially when they belong to a lower socio-economic group’ (Kuiken and Linden 2013:6). This provoked that in the more prestigious tracks of secondary and higher education Dutch proficiency tests are sometimes required in order to be accepted (Kuiken and Linden 2013:6).
62
In the Netherlands there are also no laws regulating the linguistic use of the public space. The city of Amsterdam is has a very multilingual public space due to, tourism migration and the diverse linguistic background of its population. The linguistic possibilities of the city to see, hear or speak in another language than Dutch are high, although the main alternative is English. Also almost all public services are offered at least in English and Dutch. Shops, working spaces or homes language uses are not regulated by law.
Amsterdam
The scale of the city seems to differ somehow form the national discourse outlined above. As Bonjour and Scholten (2014: 272) explain.
‘whereas in some cities, most notably Rotterdam, a similar assimilationist turn in public discourse can be discerned, in many other cities policy as well as media discourses have remained more pragmatic and sometimes even positive in relation to diversity. Some city administrations have even expressed resentment of national policy discourses negatively affecting local inter-ethnic relations, which undermines local efforts to promote inter-ethnic relations (see for instance Amsterdam’s attempt to shape a local identity that embraces diversity through the slogan ‘We are all Amsterdammers’).’
Also, as was mentioned above Amsterdam recognised English as co-official with Dutch in communications with and of the municipality. Dutch remains the main language, but the right to use English exists and there are many publications and communications with residences already available in English.
The case of Amsterdam differs from the case of the city of Madrid described above. Whilst both cities aim at promoting themselves as multilingual in the case of Spain and of Madrid the multilingualism of its citizens and of some of its places is somehow ignored and in Amsterdam it is certainly acknowledged. The city of Amsterdam is in this sense somehow confronted to the national policies with regards to the management of multilingualism. Whilst on a national level it seems to be prevented or coped with an integrationist agenda, the city of Amsterdam seems to celebrate diversity at least, at an institutional level and on the fabric of the city. The municipality of Amsterdam also offers
63 advice33 for families on how to use language at home. The rationale is that ‘children who are widely exposed to a good standard of language at home do better at school than children who are not’. The website nevertheless does not specify what language has to be spoken at home and information is available in Dutch, English, Spanish, Turkish and Arabic. Also some information on how to raise a child bilingual is offered.
3.2 Countries of origin
3.2.1 France
Demographics, Migration and role of language in naturalization law
France is a long established immigration country since the 19th century and only since 1975 ceased the Europeans to be the majority of the migrants (mainly Italians, Spanish, Portuguese and Yugoslavs) and non-Europeans took over. In 2012 the main countries of provenience of migrants with permanent residency permits where Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia (OECD: 254), showing how the relation with the ex-colonies still plays a major role in the origin of the migrants. The level if immigration declined after 2008 but has been rising again since 2012 (OECD: 254). Wihtol de Wenden (2014:145) recalls Dominique Schnapper’s description of France as ‘un pays d’immigration qui s’ignore’ [an integration country which ignores itself as being so], ‘because the history of immigration is not part of the French historical narrative’. This is in part due to the myth of the homogeneity of the culture and the population of France, which is still very much at odds with the fact that France was the biggest country of immigration in Europe between 1880 and 1970 (Wihtol de Wenden 2014:145) and in 2012 had around 5.4 million immigrants (8,5 % of the total population) (Wihtol de Wenden 2014:148).
National identity has been largely constructed based on the Rousseauian idea of the social contract and ‘it assumes a homogeneous population and universal citizenship, an equality of rights, a single social contract and secularism’ (Wihtol de Wenden 2014:154) to which newcomers have to assimilate somehow leaving its particular identities, differences and needs at the border. No differences are recognized in the republican ideal. Everyone is
33 https://www.amsterdam.nl/onderwijs-jeugd/taaltips/ , last access 15/08/2015 64 the same and should be granted the same rights, with no regards to their previous social, political, economic or religious characteristics.
The access to nationality in France is regulation by a balance between jus sanguinis and jus soli. The debate around naturalization laws was not politicised until the 1980s, when prompted by Le Pen’s use of immigration as the core of his argument, ‘the period 1980- 2012 has been inversely characterised by an inflation of laws following the shifts of ruling majorities from left to right and vice versa’ (Wihtol de Wenden 2014:146). At the current moment both, nationality and residency can be attained through the stay in the country for more than 5 consecutive years or by being born there (jus soli), by marriage or having national family members (jus sanguinis). In the applications for residency the marriage or residency are usually enough a reason to be granted the residency. In the case of the nationality, in addition to the stay in the country or marriage with a national one has to prove to be integrated in the French culture by speaking French and having notions of French society and culture as well as about the rights and duties of the French’34. The linguistic tests were set in 2010.
Linguistic norm and mother tongue
The French body regulating the use of French language is the ‘Académie Française’, [French Academy] established in 1635, which is particularly traditionalist. Both, the motto ‘À l'immortalité’ [to immortality] and the mission of the Academy ‘de clarification d’une langue française appelée à devenir « le latin des modernes », universelle et accessible à tous’ (article 26 de ses statuts)’ 35 show how their aim is primarily concerned with the immortality and promotion of the French language as a universal or world language. In the last years the Academy has been especially concerned with the prevention of the Anglicisation of the French language, promoting the use of existing or new French words instead of the borrowed English ones which are understood to be affecting the purity of the French language. In addition to the compilation and consecutive
34 http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/ and http://www.ofii.fr , last access 15/08/2015 35 the structuration of a French language that is to become ‘the Latin of the moderns’ universal and accessible for everyone (Article 26 of the charter), own translation 65 editions of a Dictionary –‘Dictionnaire de l'Académie française’–, they offer some guidance against Anglicisation in their website36. These tips of ‘purification’ have the following form:
‘La locution anglo-américaine success story tend à se répandre largement en France pour évoquer le destin exceptionnel, la réussite de certaines personnes qu’on souhaite présenter comme modèles. On rappellera à ceux qui seraient tentés de l’employer que le français a à sa disposition tous les outils linguistiques nécessaires pour rendre cette idée. On a le choix entre histoire, récit d’un succès, d’une réussite. Et on se gardera bien d’éviter de croiser les deux langues et de parler de « l’histoire d’une success story » ou du « récit d’une success story ».’37
This is only one of many examples in which this Academy shows its opposition towards code-mixing and towards the inclusion of ‘foreign’ (particularly English) words within its repertoire. Their mission of rendering French the ‘new Latin of modern times’ reveals what is probably at the core of this attitude: maintaining their language as pure and as powerful as possible; mission that has not changed much since the 17th century. With regards to their collaboration with other francophone communities their approach remains very vague:
‘En effet, l’élaboration des termes publiés chaque année ne s’effectue jamais sans que soient consultés les partenaires francophones, qui interviennent à différents stades du travail terminologique …Consciente que la langue française vit et se développe d’une manière distincte d’un pays, voire d’un continent, à l’autre, que la politique terminologique d’une nation comme le Canada, où le français et l’anglais sont des langues en contact permanent, ne peut être la même que celle d’un pays où le français est la langue commune, inscrite dans la Constitution, elle n’en conçoit pas moins une vision unie et dynamique d’un français toujours créatif, auquel ne peuvent
36 http://www.xn--acadmie-franaise-npb1a.fr/dire-ne-pas-dire, last access 13/08/2015 37 ‘The Anglo-American phrase ‘success story’ tends to spread widely in France to evoke the exceptional destiny, the success of some people we would like to present as examples. We remind those who are tempted to use it that the French has at its disposal all the language tools necessary to express this idea. We have the choice between histories, the story of a success, a success. And we will be careful to avoid crossing both languages and talk about "l’histoire d’une success story "or “récit d’une success story’, own translation. 66
échapper des pans entiers du savoir et du monde contemporains, sous peine de perdre ses raisons d’être enseigné, d’être parlé, en bref d’être vivant.38
The Académie is therefore the bearer of the French language in France, which in turn is apparently ‘purer’ that other varieties (e.g. in Canada) which are highly contaminated and Americanized. The strict structure and use of language it promotes aims to be representative and maintenance of the ‘pure’ French language of France, where it is ‘commonly’ and ‘homogeneously’ practiced across the entire territory.
The ‘Académie française’ defines ‘langue maternelle’ [mothertongue] as ‘celle du pays où l'on est né. Il se dit par opposition à Langue étrangère, Celle d'un autre pays’, [that of the country where one is born. It is said as opposed to a foreign language, from another country]39
Linguistic policy and education. Impact on public and private spaces
The French education system is highly centralised and the first two stages of the education system are completely determined by the central authorities. Every student in France has the same curriculum and school calendar in these two levels of education.40 This is again in line with the republican ideal: l’école républicaine; is free of charge, mandatory and secular and does not recognise differences across students or territories.
38 ‘The elaboration of the published concepts every year is never executed without consulting the francophone partners that intervene in the different stages of the terminological work…... Conscious that the French language lives and develops differently within each country –and continent-, that the language policy of a nation like Canada, where French and English are in constant contact, cannot be the same as the one of a country where French is the common language, inscribed in the constitution, and conceived with a unitary and dynamic vision, always creative and which cannot miss themes of the contemporary world; risking to miss the reasons for this language to be taught and spoken, that is, to be alive.’(Own translation) , http://www.academie-francaise.fr/la-langue-francaise/terminologie-et-neologie, last access 13/08/2013 39 http://atilf.atilf.fr/dendien/scripts/generic/cherche.exe?11;s=1370405955, last access 13/08/2015 40 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_France, last access 15/08/2015 67
The linguistic education is also arranged in this way. All pupils have to choose a first foreign language at the age of 7 and a second language at the age of 13; both until the age of 18. (Eurydice 2012: 49)
The only country out of the studies ones with a linguistic law regulating the language use in public spaces and even some private ones (such as working spaces) is France. The law is called Toubon law and was passed in August 1994. It established the compulsory use of French in all official government publications, public funded schools, workplaces, advertising and consumer goods. The use of the French language in the daily life is not only a right, with this law it becomes a duty.41 In theory, this law is meant to ensure the right of French locals to understand everything (in French) and to protect the French language from being invaded/contaminated from other languages. In any event, it seems to be rather targeted against the increasing use of a particular language: English. This nevertheless does not necessarily changed the linguistic landscape of the city as the compulsory use of French is not exclusive; and English is still widely used as the main language (e.g. in an advertisement) while French is left as a subtitle with the translation.42 Apart from the semi-private space of the work the rest of private spaces are not (jet) regulated by French linguistic law.
3.2.2 Germany
Demographics, Migration and role of language in naturalization law
In 2012 a 20% of the German population had a migrant background (OECD 2014:256) and still, there was no recognition of having ‘migrants’ in Germany until the early 2000. Until then ‘it was labelled as the return of asylum seekers and civil war refugees’ (Vogel and Kovacheva, 2014:157). The development of German migration policy has thus developed from ‘negating its existence’ to acknowledging it and trying to canalise it targeting highly skilled professionals. The naturalisation policy is still very much jus sanguinis based, but integrated some elements of jus soli in 2000 allowing for the regulation of children of permanent immigrants. A peculiarity of the German case is how, after recognising migration, in 2005 the concepts to classify the population were selected.
41 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toubon_Law, last access 13/05/2015 42 http://jeparleamericain.com/2013/05/28/the-all-good-law/, last access 13/05/2015 68
The population was divided into ‘population with migration background’ and ‘population without migration background’. From the latter group there were thus some native Germans excluded which did had a migration background and where, for example, naturalised or born in Germany. Vogel and Kovacheva (2014:160) explain that ‘it is often used as a term for all people who deviate from a German stereotype due to their outward appearance, accent or habits, thus becoming a proxy for ethnic or racial categorisations’.
With respect to the naturalisation laws, they were really restricted and based almost entirely on jus soli until 1990. The more open conditions for naturalisation that appeared after that and for which foreign nationals were also eligible included since 2008 compulsory tests about the legal and social system and living conditions of Germany. (Vogel and Kovacheva 2014:163). Great importance is devoted to the learning of the language as The National Integration plan of 2007 shows, which is focused on the ‘improvement of language skills, acquisition of better education and vocational training, and their civil engagement’ (Vogel and Kovacheva 2014:164) with the motto ‘fördern and fordern’ [support and demand].
Linguistic norm and mother tongue
The German linguistic rules are regulated by the ‘Rat für deutsche Rechtschreibung’ [Council for the orthography] which is made up of members of Germany, Austria, Switzerland, South Tirol, Lichtenstein and German speaking communities of Belgium. Luxemburg nevertheless has no right to vote as it is not an officially German speaking country43 The aim of this council is to preserve the unity of the German language across the German speaking areas. This council emits a report on the state of the language use among German speakers, and in case of considering it necessary suggests reforms44 which in turn the ministries of culture of the respective countries can agree on. The last reforms since 2004-2010 came to undo some of the reforms implemented in the last reform in 1996 (which unified German spelling across German speaking communities and simplified spelling norms). The 2004’s reform was not welcomed by many sectors of society, including some mainstream media, publicly boycotted the reform by ignoring it.
43 https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_f%C3%BCr_deutsche_Rechtschreibung, last access 13/08/2015 44 http://www.rechtschreibrat.com/ , last access 13/08/2015 69
Interestingly there is no official Dictionary of the German language. There are prestigious editions, like the ‘Duden’ or the ‘Langenscheidt’ but none of them is backed by the education system or by the government.
In the German dictionary, Duden (although not official) ‘muttersprache’ is defined as ‘Sprache, die ein Mensch als Kind (von den Eltern) erlernt und primär im Sprachgebrauch hat’ [Language that a person has learned as kid (from the parents) and that is its main one in language use]45
The most striking fact is that, while the Spanish, Dutch and French dictionaries define mother tongue as the language of a specific country – and French in turn emphasise it as opposed to the one of a foreign country – Germans describe the mother tongue as attached to the person, to the childhood and to transmission of it through the parents.
Linguistic policy and education. Impact on public and private spaces
Education in Germany is primarily governed by the Länder and the Federal Government has a minor role. The primary education is common to all pupils, but the secondary education is divided in 3 main paths called ‘Gimnasium’, ‘Realschule’ and ‘Haptschule’.46 With regards to the linguistic education, similar as in the case of Spain, a 20% of the pupils ‘attend a school where more than 20% of contemporaries speak other languages at home than the language of instruction’ (Eurydice 2012: 21). The exact age when pupils start learning foreign languages depends on the Land, but on average students start at the age of 10 with their first language (English or French) and between the age of 16-17 with their second and third languages. The schools are obliged to offer at least 2 foreign languages in their curriculums.
Germany, does not have a law regulating the use of language in public spaces. Nevertheless the introduction of more and more English words in the German language has been on the top of the agenda for some years now. Already in 2006 the Christian Social Union (CSU) party proposed a law in parliament for the German language to be
45 http://www.duden.de/suchen/dudenonline/muttersprache, last access 13/08/2015 46 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Germany, last access 15/08/2015 70 protected by law. Again the argument was not only the protection of the German language from what has been labelled ‘Denglish’ but also the protection of the rights to feel included of the gross amount of persons living in Germany who do not speak English and might feel excluded from the public sphere47. This law was never approved, but the debate is still on the table, as the infinite amount of articles, of which some examples are ‘Die verkaufte Sprache’ [the sold language]48 , ‘Warum Deutsch als Forschungssprache verschwindet’ [Why German ,as research language, does disappear]49, ‘Denglish invades Germany’50, ‘Europe battles English invasion’51 or ‘Denglish, when languages collide’52 show. Other versions of Denglish (e.g. Franglais, Dunglish and Spanglish) exist but the debate is less prominent. In the case of France the public debate achieved a peak that lead to the Toubon law, but neither in the Netherlands nor in Spain, such an importance has been given to this topic in the public discussions.
The results of the linguistic biographies will follow. The participant’s answers have been also clustered alongside these four dimensions: the linguistic ‘norm’, the importance of the mother tongue, the language use in public and private spaces and the role of language in participant’s perceptions of integration. In Chapter 4 the participant’s consideration of the linguistic norm and the impact of it on their language practice will be exposed. Also, the concept of porous spaces will be introduced as an outcome of certain notions of language, linguistic competences, practices, predispositions and migration experiences. In Chapter 5 the importance of the mother tongue expressed by the participants will be reviewed as well as how this common emphasis is nevertheless rooted in very different understandings of the significance of the mother tongue depending on the country of origin of the participants. In Chapter 6, the linguistic norms of the micro-contexts of the house and the working place will be described. Chapter 7 will look at the impact of the different cities of residence: Madrid and Amsterdam. Particularly it will look at how the different linguistic possibilities offered by each city
47 http://www.dw.com/en/german-conservatives-want-linguistic-law-to-protect-language/a-2016407, last access 13/05/2015 48 http://www.zeit.de/2007/31/Deutsch-Aufmacher, last access 13/08/2015 49 http://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article113150770/Warum-Deutsch-als-Forschungssprache- verschwindet.html, last access 13/05/2015 50 http://www.dw.com/en/denglish-invades-germany/a-411555, last access 13/08/2015 51 http://www.dw.com/en/europe-battles-english-invasion/a-1415320, last access 13/08/2015 52 http://german.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/denglish.htm, last access 13/07/2015 71 determine the spatialisation of the linguistic practices of the participants. Finally, Chapter 7 will address the role of language competence and practice in the integration in a cultural community. Both first hand experiences, but also the normative views on the topic on behalf of the participants will be described.
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4. POROSITY OF PRIVATE SPACES
All participants share the common characteristic of speaking or having notions of at least two standard languages which they use on a daily basis to a greater or lesser extent. This means that none of them adopted (nor freely nor forced) the exclusive use of one language in all spheres of life. There are circumstances in which participants communicate with a single language, occasions in which they switch from one code to another consecutively (code-switching) and moments where participants mix codes within the same sentences and conversations (code-mixing). The different language practices are generally arranged alongside social, spatial, temporal and normative dimensions which define more or less strictly the linguistic possibilities of a given conversation. As will be described below, personal interactions involving language are determined by the personal linguistic competences, predispositions, values and emotions of participants participating in the interaction (negotiation of language use with the audience), but also by the linguistic rules and conditions of the space where this interaction is taking place. Furthermore, the ability or power of the speaking subjects (as subject but also subject to) to influence these rules and conditions proved to be affecting the linguistic performance; as there are some situations in which participants are able to impose or negotiate with peers their preferred language use and other instances where participants just have to adapt or otherwise feel ‘out of place’. It is worth remarking that monolingual, code-switching and code-mixing practices are not incompatible, and the same participants often incur in both, as each can apply to a specific moment in life, or a particular social environment or place.
The different morphologies of these spaces seem to be perceived by participants as more or less porous and that conditions their behaviour. The use of the term ‘porosity’ is borrowed from Chloé, a French woman living in Madrid who used it when explaining the intuitive Spanish-French language switch of her (young) grandsons according to specific circumstances. In contrast to ‘normal’, ‘non-porous’ situations in which the grandsons have to switch language and adapt to the language of the audience –which they apparently do ‘very good’–, she described her house – in which everyone speaks French and Spanish – as a ‘porous’ space:
‘Ahora sí., no se equivocan nunca. Saben perfectamente qué idioma se debe de hablar y con quien, eso es muy curioso. Hacen la mezcla extraña en casa porque saben que aquí hay porosidad. De hecho hablamos un idioma rarísimo porque también españolizamos conceptos. Un juego es por ejemplo 73
poner todas las calles en francés. También cosas como ‘La Courte Anglaise’, ¿no? [El Corte Inglés], para reírnos, hacer el juego del idioma. Y eso es una cosa que les encanta, ¿eh?, jugar con el idioma, ver cómo hacemos tal o cual, o utilizar cosas divertidas y traducir que no funciona...’tomar el pelo’, ¡pero eso no quiere decir nada! Los idiomas se prestan mucho al juego. Se convierte en algo lúdico’ (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)1
Chloé’s description of the porosity of her house also applies to her (lack of) awareness in her language use with her Spanish husband:
[¿Con tu marido en qué idioma hablas?] Ni se sabe. Yo creo que la gestión es curiosa. Si hay gente francesa, por supuesto francés. Y para él es igual de fácil que el español porque su formación profesional ha sido en francés; estudió en Ginebra, pero cuando hablamos entre nosotros, según se nos ocurre más rápido una palabra que otra. Hay veces que hablamos en castellano, otras veces hablamos francés. No te lo podría decir. Y de hecho, cuando viene gente de fuera nos viene diciendo 'pero qué habláis'. Y dice Carlos [husband] que sí, que hablamos todo el rato francés pero no es verdad. No podría decirte ni siquiera pues ayer hablamos francés, no lo sé. (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)2
This lack of awareness of language use or rather freedom of speech within the boundaries of the home was also experienced by Marine, a French woman living in Amsterdam with her two daughters:
[What language do you speak at home?] ‘It is not very conscious I would say. It really depends if I am addressing only to them then I would speak French but if I am addressing to them in a discussion that involves other people then I would speak in English for everybody to understand. But I see if it is only the 3 of us I switch a lot from English to French and we mix a little bit because there are words or expressions that I would say naturally in English now. And I find now that I have difficulties to express myself in French because I think in English mainly. I also speak Dutch so... it totally depends on what I am thinking about. If it is about something that is happening in Dutch then I would tend to speak in Dutch and it depends on the language of the situation, but mostly I think I would think and talk in English’ (Marine, French woman living in Amsterdam, 40 years)
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These porous spaces are not only within the homes. Some of the interviewed participants explained how this kind of permissiveness of hybridity was for them, present in other contexts. For Jan, it was within his German-French school in Freiburg:
‘At school we spoke French and German... In school we had this weird mixture that you would just talk... if you wouldn’t know a word in one language you would just take the word from the other language and the people would understand but that would be a very weird communication..’ (Jan, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
While for Mia, who grew up in a Danish community in Schleswig Holstein (Germany), it was within her community – among her friends –where she could feel this porosity. When being asked in what language she feels better she replied:
‘No distingo entre uno y otro [Danish and German]. No hay diferencia para mí. Puedo incluso en una misma frase saltar. Si yo se que la otra persona con quien hablo me entiende, salto de un idioma al otro en la misma frase. Porque hay veces que hay palabras que se pueden expresar mejor en un idioma o en otro, o simplemente por pereza porque no te sale justamente ahora la palabra, entonces lo dices en otra y como sabes que el otro también lo entiende perfectamente entonces….hay bastante mix entre mis amigos de mi infancia que hemos hecho un mix de idiomas a veces hablando. Ni me doy cuenta de cuando lo cambio. Quizás ahora viviendo en España, más. Porque aquí hablo básicamente español. Cuando vuelvo de vacaciones me doy cuenta…”oops” como es. Pero en su momento cuando estaba ahí de adolescente no me daba ni cuenta. Me daba cuenta cuando de repente había alguien que no entendía o un idioma o el otro y me decía “pero qué dices” (Mia, German woman living in Madrid, 40 years)3
Mélanie, born and raised within an international artist’s community in Marseille with Irish and Scottish parents is absolutely not aware of the language she uses when speaking to her parents, but aware at the same time that she only does that within her family:
[¿Con tus padres en qué hablabas?] Eso no lo sé. Yo creo que hablaba los dos idiomas. Es que no tengo ni idea. Y a día de hoy no se tampoco en qué idioma hablamos. Vamos de uno al otro, siempre. [O sea, no eres consciente de si has hablado en francés o en inglés] No [¿Y si hay más gente?]
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Cambiaría automáticamente al idioma de las otras personas. Yo creo que esto pasa con muchas familias bilingües, que siempre salen unas palabras en otros idiomas, pero en general, en el contexto se cambia el idioma, sí. (Mélanie, French woman living in Madrid, 30 years)4
Thus, most of the times participants are aware of not being aware about their code-mixing practice, they enter in this porous space in which a specific mix is allowed and let words flow. Thus, ‘porosity’ could be defined as related to the level of consciousness one has with regards to the division between languages as different and separated systems. The more porosity, the less boundaries participants have to build between their learned codes as if all would be suddenly amalgamated and formed part of a single repertoire. As a consequence, no wonder that in a complete porosity – like Mélanie seems to have with her parents – the question ‘what language do you speak?’ almost does not have sense. The less porosity the more barriers participants build between single standard languages and perceive them as completely separate systems which should not be mixed together. When outsiders enter a porous space, members feel suddenly taken out of it by comments like ‘what are you speaking!’ (e.g. Chloé and Mia) that delegitimize the language practice of the group. When speakers exit their ‘save’ porous spaces they seem to switch by custom into a non-porous mood (e.g. ‘When we speak with other participants, we switch and speak only one language; the preferred language of these people’)
When the practice of code mixing is done outside of this porous space, sometimes even a bit of shame is involved in not maintaining a ‘pure’ standard code within the same conversation. During the interview with Emilia, a German student living in Amsterdam, this kind of shame was noticed:
[Is it easy for you to switch languages?] ‘Yes... sometimes I have days when I throw out German words... it is so weird... I had a group work the other day at uni with a Dutch and a Greek girls... and I kept saying words in German... like a full retard, like talking to them like I am talking to them and then I just said... 'weisst du'..[German] And like stuff in German in between... And I was thinking…”Emilia what's wrong. Like you're not doing this usually... and it was like I don’t know”... it was just one day and it wouldn't stop and it happened since sometimes as well that I just say.., like when I was directly talking to Louisa [German flat mate] and then directly switch that I'd say stuff like.. 'verstehs du?' [German] and stuff like this in German, but usually I kind of thing it is easy for me to switch.
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Probably it is being tired or also if I am really concentrated and want to express something really good and make it really clear... even though if I am still comfortable in English I still know that I make mistakes obviously because I am not a native speaker. So if I really thing about it and want to tell something that was really funny for instance or something that I really want to tell in the right way. Then I mix it up.’ (Emilia, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
She obviously identifies this practice as pathological, although the little amount of words she said in German did not render the communication impossible, and were probably just perceived as little utterances. It is interesting to notice how the same person does not describe the practice of code-mixing as pathological when it is done within a group or a circumstance that allows it. Emilia was asked whether she included some Dutch words in her normal use of English:
‘Yes.., ‚‘wir sagen‘ [German]. See! I just said ‘wir sagen’ [German]. Sometimes I do it, it is so annoying! It just started recently; I don't know what’s wrong. But with regards to Dutch, we use 'lekker' or ‘echt lekker’ [Dutch] quiet often but also really for fun reasons. Also 'gezellig' [Dutch] because this is just “the” Dutch word. But just for fun reasons.., like we laugh about it. It is not like with English, that we sometimes use an English word because it is easier because we didn’t learned the German word for it. If I am talking German I throw the English word, or I –‘ed’ the English word, like: 'Ich habe es gegoogelt' [German] stuff like this. It is just because I usually use that. For instance the word for ‘research’ I never use in German. I never did research in German, I never studied in Germany, my high school was like so easy peasy; there was nothing to do. So, yeah, for instance the word research I would say 'hast du schon ein research gemacht?' but 'Forschung' [German] sounds so weird, really really weird. We say always research.’ (Emilia, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
As can be noticed, there seem to be some elements that make Emilia discriminate between circumstances where code-mixing is acceptable and moments or languages which are not suited for this practice. The group general agreement on the approved and not-approved types of code-mixing practices, seem to depend on the regularity of its use (routine) and on the common understandability of the used words. This was also the case of the above mentioned porous spaces (homes, schools, families...etc.) as everyone in the group was able to understand to some extend all the different standard codes which were being mixed. The difference is that in Emilia’s example, the members of this group didn’t needed to speak Dutch or English fluently in order to be able to feel included (e.g. joking
77 about ‘lekker’, or saying ‘Ich habe ein ‘research’ gemacht’ [I’ve done a research]) but the few frequently used words where enough to feel that its use was nor ‘out of place’ nor ‘wrong’. When this general agreement wasn’t the case, Emilia felt it as a ‘mistake’ (e.g. to use German expressions in an English sentence). The power of Emilia to include German words into this agreement was apparently not enough, because the routine of doing so was not established. She also didn’t had the intention of changing the established rules, as she has already internalized some norms (e.g. you can do it with ‘x’ Dutch words when speaking English or ‘y’ English words when speaking German) and otherwise felt it wrong and stupid (‘like a full retarded’). As the example of Mia (i.e. code-mixing between German and Danish) proved, it is not German language per se that is not suited for code-mixing, but Emilia’s context, values and emotions that render it ‘weird’ and ‘out of place’.
What seems to perturb Emilia the most is her lack of control over her language use (‘it just started recently’). There is a tolerated and controlled code-switch between her friends and a non-controlled one when she suddenly switches to German. Also this frustration was recalled by David, a German man who studied and now works in the Netherlands:
‘So I also had to take tests to be accepted to go to the US [exchange]... so that was the TOEFL test. That was actually... like the main problem was my Dutch... sort of make my brain accustomed to speak in English again. I had a lot of trouble speaking English during my Bachelor because I didn't need to and when I needed to I was usually coming up with Dutch like the Dutch grammar, Dutch sentences and Dutch words…I use to struggle with switching between languages. When I was in the U.S I had a few Dutch friends and that was pretty easy to... at some point I had the feeling that switching between Dutch, English and German became pretty easy... So after I learned English... like switching... came after the U.S. I think it is that you make your mind think in a language, in the same language... so I think before I could think in English before I went to the Netherlands and then actually because you learn Dutch you kind of overwrite your English thinking part of your brain somewhere where you cannot access it anymore.. So I think that then you sort of train yourself again to speak English and then for some reason your brain realize that it has to switch between these three things.’ (David, German man living in Amsterdam, 27 years)
Code-switching is understood by these participants as a skill which has to be mastered, which one has to get accustomed to and control. Far from the blur between language
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‘systems’ which was described above in the so called porous spaces, Emilia and David separate these systems and want to control when and how they go from one to the other. In both occasions, the outcome should be as pure as possible.
As Emilia and David’s example show, there are multilingual spaces in which members decide not to blur all their linguistic competences and rather keep every single code alongside but separated. These spaces are somehow more regulated, as each standard language is kept for a specific moment, place, person, etc.
The differentiation between porous and non porous spaces, or spaces were code-mixing is practiced and accepted and spaces where it is not, exemplifies different arrangements of multilingual spaces. In turn, it points to the fact that a shared amount of codes help but are neither sufficient nor necessary to establish porous spaces. Competence in the used codes helps, but openness towards code-mixing is equally – if not more – important. The openness towards code-mixing has been observed to be determined mainly by two factors: the notion of language of the participants and their tolerance of difference (from the standard linguistic norm).
Lea, a German woman who has been living in Madrid for 14 years explains a family situation back in Germany, in which not everyone shares common linguistic codes, and still code-mixing is practiced and communication works.
[¿Qué habláis en tu familia?] ‘Tengo dos tías por parte de mi padre que viven en Córcega y que éste fin de semana han venido después de 10 años la primera vez y tal. Pero como han venido solas hablamos en alemán. Cuando vienen con sus hijos, ellos no hablan prácticamente en alemán y hay que hablar francés. Y eso ya es un popurrí tremendo, porque no todo el mundo lo habla, pero al final siempre se consigue.’ (Lea, German woman living in Madrid, 36 years)5
The openness for code-mixing is definitely determined by the common linguistic competence shared by some participants, but also, as the case of Lea shows, by necessity and by a sort of naturalization of it.
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While some participants reported this practice as something pathological, as a non-proper use of language and showed even concern about this practice as something to be worried about,
[¿Cómo aprendiste el español?] ‘Nos enseñaron desde pequeños. De hecho al principio yo mezclaba los dos idiomas, mi madre estaba súper preocupada. Hasta ir al colegio en realidad mezclaba todo. Mi hermano pequeño en cambio también es bilingüe, pero tardó más en aprender el español.’ (Pauline, French woman living in Madrid, 28 years)6 the participants that tolerated the code-mixing practice –at least within these porous spaces –didn’t express any worries or difficulties about it. Indeed a different notion of language was noticed among these participants, whose focus is much more on communication:
‘I see languages as a tool to find more open and better channels of communication with people’ (Marine, French woman living in Amsterdam, 40 years)
There seem to be some participants that think like Marine, of language as a tool for communication for which the realm of the ‘thinkable’ is not limited by the used languages. Language comes to express an idea, but is not the very container of that idea.
Having experienced the same level or deepness of communication in two languages –and even in its mix – really seems to be at the core of this conception of language. Louise, a French woman living in Amsterdam explains the transitory moment when she discovered that, even though with simpler language, she could communicate everything in different languages: there was no longer a barrier:
I started to speak another language on a daily basis 8 years ago and the most important thing I discovered very fast was to express myself and not use a specific vocabulary that would fit perfectly the...It is really the need to get my point through and to take it I need to express what I want to say in a very clear way. It can be very simple but it needs to be clear. So, that was the core lesson of it. That I have to use very simple vocabulary that everyone understands. I think it is also when you move to another country you give up your doubts or your complex or you prejudices very fast when you need to express yourself.... I studied literature and these days I was very careful about the language, but now it does not matter so much… I just care about what's the message I want to give. 80
[Do you see language more as a tool for communication?] Yes! I discovered that language is a communication tool [laughs], when I started to speak English and Dutch.’ (Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Also Chloé, who practices code-mixing at home, explained how she feels comfortable in both languages, ‘there are no barriers anymore’ when it comes to communicating. ‘Ahora sé que tengo defectos…, y mis hijos se burlan bastante de mí, pero oye...allá ellos si les divierte, fenomenal. Pero no me corrijo porque ya no soy capaz de discernir si lo hago bien o mal, y me da igual. Me da exactamente igual. Que hablo mal... pues hablo mal, pero no tengo barrera ninguna. Estoy igual de cómoda, o casi más en castellano que en francés.’ (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)7
Other participants who didn’t practice code-mixing tended to think of language as these very containers of thought. As Ben – a German man passionate about learning new languages – explains,
‘Aprender una lengua es nacer de nuevo. Es aprender el mundo, conocer el mundo de nuevo o/y un nuevo mundo Eso es lo que más me motiva a aprender una nueva lengua. Que podría seguir cada vez con una nueva lengua porque a través de esto te descubres a ti mismo y a otro mundo, porque descubres que hay palabras que es español sólo hay una y en alemán o en árabe o en turco hay cuatro’ (Ben, German man living in Madrid, 35 years)8
Every language seems to be isomorphic with a different world and a different mindset. In this line Lukas has a somehow determinist vision of language as a structure that determines the culture of its speakers. When he was asked why it was important for him that his two daughters speak German, he replied,
[¿Por qué quieres que aprendan alemán?] ‘El alemán te abre, como todo. No es solamente un idioma que te abra la posibilidad de abrirte con muchas otras personas, sino que te cambia la forma de pensar. Gramaticalmente es tan distinto que tienes que pensar de forma distinta. Yo creo que los alemanes no habrían sido alemanes tal y como los conocemos si no llega a ser por su idioma. ¿Es un idioma muy perfecto, no? Casi como el griego. Eso les hace ser metódicos, obedientes y trabajadores. Diferencias entre España y Alemania: 'Es que Alemania ha tenido siempre mejores élites'... ¡no! España ha tenido unas élites intelectuales terriblemente buenas al nivel de cualquier otra nación. Lo que pasa es que el resto de los españoles somos de un desordenado y de un individualista que eso es lo terrible’
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(Lukas, German man living in Madrid, 41 years)9
If different languages belong to very different mental structures and ways of thinking, no wonder that code-mixing does not seem to be an option for a fluent conversation. One would have to be constantly changing from a system to another, not only grammatically, but culturally and even psychologically. Some participants mentioned this very internalization of languages as different systems referring to how speaking in a language or another somehow makes the participants feel a different person.
‘My parents use to take me and my brother to California a lot when we were younger, so it always has a lot of memory to it, well good memories. About going through California... And I love, sometimes when I am drunk I love to swing to the surfer slang … some things you can get across in this surfer slang with the inherent ironical tone ... it is just not re-enactable in German, it is just a different person. You switch persons when you switch to slang. Yeah... You switch roles, you switch... I mean your identity gets a little twist. I am really really certain of that. Actually I thought a lot about that when I was younger... As you... you behave differently when you talk in another language’ (Philipp, German man living in Amsterdam, 24 years)
Lukas, born in Germany within a Spanish migrant family, was generally identified as Spaniard in Madrid. He explained that when he speaks English he has a strong German accent that completely confuses his audience.
‘Y en inglés, pues tengo un estupendo inglés germánico, con un acentazo que la peña se queda loca. Este tío de dónde será’10 (Lukas, German man living in Madrid, 41 years)
The unease of the audience perceived by Lukas points to the regular practice of identifying others by the language they speak or the accent they deploy when speaking other standard languages. This identification is generally done, drawing on Lukas assumptions, in national terms. Lukas’s difficult categorization (‘Spanish’ person speaking in English with German accent) seems to knock out his audience.
This is to say that, when languages are thought of as different systems of thought and being, code-mixing seems to be less likely because the participants do feel different when speaking different languages but also because the audience identifies them (and they indeed probably also do identify others) as different persons in different languages. This definitely seems too much switch (psychological, identitarian, grammatical, cultural…etc.) in a conversation or even a sentence. For some, the different worldviews
82 or cultures that languages are understood to create do work as barriers for comprehension between speakers which might be impossible to cross.
‘I mean that's something you realise when you live overseas... when you build a relationship with someone in a foreign language sometimes you can reach a barrier...not quite easy or quiet fats but you reach it much more easily that if it is in your own language’ (Alexandre, French man living in Amsterdam, 28 years)
The second factor of difference between code-mixers and others is related to the tolerance of difference or deviation from the standard linguistic norm of participants.
Pauline does not practice code-mixing and has an understanding of language, which stresses the structure and grammar of each language system:
La gramática francesa la aprendí en el cole, y la española, mi madre es profesora de español en la universidad en París. Entonces nos daba mucha caña en casa, con los acentos, etc. De hecho me pongo muy nerviosa aquí. Tengo una escritura más de libro que alguien que ha vivido aquí. Tengo un nivel de idioma escrito más alto que la media porque me han dado mucha caña. 'Haber si quedamos' [laughs]....nunca quedaremos...)’ (Pauline, French woman living in Madrid, 28 years)11
Also Théo, who works part time as a teacher at the Paris-Sorbonne University mentioned to pay a lot of attention to the proper use of language.
‘Vuelvo regularmente a Paris para trabajar con los estudiantes también de este máster que hice hace años. Doy clases y... es el mismo tema de cómo se observa la actividad turística. Y hay un montón de estudiantes extranjeros en mis clases, veo lo que escriben y tengo empatía, entiendo su situación, pero también pienso que al final tienes un máster francés con lo cual tiene que poder escribir también en un francés que no es el mismo nivel de idioma que no es igual que un francés, pero tiene que ser bastante bien. Y como estoy crítico sobre eso, también soy muy crítico conmigo. Y el hecho de escribir en holandés, pero no en un holandés muy profesional me parece un problema’ (Théo, French man living in Amsterdam, 35 years)12
Alexandre, another French man living in Amsterdam expressed a similar sensibility towards the proper use of language, but only with French persons, not with foreigners:
One thing I do is that I can't stand a French guy who does not speaks French correctly or writes French correctly I can't stand that but if tomorrow you're 83
Spanish and you start to speak correct I would never never say anything. I would correct you if you want to, but I will never judge. [Why you don't like it if a French person does not speak correctly?] I think it is more... maybe I am a bit old school but I think that your language and your culture is your background you shouldn't be proud of it or think that you're the best or whatever but at least you have to master it, you know? I respect my language I learn it and I think you shouldn't try to deny... it is a question of putting some effort to it. I am bit old school in that sense. (Alexandre, French man living in Amsterdam, 28 years)
Among the French participants that expressed unease with an ‘incorrect’ use of language there was a recurrent stress on the grammar and the syntax and not so much on accent. Only Hugo – a French man living in Amsterdam who speaks mainly in English and does not practice code-mixing – expressed to feel more comfortable speaking English to non- natives trying to talk French as a ‘strong foreign’ accent in French is for him very difficult to understand. In English he was OK with accents because he himself also had one. He also expressed a somehow ‘purist’ vision of language, as he finds code-mixing ‘silly’:
[Do you mix Dutch words sometimes when you speak English?] Yes, I've done it few times but it is not most of the times. I have the impression that it sounds silly a little bit... I have one of my colleagues that is almost fluent in Dutch but when he speaks I mean you can really tell that he is not Dutch and I hear from native Dutch colleagues that they would never start to speak Dutch with him because he has too much of an accent. (Hugo, French man living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
Although when talking about the accent of his colleague’s he was not referring to code- mixing anymore, he pointed out how his Dutch colleagues had –like he had in French –a kind of intolerance towards difference when speaking their mother tongue, Dutch. This characteristic emerged repeatedly, especially among Germans, who recurrently expressed being sensible towards different ways of performing language, when speaking in German. Christian – a German multilingual speaker of German, Italian, Dutch and a little bit of French and Spanish, who declared to speak mainly in English in the city of Amsterdam – explained how he (unconsciously) used to exclude persons that where not fluent in German from his private social spheres. He also explains how he feels about speaking German with foreigners:
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‘I think I remember... I was living there in a shared house and we had some people coming that didn't speak German or just a little and I think it might have played a role in deciding not to live together with them, but yes. I think nowadays... I have had this experience in the Netherlands and it would be different. But one thing I can tell you is that I don't like to talk to people in German if they are not fluent in German. I don't have the patience and then I rather speak English. Dutch people on the other hand I hear that they're keen on training their English and that's why they speak English... not because they're kind of impatient of something.., but because they find it cool to speak English. That's what I've heard form a Dutch person.’ (Christian, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Being put in the weaker position of the ‘foreigner’, experiencing the difficulty of speaking in a foreign language, and also getting used with living in an international environment and realising how communication still works made Christian reconsider his view and change his mind. He mentions that now he would be more tolerant towards sharing apartment with a person who is not fluent in German. His intolerance of difference when it comes to speak in German with non-natives nevertheless still persists; ‘I don’t have the patience and then I rather speak English’. David, a German participant living in Amsterdam was asked if migration was a driver for change with regards to his tolerance of linguistic difference.
[Do you think your approach to migrants or people that don't speak proficiently the language you're using changed?] ‘I think when I was in high school my friends and I were pretty ignorant in some sense... like you think like “oh yeah this person is been living here for years already and does not speaks proper German” and I think that's something that people underestimate how difficult it is to actually to learn a language perfectly ... So I think compared to my high school I have a broader view now... in general I don't really mind if somebody makes mistakes nowadays. But I remember that where I am form there are a lot of Turkish immigrants and most of them speak Turkish at home and I think you have like this channel view like “they live in Germany, they should also speak German at home and whatever, become catholic and...” I think when you're surrounded by these ideas you also kind of think the same at some point... but I would say... like I don't speak perfect Dutch so it would be very weird if I would assume that people in Germany should learn perfect German. But I think I still have the idea that if I live somewhere I should at least have the intention of learning the language a bit…’ (David, German man living in Amsterdam, 27 years)
Migration was definitely a driver for change in the case of David and to some extent in the case of Christian. We observe how David struggles to get rid of the conceptions ‘he
85 had in high school’ as he constantly shifts between the idea that ‘it does not really matters’, and the positioning of ‘if you live somewhere you should learn the language’, by which in turn he seems to mean ‘learn it perfectly’. The change in David’s opinion is clearly related to the contradictions that his experience of migration caused him, ‘I don't speak perfect Dutch so it would be very weird if I would assume that migrants in Germany should learn perfect German’.
Two main conclusions can be drawn for these descriptions. First the decision to practice or not practice code-mixing seems to be strongly related to the notion of language and to the tolerance of difference of the participants. The former refers to whether they think of languages as unique and fixed structures related to or determining single cultures or if they think of language rather as a tool for communication. The latter refers to the degree of sensibility towards grammatical or performative deviations from the ‘native’ norm. The more sensible they are towards these differences, the less code-mixing ‘friendly’ they proved to be.
The second conclusion which can be drawn is that both, the notion of language and the tolerance of difference proved to be impacted by migrant’s experiences. More often than not, participants who had a notion of language as a tool of communication explained that they were able to communicate, with a similar level of deepness in both languages, that ‘there were no barriers to communication’. In some cases, like in the long established porous spaces described above (e.g. Mélanie with her family, Jan at his German-French School, Mia in her German-Danish community or Chloé’s grandsons at her home), participants seem to have been socialised in multilingual contexts where no barriers between languages were experienced or imposed from a very young age. In other cases it is rather a transition that seems to take place in which participants ‘realise’ that there are indeed no barriers to communication when talking in another language. Most of the times this transition did not happen immediately after migration as it was not apparent across all migrants. What seems to make a difference was first, a high level of competence in more than one language and second, the existence of qualitative interpersonal relations, such as the ones with beloved ones or friends, in one, more or a mix of ‘foreign’ languages:
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‘But for me it [language] does not make a big difference. I got very drunk yesterday with and English girl and a girl from Norway and the night before we were two German one Dutch.... I am talking in English all day since 6 years so at one point I don't care anymore...’ (Emilia, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
With regards to the tolerance of difference, the experience of migration in itself seems to be a driver of change. The example of David above shows how being put in the role of the ‘foreigner’ and realise how difficult it actually is to be proficient (in both, grammar and accent) in a foreign language encourages participants to rethink their conceptions of the expected performance of language. Théo – although still sensible towards correct writing skills in French –seemed to be much more empathic with his students at the Sorbonne University. Marion explains how her conception changed:
‘Antes no me daba cuenta de la dificultad de integrarse cuando no hablas el idioma. Ahora sí estaré mucho más pendiente. Tendré más apertura a los que llegan sin conocer, a los que están un poco perdidos’ (Marion, French woman living in Madrid, 33 years)13
Also Mathis explained how migration made him realize that you are ‘just more that the worlds you say’. He did not only become more tolerant of differences, but also draw less conclusions about the identity of the person he talks to by the way it talks.
[How do you feel in Dutch?] I can say everything but too slowly. And sometimes I am frustrated not to be able to say what I wanted to do the joke I wanted to do and... so the big frustration when you live abroad is the impression not to be the same with Dutch people than with French people and the Mathis from France is very very different from the Mathis that Dutch people know in Amsterdam. Because in France I am much more social and funny and sometimes I think that the parents in the school of my children think that I am very shy and not very interesting because it is difficult to speak and.., that is a frustration. But it is interesting because I really feel a stranger in Amsterdam, immigrate and now I understand what an Arabian can feel immigrant in France. Even if it is easier for me, for a European migrant than the Arabian one.., but it is the same thing. And When I thought in France that this migrant was very shy and not very interesting....now I think that he was maybe the king of the party on his country... You are just more that the worlds you say and that's what I realized in Amsterdam. (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years)
The language practices to which participants were exposed after migration were a key factor to change their language ideologies or at least to make them recognise and
87 reconsider the stigmatisation of non-standard language uses. The somehow ‘inherited’ typical intolerances of difference of participants which many expressed to have before migration were slightly different across groups. French tended to be more critical with the grammar and the syntax of the language (i.e. the form), while Germans tended to be more conscious about the ‘way of speaking’ (i.e. the performance). This seems to be in some way related to the definition of the linguistic norms of the respective linguistic regulatory bodies of language. As was reviewed for the case of the ‘Académie’ Française; the institution aims at the immortality of the ‘pure’ French language and in addition it differentiates the French of France form the ‘other’ French languages by raising awareness on the purity (e.g. non-Anglophone contamination) of the language being spoken in France and on the ‘dynamic’ unity of the language across its territory. What seems to characterise the French way is therefore unity and purity of language: all French speak the same French and respect the structure and tradition of it, not letting any sort of cross-contamination of other languages influence their language structure. Language is a form, a fix set of worlds and rules which shall be cared about and respected to ‘be’ alive as a nation, and to ‘be’ French.
The German case is somehow different, mainly for the absence of a national body regulating ‘formal’ language. The ‘Rat für deutsche Rechtschreibung’ is an interstate organisation between countries that speak German that only regulates the orthographical rules of the language. There are no official bodies granted the authority to define the legitimacy of a certain vocabulary or pronunciation, neither a ‘pan-Germanic’ body nor national German. This somehow leaves the definition of the German rule (the orthography) unlinked from the idea of national identity. The source of the idea of German national identity is rather to be found in its approach to nationality and naturalisation which is mainly based on jus sanguinis. As was reviewed above, the official category of ‘population with migratory background’, is German census is – following Vogel and Kovacheva (2014:160) – a term often used ‘for all people who deviate from a German stereotype due to their outward appearance, accent or habits, thus becoming a proxy for ethnic or racial categorisations’. Being non-German is thus strongly connected with not performing language as a German.
This is connected with the notion of mother tongue which will be reviewed next.
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5. IMPORTANCE OF MOTHER TONGUE
Very often, participants explained how a sort of rule of ‘one language-one person’ regulated their multilingual language use at home. Mathis is French and has been living in Amsterdam for 11 years. He was explaining how he and his wife decided the rule of one language-one person. He speaks French with his wife and daughters, while the wife speaks Dutch to them. The norm is more lax outside the home, where he speaks either Dutch or English to everybody, but always in French to the children.
‘With my children I absolutely want to speak in French and just in French because I read a lot of books about bilingualism and how to do it with children and something I discovered in this book is that it should be 1 person-1 language and you shouldn’t change the language in order to be consistent with the kid. That's why I always speak in French and when they speak to me I really want that they do that in French.’ (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years)
He was emphasising how natural this code-switching took place, when his younger daughter – still a baby who had been playing around during the interview – suddenly stand up for the first time. The code-switching he was talking about happened indeed in a very natural way:
[To the interviewer]: ‘It is the first time she stands up!’ [To the baby]: ‘C’est bien [Name of baby]! Très fort, bravo … [continues in French]’ (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years)14
The pattern of speaking one language to one person was especially acute among participants with kids. People with kids tended to have a strict arrangement of their language use rules with the children, while having a less regulated dynamics between the couple and other adults. These rules reach sometimes even the houses of the grandparents, in which the linguistic use is again mostly regulated only for the children.
[¿En casa con tus hijos en qué idioma habláis?] Ellos siguen hablando en alemán con nosotros, pero entre sí -y están todos casados con españolas- hablan en español, bueno hay ocasiones en que no, pero normalmente sí. Pero cuando estamos todos juntos, en alemán. Por supuesto si están las nueras hablamos español, por supuesto. Una habla un poquito de alemán, porque su padre habla perfectamente alemán, es
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español pero lo habla. Mi nieto va al colegio alemán y habla ambos idiomas perfectos. Con este nieto me obligan a hablar en alemán con él. (Leon, German man living in Madrid, 73 years)15
This also happened to Élodie with her grandchildren. She spoke French with her children at home and now that her daughter is living in France, she asks her to reverse the situation and to speak in Spanish to her grandchildren,
Ahora es al revés. De hecho con mis nietos franceses, realmente yo soy la parte española de la familia.’ [¿Viven en Francia?] ‘Sí viven en París.’ [¿Les hablas en francés o en español?] ‘Mi hija quiere que les hable en español para que aprendan el español. De hecho vienen aquí a hacer un curso de español. Hablan un poco las dos cosas.’ (Élodie, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)16
Guillaume, a French man living in Madrid with his French-Canadian-American wife also applied this rule at home and specify, that everyone spoke their respective mother tongues
[¿En casa en qué idioma habláis?] Yo hablo francés a mis hijos, mi mujer habla inglés y ellos hablan español con la niñera y en el cole con los amigos y tal. Entre nosotros dos va a ser principalmente (80%) francés y (20%) inglés, dependiendo. Los niños, eso es bastante impresionante, te localizan, te estampillan y entonces a mí siempre en francés y a su madre siempre en inglés. [¿Y cuándo estáis todos juntos?] Pues te van a decir 'papa es ce que tu vois sal' [French] y van a decir 'and you mammy, do you want?' [English]. Es bastante impresionante. Localizan cuál es el idioma materno de la persona que acaban de conocer y se van a dirigir a ella en su idioma. (Guillaume, French man living in Madrid, 45 years)17
Many participants with kids explained that the main reason to teach their mother tongue to their kids was to enable the communication with their families in their home countries. This was mentioned indistinctively among French and German parents.
[¿Por qué te interesa que aprendan francés?] ‘Para que tengan acceso a su familia, que puedan comunicar con el resto de la familia porque mi familia no habla holandés y no lo va a hablar nunca. Cuando vamos en vacaciones se comunican únicamente en francés.’
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(Théo, French man living in Amsterdam, 35 years)18
Other very recurrent reason was the access to culture that learning the language is seen to enable. This was conceptualized in different ways. Some, like Élodie, explained that they wanted to transmit their culture and values through language. Language was seen as a way not to lose their ‘roots’.
[Por qué era importante que tus hijos hablaran en francés] Sí, para no perder las raíces, la cultura y que estuvieran integrados en su ambiente francés y sobre todo yo creo que es una cosa natural que quieres transmitir tu... tu....’ (Élodie, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)19
Others, like Mathis, described the connection to the culture as the access to cultural products:
‘The French culture for me is very important. Because I really like to read French authors of cartoons. I really like it. That's typical French and Belgian [He stands up and take a comic from the shelf] I really want Maxime and Lune [daughters] to discover this art because in Holland Dutch people absolutely don't know that, they just know Tin Tin and Asterix.... So yeah.., there are a lot of this kinds of books but also Marcel Pagnol; an author from the 20th century in France and when I was young I really appreciated it to read its books, adventure books for children... and I really want Maxime and Lune to feel pleasure to read French literature because for me it is very important, and to see French films and…’ (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years)
Finally, there was an understanding of culture as a ‘structure’, as a specific mind-set. In words of Camille,
[¿En qué idioma hablabais en casa?] ‘Siempre en francés, me parecía muy importante para mis hijos, porque ello hablaba español muy bien. En la calle aprendieron así de pequeños con la persona que les cuidaba también y luego en el Liceo francés hablaban en español todo el rato, nada más que con los profesores en francés. Me parecía muy importante el idioma maternal 'la langue maternelle' [French], es muy importante para mí. Por eso yo les hablaba siempre en francés. El idioma materno para mí te da una estructura’ (Camille, French woman living in Madrid, 69 years)20
The emphasis on the transmission of culture (through language) when it comes to the education of the children was particularly acute among French participants, although the
91 accounts of the way in which language is supposed to enable the access to culture was different across participants. Élodie and other (older) French participants living in Madrid had a vision of language, as sort of cultural artefact:
‘Es verdad que entonces se estudiaban lo idiomas de otra manera, porque por ejemplo, tanto el inglés como el alemán, el fin no era tanto poder hablar, ya ni te digo hacer negocios. Por ejemplo en alemán, hacíamos traducciones de autores clásicos, pero después estabas en la clase y no podría comunicarte. No aprendíamos el idioma de manera coloquial. Además, aprendíamos la cultura, la historia y todo esto. Era otra manera de aprender los idiomas que además es una pena que se haya dejado. Cuando veo el libro de francés de una de mis nietas que ella es bilingüe italiano-español (la madre es suiza de Lugano y habla italiano con su familia e hijos). Esta niña, vive en Madrid ahora ha elegido francés. Voy a echarle una mano, pero cuando leo su libro de Francés casi me echo a llorar. Porque es tan coloquial. Aprende el idioma de los SMS. Le da la sensación de que va a aprender el francés en 3 meses. Aprende un nivel que aprendes yendo un mes allí. Incluso ha tenido textos que no entendía. (A+, au plus (tard)). Yo nunca lo había visto. Aprender un idioma así encuentro que poner el nivel súper bajo. Sobre todo la falsa sensación de que esto va a ser un coser y cantar. Me ha extrañado. Cómo ha evolucionado la enseñanza de los idiomas’ (Élodie, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)21
In this view language is seen as a cultural product that in itself might transmit culture and the French cultural heritage. Élodie emphasises the role of schools in this endeavour and criticises the turn education has taken with regards to the teaching of languages. Culture, is understood here as cultivation, as something which can be learned and which is a key element of their French identity. They thus wanted their kids to be able to catch upon that as well.
Guillaume, whose children currently study at a French Lyceum in Madrid, explains how his identity as French is partly determined by a specific formatting that the French education system gives:
‘Más que sentirme francés, es que por mi formateo educacional obviamente soy francés. Pienso en tres partes: tesis, antítesis, síntesis’ (Guillaume, French man living in Madrid, 45 years)22 Again an emphasis on the form(atting) at the core of the national identity can be observed. This notion of culture as being transmitted through education (and often through language) is very much in line with the republican idea of l’école de la République, that
92 although slightly reformed in the past years, still preserves very much the idea of a standard an unique education across all schools alongside the entire education. The idea of equality and giving everybody the same right is very much present in the rationale. As Louise explains:
‘In France we have this idea of L'école de la république is very important. It is a very important heritage of the French Revolution, to give the same chances to everyone and the schooling is a very important part of this value. Therefore you want everyone to go to this French school and you will not make a special school for people with special.., like something specialised for being foreigner or being a migrant... It is again this.., not handling the differences. So the very good thing of it is that everyone can learn French but if you don't want to see the differences and if you don't want to take them into account in the way you teach you're hiding the origin of people and you're making them frustrated, sad, and give them the feeling that they have to give up their life and their identity and that's... my reflection is that they don't feel recognised as a full person, they just feel recognised like someone who is trying to integrate.’
(Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Pupils are not persons, but units of a system, being formatted, and indoctrinated. This opinion is not singular to Louise or other participants of this study; it is very much present in the French public debate: the compatibility of the recognition of different identities with the republican values. The divergences in opinion are somehow also linked to the notion of language of participants, and, like was explained in the previous chapter the extent to which French participants think that through a specific form(at) and cultivation of a certain language and stricture of thinking one becomes French. This is in contrast to participants who think that one can feel French without having to agree to a fixed identity and culture; keeping it rather to the singularity of each citizen. And what is more important: that learning a language and a culture (as separate things) does not determine your mind set or thought. French ‘do not have a different mental structure’ but only a different standard language. Among our participants the divergences in opinion around this topic seemed to be split along a generational cleavage. (Older) French participants lived in Madrid and younger participants tended to live in Amsterdam. Nevertheless there
93 are no indications that point to the cities of residence as factors of change in this particular case. Also the automatic assumption that older participants tend to have more conservative opinions about politics, language education or notions of language is not approved by the researcher. The generational cleavage will thus be noted here as an observation as this research lacks the necessary information to draw further conclusions about the impact of age in these ideological conformations.
French participants devoted great importance to the transmission of culture through language, although in very different ways which are not particular of these sample of French participants but also reflected in the French public debate.
Among German participants – again – the proper use of language and having a ‘good’ accent was among the main reasons to speak to the children in their mother tongue. Johanna is German, 26 years old and living with her French partner in Amsterdam, with whom she speaks English. When she was asked what language she would speak with her children in case of having them she replied:
‘I would never speak a foreign language because then I make mistakes and the kid wouldn’t know what is really right and maybe catch up on you, you know? Also get my accent... I would just never do that because it is not my native language. I would also speak in German, because otherwise they would not be able to talk to their grandparents in a proper way and I would not like that, that they don't have a good relationship with them. And I wouldn't mind if both parents would speak their languages. Like I would speak German and you [to her partner] French to keep it separate, that the kids would know OK this is German and this is French and then I would have to speak French at home because I wouldn’t want them to pick up on English in a wrong way. So that would be my opinion. So I would have to switch to French permanently because I wouldn’t like them to learn a language not having the... I wouldn't speak proper French but then kids would... I have a friend for example and one of the parents is not from Germany and they still speak German at home and then the kids understand that you're learning you know? They wouldn't... I don't think they would pick up your mistakes then, because you still have the right version.., you know? And there is no chance otherwise.., we wouldn't speak. I would prefer that then English.’ (Johanna, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
The mother tongue is somehow regarded as something one is supposed to master, not only syntactically but also with regards to accent. It is a part of oneself, a second nature. Paul was born and raised in Madrid within a German family, speaking German at home
94 and at school but Spanish everywhere else. He explained that while his mother tongue is German, he feels more comfortable in Spanish.
Me siento más cómodo en español por el vocabulario… yo tengo más vocabulario en español que en alemán. Es decir, considero mi primer idioma el alemán, mi mandíbula está hecha para hablar alemán, pero me resulta más fácil escribir en español que en alemán. Es que claro, tantos años fuera... (Paul, born in Madrid, 33 years)23
The naturalization of the mother tongue in the case of Paul is very interesting. Not only he considers that something as physical as ones jaw is ‘done to speak German’ but he incurs in saying that ‘after so many years abroad…’, as if he would have ever left his (German) country. He ‘became’ German or abroad-born by the act of speaking German, but actually he was born and raised in Madrid and although he studied abroad for a while ended up living in Madrid again.
The only hint of French participants giving this importance to accent and language performance was given by a German man. Jan’s feeling speaking in French, shows a projection of the discourses of the above German participants in a somehow opposite situation. He was born in Germany, but always spoke in French to his mother and reported to feel bilingual, with both languages (German and French) being his mother tongue. When he was asked if he felt more comfortable in one language or in the other he replied:
‘Well... I think I have more ease with German because I grew up in Germany and usually everything I had to read or write from school in the beginning was in German and later I went to a German-French Gymnasium (German accent) so I had a lot of French friends, but somehow I still have this small tiny accent when I talk French. Like a German accent or some weird accent so when I am with French participants sometimes they're like 'why do you talk so slow....’ you know... yeah... because I don't have any specific accent from a region so they don't really recognise me as from Paris or from the North or from the South. It is a little bit like... I mean... French are really picky about their language. So but yeah... a lot of participants say that I talk really good French so... you know I never really lived there for a long time.’ (Jan, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
This emphasis on accent on the German side of the sample seems to be at odds with the reported and accepted linguistic variety (e.g. dialects and different accents) across the German territory of the participants. Ben is just one of many examples that explain this variety: 95
‘Se hablan muchos dialectos en Alemania. En la zona donde nací yo se habla Rheinish, digamos Rheinfränkisch, pero mis padres son del Palatinado (Pfals) de la parte sur y eso es un dialecto muy fuerte. Yo no lo he aprendido..., yo intenté siempre hablar Hochdeutsch [German], alto alemán más o menos, pero claro mis padres sueltan a veces palabras que se usan en el Palatinado sólo, que son muchas palabras francesas, por ejemplo. Creciendo en el valle del Rin, alguna palabra es típica del Rin y la pronunciación…Uno de mis hermanos vive en el Palatinado, ha vuelto a donde mis padres nacieron y el otro vive en Baviera, cerca de la frontera con Chequia y allí hablan otro dialecto muy fuerte. Su mujer es de ahí, es Niederbayrisch [German] ‘Youmei'... [imitating with strong accent], es difícil de entender.’ (Ben, German man living in Madrid, 35 years)24
The impression is that only by speaking ‘proper’ German or German with (one of) the ‘German’ accent(s), authenticity might be achieved.
‘There is really a stigma on like not speaking native German. If you can kind of tell that someone has a kind of accent from another country and even in the grammar is correct and they use sophisticated words... when you can still hear that they have a different accent or something... It is really something that I try to really resist now but I also only noticed when I came here [Netherlands]... like how much it is like immediately there is a link that this person is less intelligent or something. It sound awful but I think typically that's what happens. And also... like there is a lot of... I don't know... there is this big... I don't want to say ‘Turkish community' or participants with Turkish heritage or whatever and there is this specific style of speaking amongst the Turkish youth... but obviously they are also German, you know?, young participants that also speak like this slang that participants just connect with foreigners and youth that hangs on the street and kind of a negative picture and that's you know this really negative thing that is just connected in Germany with the language and with not speaking it properly.’ (Clara, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
Clara emphasizes that individuals speaking with a ‘specific Turkish style are also German’, probably because these specific style of speaking is typically not considered to be enough German to be German; like the census category ‘population with migrant background’ that seems to draw a line between population with and without migrant background as more or less German; although in both groups nationals are to be found. In order to be considered German, one has not only to master the language, but in addition one has to perform, embody the language in a typically German way. By trying hard to teach their kids German with a ‘proper’ accent participants are basically aiming at their kids inclusion in the group that is somehow ‘allowed’ and ‘considered’ German.
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Although, as mentioned above, this might seem in contradiction with the linguistic variety of the German territory the hint again seems to be the conception of nationality of the German state, mostly regulated by jus sanguinis. This sort of naturalisation of the nationhood, by means of blood, race or language seems to be (unconsciously) addressing the ‘purist’ conception of language among participants, both the ones that are critic towards it, like Clara, and the ones that reproduce this discourse.
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6. REPRODUCTION OF DOMINANT LINGUISTIC IDEOLOGIES
Participant’s exposition of their language practices and the added rationale for doing so showed that they frequently have normative values attached to language. They have conceptions of ‘right or ‘wrong’ ways of speaking and learning a language which are very much aligned with the values on which the dominant language ideology is built. In two places and cases the normativity was especially acute: home and work. At home, especially in homes with children, the implementation of the linguistic norm was very much top-down. This is, determined at parent’s whim and expected to be adopted by the kids. In addition, as was exposed in the last chapter, the one language-one person rule was not argued as arbitrary, but as the ‘right’ way to do it in order to not confuse the child and enable it to be able to differentiate between different linguistic codes. At work, participants very often explained how they complied with the dominant language ideology as it is a place where power relations and being taking serious are important for them. The same symbolic violence of the hegemonic linguistic ideology that these participants, as workers, are subject to is thus reproduced by them at work.
In the following these two spaces and cases will be described as well as the exceptions to these reproduction of the dominant language ideology. The conditions and experiences that give rise to alternative arrangements and understandings of language in these micro- contexts will be also described.
6.1 Source of the norm and negotiation of linguistic rules
In addition to the emphasis on communication (both groups), culture (French) and achieving a ‘proper’ use of language (Germans), what is striking is that within the households described in the previous chapter, kids seem to have no or little voice. Nevertheless, it is not always possible to manipulate them at the parent’s whim. Some examples of resistance were also explained.
‘But I really don't want to fight to put the French in a violent way. I see a lot of children around me from mixed couples and when the kid was 6-7-8 at once he decided not to speak French anymore and then he spoke in Dutch and finished with the French... So ... I am not sure that this is going to work. See.., for me it is very important but I know that for them the most important is to be happy here...’ (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years)
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The fact that Mathis uses the term ‘violence’ is salient, since none of the other parents seem to notice the ‘authority’ they exert on the regulation of the linguistic rules of their kids. Moreover, most of the young parents had the impression that by creating a norm at home, the children would just passively follow. As Chloé, a mother of grown up children explains, this is not always the case.
[Cuando los niños eran pequeños, ¿en qué se hablaba en casa?] Intentamos en francés, yo intentaba que ellos me contestaran y más o menos lo hacían. Sobre todo Natalia, la mayor, porque Natalia vivió 6 años en Ginebra y su idioma materno es 100% francés y con ella hablo mucho a día de hoy. Con Jan, llegó aquí con 3 años; no hablaba nada español y fue una especie de rechazo absoluto del francés. Hasta cambió su nombre en Juan. Porque fue a un colegio donde además le pegaban por 'franchute', y entonces yo no le obligué porque veía que para él era una complicación. Y con él hablaba más castellano. Intentaba las dos cosas, y como venían mis padres pues le mantenían. Laura nació aquí y hable francés con ella y ella muchas veces me contestaba en Castellano. Luego ella se fue a París y empezó a hablar francés y ahora habla solamente francés conmigo. Cada hijo tiene un poco una forma particular. (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)25
The case of Chloé was used above to exemplify her home as a porous space, but as can be observed by this statement, this porous space was the outcome of a transition that passed through the negotiation with and accommodation to the preferences and needs of each child. Both Mathis and Chloé challenge the common assumption that parents have the right (and duty) to ‘impose’ a language on their children. The opposite is not be blamed on the parents that don’t do so, there is no right and wrong. The remarkable idea is only that they are reproducing a pattern that has been done for centuries in monolingual states and families without objection and adapting it to their new multilingual condition.
Interestingly, Mia used a similar concept of ‘being imposed a language’, in a different context and on a different scale: the city of Barcelona. An exercise of abstraction enables the comparison of this case to some of the household’s linguistic hegemonies:
‘En su momento en Barcelona el idioma nunca ha sido un problema, pero si lo veo ahora 'im Rückspiegel' [German] sí que lo hubo. Y yo llegué una vez a escribir una carta al ayuntamiento por un archivo de fotos; tenía que buscar
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fotos para documentar una peli y no me querían atender en español. Y yo en su momento llevaba dos años y medio y mi catalán era cero todavía, porque mi español todavía estaba en desarrollo y preferían casi hablar alemán e inglés conmigo que el español y sobre todo querían hablar en catalán. No sé… se trata de comunicar, no de imponer un idioma. Y yo pensaba…“pero si he aprendido algo que tenemos en común de idioma…”. Depende de quién te toca. Era una persona muy desagradable, pero eso te provoca rechazo.’ (Mia, German woman living in Madrid, 40 years)26
Of course this person’s ease to speak in Spanish – not only with respect to its actual capacity but also regarding values and emotions – remains unknown. In any case Mia’s emphasis is that ‘they didn’t want to attend me in Spanish’; not that they couldn’t. That seems, for her, to make a difference, as she stresses the potentiality there existed to negotiate a common language use: ‘I´ve learned a language we have in common’. A similar kind of imposition – although with slightly different political connotations – was recalled by Hugo. This time physical violence was also involved:
‘I am from Renne, France. It is in Bretagne in the West. I don't speak Breton. I speak standard French without an accent actually. I think we are one of the regions where there is no accent; because basically everybody would speak Breton but for example the government would say “no no” ... And you would get hit in the class if you speak Breton... well not me but 200 years ago, so they prevented kids from speaking Breton and that’s why we have kind of very formal and plain French without accent and without… (Hugo, French man living in Amsterdam, 26 years) . The kind of goal of this practices as well as the rejection that might appear after this ‘violent’ imposition was explained by Louise:
‘And then you have the separatist in Bretagne, Pays Basque, Corsica as well.., it is not important and it is more like a joke nowadays but it has been important in the 17th and 18th century and then again in the 19th century they didn't wanted that local languages were spoken. On the one side it is good because then you have a country in which people can understand each other but it was maybe too much or too extreme and nowadays there are schools that are setting Breton or Corse or Basque as a second language; so they are claiming their identity that had been a little bit erased by communication. Everyone needs...I mean, there is a time where you don’t want to be like everyone, like teenager years, you want to be different, you want to be, to have your own identity and you want to include in your identity a lot of things. It depends on people and their own story, but a lot of people want to be both French and Breton, or French and Catholic or French and whatever, Jewish, Muslim.’ (Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
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Louise and Hugo are describing a top-down nation building process, which was (and still is) common to most modern nation states and especially acute in the case of France. Louise intertwines the imposition of a certain language with the oppression of culture(s) and identity(ies); which becomes very clear after her comparison of the cases of Bretons with other religious groups which actually don’t have a linguistic claim attached to their identity. Mia mentions a possible case of bottom-up nation or identity building process attached to language that made her feel uncomfortable and she suggests to approach language in a rather practical way: finding a common language for communication. Louise also points to this element in her example: the top-down approach of the French case was also aiming to enable communication within a territory. Both, identitarian and communicative purposes have been translated to the realm of the home as a territory, in which a language is imposed and the preferences of the kids are not really taken into account. Nations become homes and citizens become kids. Whether this ‘violence’ is done for the sake of communication within the home or with the aim of transmitting a certain culture and identity, people seem to be as trapped as states (and/or nations) are in a multilingual world. The common assumption indicates that there has to be a language for a state to work, for public education to run, for administration to be efficient, for communication to exist. It is also given for granted, at least for some, that there is a language that expresses one’s identity and culture, claiming a sort of ‘one language-one people’, or ‘our language’. A parallel can be drawn with the homes as it seems to be obvious that children have to be taught a language, even more: a mother tongue. As has been reviewed before, some assume that this mother tongue will endow the kid with a culture, with the access to a cultural heritage, or even –as was seen with regards to the ‘proper use of language’ and accent – with an identity and the right to belong somewhere. There are three striking elements that seem to disconcert parents: first; how to establish the linguistic rules within the homes. Should it be imposed? Should it be consensual with kid’s needs and preferences? Second; how to achieve a satisfactory level of communication at home and with relatives? Should it be in a single standard language? In two or more languages? Is a hybrid mix of them (i.e. less aware separation between the languages) an option? Will this last option harm the children’s’ mental structure? Third; the meaning and weight of language. Is language a transmitter of culture? To what extent is identity negotiated through language? Most of the parents are more conservative in their linguistic relations with their children than they are in their inter-adult communications. Furthermore, the fact that the more
101 loose regulations of adult’s spheres don’t render communication impossible (e.g. within multilingual couples many participants reported not to have a strong awareness of their language use, and often practice code-mixing) does not seem to motivate them to apply this laxity with their children. Moreover, when children incur in code-mixing or do not quite master the code-switching transitions, parents are worried about it.
It has to be conceded that the ‘porous homes’ examples of Chloé and Marine (Chapter 4) in which there seems to be a negotiation of language use from a fairly young age, Mathis’s sensibility towards not imposing a language with ‘violence’, or even Mia’s thought in Barcelona: ‘but I’ve learned a language we have in common’, meaning ‘why don’t we use it?’ are paths already been taken than seem to open the horizons of the ‘thinkable’ multilingual territory, sometimes also called home.
Let’s analyse these alternatives in order to sound out how different they actually are from the dominant language ideologies of the monolingual states. Indeed, some participant’s description of their homes as porous spaces where they cannot remember what language has been spoken are already a paradigmatic shift in the way of thinking about languages that runs away from the notion of standard languages and/or a quantitative approach to multilingualism. The focus is rather on communication, on languages being integrated into one’s linguistic repertoire. Also the fragment of Chloé recalling the negotiation of language use with her children and explaining how every child followed a somehow different path is breaking away from an authoritarian approach to the implementation of linguistic rules. It is suggesting a more democratic approach to the establishment of linguistic hegemonies in territories: negotiating instead of imposing. Also Mathis is doing this when drawing attention to not wanting to ‘impose a language with violence’.
Nevertheless, Chloé’s speech recalls somehow a strong link between identity and language. Every child followed a different linguistic path because it was their way of defining their identity (as French, as non French, as Spanish, as teenager…etc.). This is to say that by breaking away with some of the elements of the dominant language ideology (i.e. an isomorphic relation between one (single standard) language, one territory, one culture and one identity), one does not gets rid of all its implications all of a sudden. Although Chloé challenges the notion of language and the common practice of its authoritarian imposition, she still sticks to a strong link between language use and identity. She is of course not the only one. And that’s good so. It only means that having
102 a hybrid notion or use of language does not necessarily imply not drawing a connections between language and identity, which confirms Otsuji and Pennycook (2010: 244) call of attention against the construction of fixity and fluidity as dichotomous. As has been observed, fixed identitarian elements are to be found it this rather fluid conception of language. Same applies for culture. Marine, for example, although having a very loose notion of language and legitimizing hybrid practices, seems to have some kind of connection between language and culture. She declares:
‘I really like to speak in French to my French colleagues. It is just easier and I don’t have to think of the social codes. I find that very difficult sometimes but especially with Dutch people I think the social codes are so different that I am always a bit careful and if I speak French I can let myself go and be more natural. Because I know the limits better’ (Marine, French woman living in Amsterdam, 40 years)
These are the beautiful contradictions that enable a greater comprehension of the matter at hand and deny some possible simplistic assumptions of an all-or-nothing approach.
6.2 Hegemony of dominant language ideology
In addition to the homes, one of the most frequently mentioned places among participants was the workplace. Most of the participants worked in a different language than the official language of their city of residence.
In the city of Amsterdam participants usually worked in English; situation which does not really differs much from the language they often use in the public sphere. Nevertheless it was interesting to notice how the criteria for using Dutch or English – when possible – were different at work and in the public sphere. Laura explains the reasons:
[You tend to use more English?] Just at work... Most of the time if I go shopping, cinema, doctors, meet people in the street I speak Dutch... I don't feel more comfortable but I am in the Netherlands, so I need to speak Dutch. At work it is different because I have to tell people how to do things, and I have to be strict sometimes... if you're not able to do that with the right words then it sucks of course no one takes you serious. With Dutch I wouldn't be able to do that.’ (Laura, German woman living in Amsterdam, 40 years)
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Also Louise mentioned the importance of language at work in order to be taken serious:
‘I started as a translator last year, last summer and I can translate that’s no problem but I need to speak better Dutch; to my clients it is very important. As I translate form Dutch to French it is very important that they have a secured feeling with me that I can understand properly what’s written and what I have to translate.’ (Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
None of the participants mentioned any code-mixing or code-switching practice at their working place. People tend to value a ‘proper’ use of language at work; as Laura and Louise explain, they want to be taken serious. Not being proficient in a language or the practice of code- mixing and code-switching is not regarded as such. Thus, these participants tended to ‘comply with the symbolic domination’ (Blackledge and Pavlenko, 2001: 254) of a standard use of the language at work, more than in other places, for the sake of being taken serious.
Théo mentioned a sui generis version of linguistic rules at work which was neither code- mixing nor code-switching, but a conversation in which different persons spoke different languages. This is how he worked before being confident enough in Dutch:
El trabajo es el lugar donde el hecho de aprender el idioma tuvo el impacto más importante. Pienso que ahí al principio trabajaba solo en inglés, pero tenía que leer reportajes también en holandés por lo que fue importante aprender rápidamente a leer el holandés. La segunda etapa era participar en reuniones en donde se hablaba holandés y yo participaba en inglés y la última etapa era hacer todo el holandés.’ (Théo, French man living in Amsterdam, 35 years) 27
This was apparently a more desirable situation that talking Dutch ‘badly’ as he would have been taken less serious or vulnerable.
The case of Madrid was slightly different. The working language was very often the standard language of their country of origin. Often participants did work in the education sector either as language teachers or teaching other subjects in a foreign language. Others worked in cultural institutes related to the promotion of the language in Spain. The rest worked very frequently for the market of the country of origin or with compatriot
104 associates. The languages of the country of origin were therefore an asset for many of the interviewees when it came to job opportunities:
‘Realmente como alemán he tenido la posibilidad de trabajar para muchas empresas alemanas aquí, grandes empresas. Ellos buscaban a alguien con quien se pudieran entender en su idioma. Empresas grades, como seguros Allianz, Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank, industrias también.’ (Leon, German man living in Madrid, 73 years)28
Mélanie, bilingual in French and English didn’t spoke any Spanish when she arrived to Madrid and explains how terrible it was for her to work as a music teacher in Spanish and how relieved she feels now that she can work in English. She also emphasizes how speaking two languages ‘saved her life’ in Spain.
‘Empecé dos meses o tres a trabajar en español con niños dando clases de música, y era terrible. Era terrible porque no les entendía…Ahora trabajo más en inglés y para mí ha sido una maravilla. Los idiomas..., eso es lo que me ha salvado la vida aquí en España. Trabajo bastante dando clases de música en Inglés. También dando clases de inglés y de francés: más de conversación, porque yo no tengo formación. Ahora estoy en un colegio bilingüe (Kings College) entonces trabajo en inglés y en español. El francés, me queda una alumna en francés de piano, pero la hablo en francés’ (Mélanie, French woman living in Madrid, 30 years)29
Mélanie confirms that foreign spoken languages were an asset when she just arrived in Spain. In addition she explains how not speaking the language was a barrier and how horrible and unsafe she felt teaching in Spanish. Now that she can teach in English she feels confident and safe. She didn’t mention any frustration in her daily life, but only at work when speaking in Spanish because children would not take her serious. Therefore, despite the differences across both cities, work seems to be a micro-context in which the stigma and vulnerability of participants not speaking fluently the standard linguistic code being deployed at the working place seemed to be stronger. Repeatedly language was mentioned as a barrier to integrate within the company or with colleagues.
I work for a Dutch company.., and it was very small at the time so I really needed to speak Dutch. It was really hard. I did my best but I felt a little bit apart and then with time it came and came and then I got more present in the company. So, I could work. It was a very good experience because then I was forced to start to speak in Dutch for work.
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(Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
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7. POROSITY OF PUBLIC SPACES
It is interesting to understand how the conditions for a communication are constituted in the absence of a long established agreement in daily interactions with multilinguals in the public space. It is believed that in these cases the potentialities of creating a porous space have to be negotiated and established on the spot.
[Hi Jan] ‘Ja, hallo Carmen.’ [German] [Wo kommst du her?]-[German] ‘Freiburg. South West of Germany. Born and raised there.’ [Do they speak any dialect there?] ‘Ja... Badisch.. aber in Freiburg ist es ziemlich Hochdeutsch.’ [German] [Sprichs du dort Hochdeutsch oder Badisch?]-[German] ‘Nö.. kein Badisch aber [German] I understand it.’ [Du hast mir erzählt dass deine Mutter Französin ist?]-[German] ‘Ja. Meine Mutter [German] is French, from Paris her family and my dad is German from around the Schwarzwald, so he's been in Freiburg for quite some time... a couple of years and I grew up there.. So I was raised bilingual and we went on holidays a lot to France.’ (Jan, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)30
The beginning of the interview with Jan in Amsterdam was quite revealing with regards to the dynamics of the establishment of a communication and the identification of more or less porous spaces. The researcher and Jan didn’t knew each other beforehand, but an informal chat was held in German right before the interview, which in turn was started in English. These first seconds show therefore a sort of recognition phase in which both speakers –researcher included – are negotiating a shared code for the conversation. The interviewer tended to adapt to the main language chosen by Jan. This attitude of not being able to let go the conception of languages as separate systems probably prevented the appearance of more hybrid linguistic forms and the conversation finally ended up being almost entirely in English. Standard languages where used and not mixed very often, thus a high awareness of the language being used prevailed after this mixed beginning. The languages being deployed in this fragment reveal that the decision to speak in a certain code with a stranger is strongly determined by the speaker’s linguistic competences, but also by the feedback received during the conversation. Jan spoke languages which were understood by the interviewer (German and English) and didn’t mix them with French or Dutch; languages which he also masters. This verification of the
107 other’s language competences in order to sound out the linguistic possibilities of the conversation happened repeatedly during more interviews.
‘I started with a Dutch Bachelor ... I don’t know... do you speak Dutch?’ [Go ahead, I can understand you] ‘Ok. So I started with a Bachelor in Culturele antropologie en ontwikkelingssociologie [Dutch], so cultural anthropology and development sociology.’ (Clara, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
Clara was interviewed at home in Amsterdam, and far from assuming that in a Dutch city she could speak Dutch she didn’t switch codes until confirming the successful perception of the language she was going to use. The fact that the interviewer is not Dutch and that the conversation was established in English probably influenced this attitude. When Clara was asked about her Dutch language use, she explained:
‘When I am speaking in Dutch I switch to English only if I really can't find words. But then I still try to continue in Dutch. Say the sentence in Dutch... everything I can... but at some point I just stop to stop and search and ask for words and I just say them in English you know? Also everyone speaks so well English here that you can just do that, that no one really notices it. Like Dutch people do it themselves sometimes.’ (Clara, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
Thus, in the context of Amsterdam and when she is speaking in Dutch, she assumes that she can switch to English without any kind of recognition phase, because ‘everyone speaks English’. Nevertheless, she keeps track on the ‘main’ language being used (in this case, Dutch) and comes back to it whenever the temporal code-switch has come to an end. The same could have happened with Louise, a French woman living in Amsterdam, in case the researcher would have had competence in French.
‘With my husband I speak French and English all the time’ [Do you switch between French and English everywhere, also when you're with friends?] ‘All the time’ [Why are you not doing it with me?] Do you speak French? [No]
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‘So if you would speak French I would just use the language in which we are both more comfortable. So if we feel like we can communicate better in English then I will use English but I know I can speak French when I miss a word. So it is not about me switching languages, it is about what the other person can speak because I want them to understand me. So, I would do that with friends who can understand some Dutch I can do that. When I speak English with Dutch people I use very often Dutch words because I know they will understand I have been living here more here than in England and I know the weight of words is.’ (Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Louise confirms the attitude of negotiating the possibilities and limitations of a single conversation every time a new interpersonal communication is established but also the naturalisation of the practice of code-switching between English and Dutch in Amsterdam. This feels like a sort of alleviation:
‘It is very helpful; you are never lost in translation’ (Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Marine, a Lyonnais woman that moved to Amsterdam with her family 7 years ago, explains:
‘You can live fairly easy in Amsterdam in English, because everyone speaks English. From the bus driver to... everyone has a very good English and sometimes French and Dutch. I think Dutch people are amazingly talented with language, while if you live in France and somebody would move to Lyon, not learning French would make their life impossible almost to navigate the social security and the administration. Here..., just take a look at the official websites of the belastingdienst [Tax Authorities] or whatever, everything is translated!’ (Marine, French women living in Amsterdam, 40 years)
Certainly this impression differs from the opinion of some of the interviewees in Madrid, which tend to perceive the city of Madrid and the administration of the state as very monolingual; not available in other language than Spanish. This impression is illustrated by Marion’s recalling of her first experiences when she moved with her husband and kids 3 years ago.
‘Claramente ya lo he olvidado, pero cuando llegamos, es que nos volvimos totalmente locos de los trámites que tuvimos que hacer. Además yo no podía hacerlos sola porque no hablaba y entonces cada vez mi marido tenía que poner un día de baja para venir y hacerlo juntos’ [¿Había posibilidad de hacerlo en otros idiomas?] ‘No, todo en español’
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(Marion, French women living in Madrid, 33 years)31
The expression ‘no hablaba’ [‘I didn’t speak’] is particularly interesting for it exemplifies how the perceived monolingual space in which Marion enters renders her speaking competences insignificant. Marion is not dumb and declared to speak French, English and a bit of German upon her arrival in Spain. Of course she does speak but the monolingual linguistic regime (Bloomaert et al. 2005) of the administrative services of Madrid invalidated the functionality and value of Marie’s language abilities at the time. This division between ‘spaces where she speaks’ and ‘spaces where she does not speak’ are considered spaces of security and insecurity respectively.
‘Claramente he visto que si no sabes el idioma te encuentras fuera de la sociedad. Yo me he visto. Es que no me atrevía ni a salir de mi casa porque tenía miedo de encontrar un vecino que me hablara... Yo iba a recoger el correo corriendo. Porque te pone en una posición de debilidad increíble. Sí, a mí me impactó mucho. Crees que te vas a..., pero no’ (Marion, French women living in Madrid, 33 years)32
Against the fear Marion experienced in generally in public spaces, she explained how she found some spaces of security during her first period in Madrid not speaking the main language of the city.
Mis espacios seguros al principio eran la casa y colegio de los niños, porque había mucha gente que hablaba francés, o casa de amigos franceses también. El supermercado o compras también porque sabes que no se habla mucho en este caso. (Marion, French woman living in Madrid, 33 years)33
Supermarkets and shops were, alongside with the home, very frequently mentioned as save places. In the supermarket ‘you don’t have to speak’ much, and in any event it is somehow easy to predict what it is going to be spoken about. The language of a supermarket can be learned fast and the sort of impersonal interaction that is established with the cashier created Marie, and others, a sense of security.
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The city of Amsterdam is slightly different in that sense, as with English one can go by and all participants did speak English. Nevertheless some participants also mentioned the supermarkets as the first places where they practiced Dutch without being ashamed.
‘I tried to speak first with people in the supermarket you know... at the checkout they will talk Dutch because they don't know if you're a foreigner or not... then I would try to reply to them and every time I had the chance I would try to talk Dutch Because it is really hard to actually learn Dutch because many people speak English.’ (Jan, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
For Jan it was quite the opposite as for Marie. The supermarket was the place where he could actually speak Dutch, the language he wanted to practice. Faced with the difficulty of practicing Dutch anywhere else, this was his place of reference, where he could finally speak the language he wanted in this period of his life.
The pattern of looking for places where one can actually speak was very recurrent among the participants in Madrid.
‘Para empezar a conocer gente fui a la Iglesia de los Franceses, que estaba en el viejo Madrid al lado de Gran vía en Tres Cruces y allí había una biblioteca. Yo en Francia había trabajado en una biblioteca para ayudar y me presenté allí diciendo 'tengo mucho tiempo y se un poco de esto si necesitáis algo’... y a partir de ahí empecé a conocer a gente, que eran la mayoría franceses’ (Camille, French woman living in Madrid, 69 years)34
In Madrid many participants had reference places where they knew, they could speak their ‘native’ language:
‘Mis amigas francesas viven mucho en Chamartín. Cuando voy al mercado de Chamartín (potosí) veo a muchas francesas amigas mías. Por ejemplo el que vende el queso es francés y hablamos en francés’ (Élodie, French woman living in Amsterdam, 72 years)35
Also schools and language centres were often recalled as places were a different linguistic environment was present. These places were also described as having an expansive effect of the language being spoken within them. Paul explained, for example, how around the German School in Madrid, situated in a street called Concha Espina, a kind of language
111 mix between German and Spanish could be used. This language is called ‘Concha-Espina Deutsch’.
‘Sí que es cierto que aquí [neighbourhood] a veces hablamos lo que se dice 'Concha Espina' Deutsch y sí que es cierto, que a veces mezclas alemán y español. Con mis padres, con gente en la calle... Hablas en alemán pero españolizas algunas palabras...’ (Paul, born in Madrid, 33 years)36
This linguistic centres as places having an impact on the whole area were also recognised by Lea,
‘Alrededor del Instituto Francés se escucha muchísimo francés. Hay tiendas en las que hablan en francés’. (Lea, German woman living in Madrid, 36 years)37
The reason for having these places of reference and pointing them out was often enough ‘being able to speak in your language for a while’ as a place where to go when wanting to escape from your ‘living abroad’ or ‘living in a foreign language’ reality.
‘Me gusta estar ahí [Goethe Institut] más bien por eso de que puedes a veces hablar de tus cosas en tu idioma también. Con los amigos españoles que tengo, no tengo ningún problema de expresar mis sentimientos, lo único es que creo que si no lo tuviera a lo mejor lo echaría en falta. No es mejor o peor, pero es una parte de mí y lo disfruto mucho también. Yo creo que en general, pero luego depende de cada uno, creo que es el fondo cultural. Digamos de la infancia...al menos de los que tenemos la misma edad...de haber tenido una infancia parecida. Respecto a literatura, respecto a película y tal. Eso, aunque no hablas mucho de ello a veces pienso que es importante saber de qué base estás partiendo de alguna manera, ¿no?’ (Lea, German woman living in Madrid, 36 years)38
In Amsterdam none of the participants talked about such language enclaves, but nevertheless some persons still mentioned the fact of sometimes needing to talk in their ‘native’ language.
‘I mean obviously some stuff like, when it comes to like... I don't know... when my boyfriend broke up with me of stuff... I obviously prefer to tell it in German it is just easier’ (Emilia, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
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In addition to the greater ease of speaking in their mother tongues, there appears to be a strong relation between a language community and an emotional community:
‘German feels a bit like home kind of, you know?’ (Christian, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
It seems like the different linguistic hegemonies of the spaces of Madrid and Amsterdam made the public spaces of the cities more or less porous. While in Amsterdam one can switch to English (and sometimes German, French, and others) in Madrid this practice seemed to be completely impossible outside the mentioned enclaves. The concept of porosity can be applied here in a larger scale. It is not only that participants have to separate language as different systems in their minds in order to enable communication; languages are literally separated by walls. Every language belongs to a place where it can be legitimately practiced.
The contention here is that the different language hegemonies of the cities, has an impact on the spatialisation of linguistic practices. Living in a non-porous public space like Madrid, encourages the spatialisation of alternative linguistic practices. If one does not master the official standard language of the public space, like Marion experienced upon arrival, one feels fear and refugees in save or porous spaces that function as enclaves.
The city of Amsterdam was an environment that enabled a little bit more porosity which prevented participants from spatialising their linguistic practices so much. In Amsterdam, participants do not need any specific places to fulfil their wish to practice different language codes. This is probably influenced by the international environment they live in, but certainly the city of Amsterdam facilitates it in any event. The case of the administration of the municipality of Amsterdam as being always available in English (indeed English is accepted as an official language in this administration) is in clear contrast with the administration of Madrid, which was described as a place where one ‘does not speak’ if not having a high competence in Spanish. For example Chloé, just laughed when being asked about the possibility to live the ordinary life in the city of Madrid and/or navigate the administration in another language than Spanish – implying the level of impossibility and thus the level of perceived nonsense of the question – and then replied,
‘¿Aquí, inglés? ¡Ni en broma! 113
(Chloé, French women living in Madrid, 72 years)39
Not only does she considers Madrid a monolingual space, but she interprets that ‘any other language’ is sort of synonym for English language, as the only possible alternative to Spanish. This deserved a special note for the description of Amsterdam as a porous city as migrants not speaking English might not feel the same in the city of Amsterdam.
While participants speaking English described Amsterdam as a multilingual environment,
‘Amsterdam is very multilingual. I tend to compare it to Scandinavian countries when it comes to international flair and the basic proficiency of most people speaking English… also I think that the international community here is more diverse and English is like a non-verbal contract... 'Ok people let’s all talk English and we're good'... so that's the vibe that you get here.’ (Philipp, German man living in Amsterdam, 24 years)
That does not mean that in order to feel save in the public space of Amsterdam learning Dutch is never a necessity. As Mathis illustrates:
‘I was not good in English. A lot of English people think that they don’t need the language [Dutch] but when you’re French and you don’t speak English you have to learn a new language, so I learned Dutch’ (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years)
Far from multilingual, in Amsterdam a sort of bi-lingual linguistic regime seems to prevail.
‘It is a multilingual city, yes, because I see a lot of different types of people and a lot of tourist but it feels like everyone is speaking Dutch or English. All foreigners speak English except they are in their own little group. So, there are not many other languages’ (Laura, German woman living in Amsterdam, 40 years)
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It seems like the premise that it is not necessary to learn Dutch in order to live in Amsterdam has to be reframed as it seems to apply only to those participants who do speak English.
In any event the degree of porosity of the city of residence – accepting that the case of Amsterdam might be reframed as only porous between Dutch and English – definitely had an impact on the perceived linguistic landscape of the city. Participants living in Amsterdam had a hard time to tell the researcher were they would expect to hear which languages in the mental mapping exercise and rather talked about the city in general being very multilingual (predominantly European languages, Arabic and Turkish). In the city of Madrid this exercise seemed much more straight forward as participants were able to point specific places and sometimes streets or neighbourhoods in which they would expect to hear and to be able to talk in a certain language.
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8. LANGUAGE AND INTEGRATION
As was explained in the previous chapter, all participants had the feeling that they could switch to English, or even just speak in English (and to a lesser extent other languages) at any moment in the city of Amsterdam and very rarely in the city of Madrid. This is reflected in the standard linguistic competences of the participants. While all participants master the standard official language of their countries of origin – i.e. German and French – a striking difference emerges with regards to the competence in the official language of the cities of residence: all participants currently living in Madrid speak Spanish to some extent and many of the residents in Amsterdam (7 out of 16) didn’t speak any Dutch and only 4 use it on a daily basis. As a German man living in Amsterdam explained:
‘Honestly, I think the Netherlands is a country where I would say that long term migrants.., they speak Dutch very good and most of the people that don’t talk Dutch are people like me or tourist in the centre’ (Christian, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Christian has been living in the Netherlands for 6 years and is planning to stay in Amsterdam in the near future. When he refers to ‘people like me’ he is referring to his doubt about staying in the long term but also the fact that his social life is largely international, he barely knows Dutch individuals. This impression was repeatedly reported by other participants living in Amsterdam and points to the possibility of living, working, studying, reproducing, etc. in Amsterdam without speaking Dutch.
While in the city of Madrid learning Spanish seems to be a must in order to live, the reasons for learning Dutch in the case of Amsterdam are most of the time other that the necessity.
‘If you want to feel integrated and that it is home forever you should learn the language. Otherwise you cannot build a long term relationship with Dutch people’ (Ian, German living in Amsterdam, 27 years)
More participants mentioned the fact of learning the language in order to integrate but also as a matter of respect for the country that is hosting you:
‘We are living here, I am raising two children here I benefit from a lot of things I would say like the kinderenvantoeslag and a lot of help from the government also financially so I thought, you know? If you are there you have to try to be part of the whole thing and I think it starts by learning the
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language and I felt after a few years you don’t have any excuse not to learn. And I also thought, if you really want to integrate into a society you also have to speak the language’ (Marine, French woman living in Amsterdam, 40 years)
Also Jan explained how he saw language as a way to connect to the locals, and ‘go a bit deeper’:
‘Yeah...I think it was not a necessity... I know a lot people that have been here as long as I have [9 years] and don't talk Dutch but just English but I had this... I wanted to go a bit deeper... I wanted also be recognised more... like somebody that makes the extra effort So I thought it was a challenge also to understand the people you know? I mean... people talk differently and you know all this subculture… There is all this words that means stuff and it is... for me Dutch is so like concise...like to the point... it is really direct. A lot more than German. And sometimes I think even more than English. It is like really blond and direct and in your face... The language and a little bit the people. Somehow I had the feeling that in the subculture there was really... there were so many small words that meant so much, you know? Like when I was hanging out with only Dutch people I would be like 'woou’, they talk like stuff that I can understand but every now and then there is this word that means a lot for everybody and then they all laugh and they all have this mutual understanding .. All this 'gaast' which means 'dude'... all this sort of slang that connects people and if you don't understand it then you're not really following a part of the group.’ (Jan, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Language seems to be perceived as having the double condition of facilitating the bonding between individuals, but also creating borders towards the persons who do not belong to this language community. To what extent this border between communities might be crossed by learning the language was also addressed in the interviews. Many times participants brought out the topic of humour when wanting to exemplify how difficult it is to really integrate into the ‘meaning community’ of a society or group or the extent to which participants think that language generates different spaces of meaning – like different senses of humour –, which can be funny only in case of belonging to it. Hannah and her son, Max were interviewed together at home. They complained about not being able to use their German kind of irony in Spanish contexts:
[Hannah ]: ‘Y falta la ironía aquí en España. En el alemán se usa mucho. En casa usamos mucho la ironía sutil. La usamos mucho en casa y es muy divertido y no lo puedo usar fuera de la casa, porque...’
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[Max]: ‘es un sentido del humor completamente diferente. Y si no lo entiendes, si lo ves desde fuera pues parece estúpido, pero si estas dentro...’ [Hannah ]: ‘No se usa. Es jugar con las palabras. No se hace con el español’ (Hannah , German woman living in Madrid, 50 years and Max, born in Madrid, 16 years)40
Already in this example it becomes clear that the concepts of language and culture are being blended. Would someone understand the irony Hannah and Max are talking about just by learning the German language?
Louise, who moved from Paris to Amsterdam 5 years ago, has a somehow negative answer to the question:
Once I looked at my books, my poetry and everything and I was like ‘mmm’... this is my past, I have to build up a new way of thinking, a new language I have to give up the fact that I won’t speak perfectly a language, I have to admit that I will not be able to read a satiric newspaper and understand it perfectly… When I was in a school of journalism is what our teacher told us. People that speak perfectly French but that are foreigners can't understand the Canard enchaîné [satiric newspaper] because it is a specific humour. So, you have to accept that you're not going to be as good as you were in your own country.’ (Louise, French woman living in Amsterdam, 30)
While on the other side, Chloé explains how it took her ages to understand a Spanish graphic humorist but finally, after many years, she did so:
Por ejemplo, Forges yo tardé infinitos años en entender. A mí no me hacía ninguna gracia Forges... ahora sí. ¡Son 40 años ya! (Chloé, French Woman living in Madrid, 72)41
As Louise expresses, the border seems to be the culture, rather than the language. So the issue becomes rather a matter of ‘meaning’ community and not a linguistic one. Even within one’s own ‘native’ linguistic community it seems pertinent to think that one is not able to understand certain conversations which belong to the realm of a completely unknown meaning community. Sometimes, it is possible with time. Other times, not. For instance, it is not the same to talk about classic literature than about quantum physics.
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Even within the same linguistic code, one can feel as lost as in a completely unknown language. But to blame it on language seems to be more straightforward, and this is so because of the relation participants tend to draw between language and culture.
Lea had a Spanish boyfriend and she explains this difference between linguistic and meaning spaces very clearly:
‘Con mi ex me pasaba muchas veces, que había malentendidos a lo mejor, pero no eran problemas del idioma sino que eran problemas de entre hombre y mujer. Pero al principio siempre pensaba que era una cosa de que no me entendía bien, pero no era una cosa del idioma sino del entendimiento entre un hombre y una mujer.’ (Lea, German woman living in Madrid) 42
The difference between language community and meaning community which has been drawn here by no means aims at trivialising the big barrier that emerges when being confronted with a community speaking an unintelligible language. The fear and insecurity experienced by some of the participants upon arrival when they still didn’t speak any of the common used languages being spoken in the destination cities clearly shows how language build’s spaces, linguistic spaces. Also Jan example of being able to laugh with Dutch friends about their very ‘dutch’ jokes was greatly due to language. Nevertheless, the spaces generated by language and the cultural spaces or spaces of meaning are still not the same, as Lea showed with the example of her boyfriend. This is so because the amount of ‘meaning’ communities is not isomorphic to the one of standard languages in the world. Nevertheless, due to the standardisation of languages across nations, ‘meaning communities’ related to the public sphere of the states are very often accessible through the comprehension of the language. In these cases it seems pertinent to accept that these two different barriers (language and meaning) are conceptualised as different stages of a single learning process. That is, first the barrier of the language is surpassed and second, the one of the culture. As the example of Chloé shows, she was first able to access the Spanish public sphere and opinion – through the comprehension of Spanish – and then able to understand the mentioned graphic humorist.
This is the opinion of some participants that think that the right way to integrate is by at least, learning the language. They often recalled in a critic tone the perceived enclave in
119 which some migrants live. Lena was 9 when she moved to Madrid with her parents and was enrolled in a German school in Madrid. She explains:
‘Cuando era pequeña yo vivía en un mundo muy alemán [en Madrid] y no me preguntaba si estaba integrada o no, pero luego ya de mayor me di cuenta de que tenía que aprender español. Entonces claro, me apunté a cursos y tal…’ (Lena, German woman living in Madrid, 49 years)43
Lena did not wanted to reproduce this pattern at home at maintained a bilingual household with her husband speaking in Spanish and her speaking in German to their children.
Also Lukas, born and raised in Ulm within a Spanish migrant family explains how some of his peers didn’t learn the German language:
‘En Ulm había españoles que llevaban ya veinte y pico años y no hablaban ni palotada de alemán. Porque vivían en comunidades españolas muy cerradas. Iban a la casa del español a jugar al mus, a beber lo que fuera, tu tortilla y ya. Dominaban al final 4-5 tecnicismos necesarios para sobrevivir…no para vivir. También había una comunidad hispanohablante no española bastante fuerte.’ (Lukas, German man living in Madrid, 41 years)44
Also a critical attitude was adopted by Mathis with regards to English speaking persons who never learned Dutch in Amsterdam and expect everyone else to adapt.
‘I really don't understand how it is possible that English people with a Dutch wife are not able to learn Dutch; it is a mystery for me. At least to speak Dutch to the parents, or friends! I have a good friend who is English and he absolutely does not speak Dutch and he has a Dutch wife and for me it is yeah...He has a very important job in English, always speaks English and everybody speaks English in the street, so...But sometimes, when you're in a party you can't arrive in a conversation... But these kinds of people are very self-confident and they're able to come in a conversation in Dutch and speak in English and make everyone else speak in English. And I am absolutely unable to do that... I am more the one that adapts. (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years)
On the other side, Clara explained that first she thought that by learning the language she would somehow integrate very fast, but as she notes,
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‘it happens so easily that you just happen to end up with people that are either form your own country of origin or like other internationals... It is actually quite hard to really integrate. Also because as a foreigner you don't know into what you should be integrating to in a way... what is the Dutch culture you know...? So for that a lot changes in my conceptions’ (Clara, German woman living in Amsterdam, 26 years)
Other participants experienced similar surprises, as if the assumption that by learning a language one would integrate would be more a myth than anything else. Clara suddenly realises that although having learned Dutch, ‘you do not into what you should be integrating in to’. This is to point that although many spheres of Dutch society and meaning communities are more accessible by learning Dutch, there was no automatic integration, in the case of Clara and others, just by learning the language. And her ‘integration’ into the ‘Dutch’ culture was very similar before and after: her friends and social spheres remained highly international. Even the idea of integration becomes vague: ‘integration into what?’
‘The question is of course... what integration is. I mean there are tons of people living here that probably don't speak a word of Dutch and they feel at home and they feel good. I mean... should I get the residence permit without speaking Dutch? I think so, why not. I mean... yeah... but it really depends on the country and also on the... I guess there can be problems not for the ones that arrive but for the people that already live here, that there are negative sentiments towards people coming to the Netherlands and that negative sentiment could be, let’s say.., reduced, if local people see that there is an effort from the part of foreigners people coming to the country to adapt and integrate’ (Christian, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
Christian somehow reverses the argument and focuses not so much on the integration of the migrant but on the integration of the local. By learning the language migrants ‘help’ the locals to accept their presence and not to feel excluded from ‘their’ space. This is certainly among the motivations of, for example the Toubon law, which states that it prevents the locals from feeling excluded from the public space if not speaking English. The question remains: who has to adapt? Migrants, locals, both?
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9. CONCLUSION
Linguistic hegemonies of space
The language practices of the participants proved to be very much influenced by the morphology of the space in which these practices take place and by the limits with regards to what is possible in terms of linguistic performance within its borders. Interviewees expressed the impact that the perceived notions of language and tolerance of linguistic differences regulating a space had on their language practice. Depending on these settings, spaces might enable or not alternative linguistic practices and notions of language. Also these different spaces where perceived as being regulated by very different positioning norms vis a vis others. In some spaces participants expressed feeling identified and identify others by their language use, chosen linguistic code, perfection of it, etc., while in other spaces this negotiation of identity through the language use seemed to be irrelevant. These different spaces can be imagined as a mosaic, through which migrants navigate in their daily lives. Every piece of this mosaic can be understood as one of these spaces in which different linguistic rules and conditions apply. Their language use, as well as the weight and meaning of language, might change several times a day as they navigate through their personal mosaics built out of their homes, working places, meetings, schools, universities, shops, bars, social activities, friends’ houses, administrative offices of the state, conversations across the city with beloved ones, with strangers, online, etc.
The morphologies of each of these spaces have been clustered around the concept of porosity. What have been called porous spaces are the ones where interviewees seem to feel free to let go the mental separation between single linguistic codes and just deploy their entire linguistic repertoire in a non-aware fashion. In addition, the main tool for the negotiation of identity in these spaces seems often not to be language per se. Rather than how something is said the focus seems to be on what is said. Also, as there are no big differentiations between languages, no barriers for the comprehension or communication between ‘native’ speakers of different standard codes are established or even imagined. ‘Native’ speakers of different languages can merge here into a single communication arena in which the realm of the ‘thinkable’ is not connected to the standard language of expression. Everything can be explained in every language and therefore also in a mix of them.
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Non-porous spaces, in which the dominant language ideologies are to a greater or lesser extent more present, exist alongside porous ones. Some of the interviewed migrants reported to have to switch to a non-porous mood; separate their known linguistic codes and be aware of not using them together, when entering these non-porous spaces. If they did not switch mentality, they expected their linguistic practices to be ‘out of place’. Often in these non-porous spaces the linguistic practices of the speakers and its audience are mobilised to draw conclusions about its culture, identity and potential inclusion. The switch from one mood into the other becomes a very important skill to be learned if the migrant wants to be accepted, respected, taken seriously or identified in its desired way. As was exemplified alongside the exposition of the results, many migrants expressed how it is nevertheless not always easy and sometimes not even possible to perform every single language in a ‘pure’ fashion. The competence in the formal and performative elements of the single ‘pure’ standard linguistic codes might be varied.
Thus, in the participant’s daily path through their personal mosaics, not only do they have to adapt to the notions of language and tools for negotiating their identities offered by the spaces; also their power and role in these spaces might vary greatly, as their linguistic competences will not be valued in every space in the same way. Under the different linguistic hegemonies of single spaces they might feel and be perceived as very different, and what is more important: as something they don’t think they are. This was exposed as a very frustrating experience.
Scale is also important, as processes happening in one scale influence others. Not only do the micro environments of, for example the house or the working place, have an impact on how its inhabitants think about language. Also the linguistic hegemonies of the cities of residence proved to have an impact on people’s strategies to cope with the linguistic environment. While Madrid was experienced as a very monolingual public space where in order to be able to practice alternative linguistic codes participants have to go literally into specific places (here seen as linguistic enclaves); in Amsterdam the possibility to have alternative linguistic practices was more spread around the city. The porosity of Amsterdam is mainly between English and Dutch, and one could think that the German and French participants would feel out of place including some of their linguistic competences in the city’s environment. Nevertheless, the greater tolerance of difference and the possibilities offered by the city of Amsterdam to deploy different linguistic uses renders it more possible to unlink language practice from a specific micro or macro
123 territory. Particular places with special rules do not have to be established across the city in order to practice any kind of language variety; one only has to find the person with whom to do that across the city.
The porous or non-porous spaces explained above are based on different linguistic ideologies. Some spaces are more prevalent than others and non-porous spaces tend to be more common. The (social) institutions of the modern nation state are generally non- porous. The same applies for the background homes and families of some of the participants. The linguistic norm is in fact, generally non-porous and regulated by a derivate version of the dominant language ideology of the states. Nevertheless, across the selected sample there were already some cases which have been (consciously or unconsciously) building non-porous spaces for generations and who seemed to have normalised it.
Being socialised under the influence of a certain language ideology or another of course does impact the conformation of participant’s language ideologies. But also other experiences have been identified as informing the conformation of person’s language ideologies: The different findings in this respect are summarised below.
Linguistic ideologies as influenced by socialisation
These porous and non-porous spaces are not given, but established through time and practice. They can be nevertheless more or less established and difficult to challenge. Certainly, non-porous spaces have been established for a long time in monolingual, monoidentitarian, monocultural nation states. Being socialised in these has a great impact on the conformation of the personal language ideologies in line with the dominant language ideologies. The German and French ideologies of the standard are, as was reviewed in Chapter 3, quite different. The different dominant language ideologies in which German and French are socialised proved to have an impact on the migrant’s language reported practices. German participants showed higher sensibility towards the performance of language and especially the accent. The idea that one ‘is’ what one talks is very much in line with the German’s state naturalisation policy which has still a high degree of jus sanguinis in its conceptions. This link between nationality, blood and
124 language is somehow present in participant’s conception of language and the link between the performance of language and their sense of belonging. The concept of belonging is attached to language performance or ‘parole’, and not so much to the structure or ‘form’ of it. Being able to embody German language and perform it with a ‘native’ German’ accent is very important for German participants; especially amongst German current or future parents. Although they seemed to be slightly more tolerant with adults learning German –due to their experience of migration and their sort of empathy with learners – they still devoted a lot of importance to the accent when they talked about the linguistic education of their children. This somehow resembles the German ‘standard’ definition of mother tongue that described it as something which belongs to the person and which is transmitted through the parents (‘nature’). This identification of the mother tongue with the identity of a person was reflected in the importance German participants devoted on being able to talk ‘perfectly’ German, their mother tongue. Among participants with a strong sensibility for this linguistic norm, looser conceptions of language were difficult to find. Indeed the sort of intolerance of difference that this implies was seen as impeding practices of code-mixing and the generation of porous spaces. Embodiment or performance of language is one’s identity; and that shouldn’t be changing all the time.
The way French dominant ideology had an imprint on French born participants was somehow different. French participants showed a strong link between language and culture (as something which can be ‘cultivated’ through education; not natural). The emphasis of French participants was thus not on the embodiment of the language, but on the form; the structure. In sum the cultivated use of the language, of the heritage of the French grand culture which is intrinsic to the French identity. The protection of language per se ‘á l'immortalité’ [to immortality] –to recall the motto of the French Academy – and as a sort of icon of identity was very split among French participants and it was discussed how this somehow reflects a broader discussion about the republican French values which has been taking place for the last years in France. The importance devoted to the access to French cultural goods as a way to become French was nevertheless present across most French. Connections can be drawn between this understanding and the Republican idea of belonging. One does not ‘become’ French by being born with French ‘blood’ but by participating in the culture, public sphere and values of the nation, by agreeing on a set of rules and constitutional values. The education (cultivation) has a crucial role in this
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‘becoming’ French, not only for the Republic (note the importance of l'École de la République) but also for parents who recall feeling and being French mainly because of their educational structure, formatting, mind-set. Among some French participants this didn’t only imply an intolerance of non-‘pure’ uses of language (mainly in written from), but also a notion of language which seems to be at odds with code-mixing and with the conceptions being mobilized in porous spaces. In the extreme version of ‘every culture has an idiosyncratic language; which is transmitted by means of education to its people conforming their mind-sets’ there seems to be a strong separation between languages as different systems, belonging to diverse cultures and distinctive ways of thinking. Again, that is not very compatible with the idea of code-mixing or blurring all your linguistic competences in a single repertoire, as every language belongs to a different world and way of thinking.
Across both groups and in both cities it was found that the top-down approach of implementing linguistic regimes borrowed from the procedure of the states was usually not challenged, but reproduced at home, mostly among parents. Also at work a high reproduction of the dominant language ideologies of the state was observed.
Some cases have been also reviewed in which participants have been partly socialised in porous spaces or that have been experiencing porous spaces for generations. That certainly also influences the more alternative language ideologies of these participants and their naturalisation of porous spaces and practices. One factor that was considered crucial when determining the linguistic use of participants was their notion of language. Participants socialised in these contexts, tended to see language rather as a tool for communication and were more open for code-switching. Not only code-switching, but a rather loose notion of language; not necessarily determined by the culture or identity of its speakers. The interaction within this frame of mind tended to contribute to the generation of porous spaces, where less judgements drawing on language are made. It was also observed that participants that were socialised or grew up in contact to some kind of porous spaces tend to reproduce these porous spaces, at least in the realm of the home. Their concern about accents, ‘pure’ linguistic rules and the judgements on the
126 culture and identities of the speaker’s performing a certain standard language were less salient than among other participants.
Linguistic ideologies as influenced by experience
In addition to the influence of the context of socialisation in the conformation of the language ideologies of the migrants it has been proven here that there are also experiences of live, like the very experience of migration, that promote the reconsideration of the given for granted linguistic norms and rules.
Amongst the experiences of live promoting change with regards to the dominant language ideologies, the more salient ones where the very experience of migration, the experience of satisfactory conversations and communication in different linguistic codes – including code-mixing and code-switching – and the length of stay in the place of residence. The experience of migration proved to have an impact on migrant’s tolerance of difference and in their perception of identity as being transmitted through the way of speaking. Participants expressed how being put in the weaker position of the migrant who does not perform a standard linguistic code perfectly, and experiencing how frustrating the negotiation of identity can be under these circumstances, made them reconsider their previous notion of identity being expressed through language. Now, some explained, they judge migrants who do not speak ‘properly’ a language differently as they realize both, how difficult it is to get to the stage of speaking like a ‘native’ and, more deeply, that one is not the way one talks. Not speaking in a perfect standard form or with a ‘native’ accent was not judged by them anymore as pathological, silly or stupid. The way of getting to know a person is beyond that.
Also, the very experience of communication in other standard languages, code-mixing or code-switching practices, made some of the participants ‘realize’ that language is a tool for communication, and that there are no barriers (at least for them) between languages anymore. This lies at the core of the conception of language; the ‘presumed’ separation between single standard languages was gone for these migrants. This of course was the very reason for them to feel it good or natural to practice code-mixing; as it was no longer perceived as changing from a system to another, or from a personality to another. There is a unified linguistic repertoire which they use. In this context it also makes little sense to think of languages as the very continent of their and other’s identities.
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Finally, a driver for change was the length of stay of a migrant in the place of residence. A major difference was observed between the city of Madrid and the city of Amsterdam. While in Madrid participants reported the need to learn Spanish from the beginning, in Amsterdam this choice seemed to be more voluntary as there is no real ‘need’ to learn the language. With the time people explained that they started to feel strange about not learning the language of the place where they are living, working, raising their child’s, etc. It was concluded that, while the understanding of the language enables access to some communities of meaning it is a fallacy inherited from the dominant language ideologies of the states that by learning the language one will be integrated in society. The questions that arose where: integrated to what? And for whom? In any event participants reported to feel the ‘integration’ process as much more (or just much different) than just learning the language. The length of stay was considered a factor of change because it was the very reason for the beginning of this transition. If migrants would not have felt strange about not learning Dutch they would never have done so and never draw the conclusions that were outlined.
Although in the language ideologies and practices of participants, many traces of the dominant language ideologies of their respective countries of origin where to be find, there were always some elements of change promoted by the experiences explained above; mostly prompted by the experience of migration.
Nevertheless, these alternative arrangements of linguistic norms, practices and conceptions are not very likely to emerge in scales and spaces where a very strict linguistic regime has been established and naturalised for a long time, like in the communications with national institutions or in monolingual cities like the case of Madrid.
The change of some of the linguistic conceptions of a single speaking subject is of course not that influential, and speakers will rather tend to adapt in these occasions. Still and all, some participants explained how, although adapting to the rules imposed by these spaces they did not agree with the intrinsic language ideologies by which they are ruled anymore. Although trying to perform language in a standard way, and being aware of being identified by others by their talk, they do not comply with this ideology and resist against a traditional way of identifying others when interpreting the identity of third parties; they
128 do not think any more of their audience as being ‘the way they talk’ or being ‘radically different in thought’. The judgments related to languages are not in place anymore, at least not for them.
The more visible (audible) deviations from the norm have been observed to be more likely to appear in places where the agency of the participants is considered high, such as in private homes and social spheres. This is not to say that all participants built their interpersonal linguistic relations at home in a porous way. In some cases it was the lack of shared linguistic codes among the persons living together which rendered this activity very challenging. In other cases the participants simply comply with a dominant language ideology to some extent and considered it more ‘correct’ to keep their homes as non- porous spaces, sometimes even regarding porous spaces as pathological. It should be noticed that none of the respondents had a completely monolingual life and that all made some innovations with regards to the dominant language ideologies. Sometimes very strict arrangements of the language use were set up (like the one person-one language rule established for children in many households), but in most of these cases participants just ‘started’ to have a multilingual life. In other cases participants had been experiencing multilingual and porous households, schools or communities already for generations and these tended to care less about the establishment of linguistic rules in spaces having a looser arrangement. The participants who had been experiencing code-mixing for a long time now, where in this sense different from the others, but – except for the cases that were born in such environments – their condition was the outcome of a transition: it can be advanced that the more time one has been managing a multilingual life, the less strict the rules and the linguistic arrangements one has. It would be very interesting to examine this dimension in further research by, for instance, coming back in 5 years’ time to check how the familiar linguistic arrangements and rules developed as the kids grew up and the whole family gets accustomed with living a multilingual –sometimes porous – life.
It can be concluded that although dominant language ideologies are still very much present in the linguistic notions and practices of these migrants, the experience of undertaking a migration somehow reshuffled the language ideological patterns of the migrants, and in this sense, the thesis of Collins and Slembrouck (2005) was confirmed.
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These different understandings of language generated many times different socio spatial relations which – picking up on the metaphor taken at the beginning of this research – resemble neither a total Kokoschka’n world full of different brushstrokes nor the modern Modigliani-like imagination of clearly demarcated monolingual, monocultural and monoidentitarian spaces. Rather an overlap of both representations is taking place. Migrants managing a multilingual life navigate through both kinds of worlds in their daily lives, having to adapt to the linguistic rules of each of the spaces; being aware of when they enter a Kokoshka’n like space (what has been here called porous) in which different linguistic uses are allowed and none of them is irreducibly related to a certain identity or culture – and when, on the other side they enter modern traditional Modigliani like spaces in which they have to adapt to the use of a ‘standard’ linguistic practice at a time, and rule their linguistic practices and comply with the dominant language ideologies of the state in order to avoid to be ‘out of place’. The hegemony of the dominant language ideology of the states is thus breaking up, mainly in the private spheres of live of the migrants and sometimes expanding towards the public spaces in the cities, with its inhabitants getting accustomed to not being surrounded by a monolingual environment, where they are able to understand everything which is said in private.
These emerging new understandings and practices of language tend to diminish the custom of stereotyping individuals based on putative membership of definable communities (Ricento, 2014) and diminish their competences and capabilities. As was mentioned above this step has not been taken by states and institutions. The sociolinguistic economies of the cities seem thus to be also affected by these changes but on a slower speed. Further research should be done with locals, persons working at the public institutions and the like to see how their respective perceptions of these changes are, how they might feel excluded from some spaces and or how their language ideologies are maybe also changing, and in what direction.
Given the sample it cannot be affirmed that greater tolerance of linguistic diversity is taking place. Certainly among these migrants, who are also locals, something is changing; and they might be now more tolerant than they were before. The researched group is understood to belong to a rather high socio-economic and high-educated group which is first, less dependent on the local language in order to find a job (as can be seen, most of the participants worked in English or in their respective ‘native’ languages) and to which a membership is ascribed (European, French or Germans, expats, skilled migrants)
130 against which generally less discrimination takes place. Not only are these migrants not exposed to residence permits or naturalization procedures of the respective locations, nor are these the target of common populist or popular discrimination, but most importantly, they are not the victims of any racial or socioeconomic systemic discriminations. The double stigma of being discriminated against and ‘not speaking properly’ can certainly change migrants experiences and attitudes across non-porous spaces. It should be noticed that the identification of others by means of the language (use) coupled with a deterministic notion of language (e.g. ‘the language renders Germans methodical, obedient and hard-workers) very easily points to a hierarchy of languages and thus persons (e.g. ‘the almost perfect structure of German rendering Germans more analytical’, or more degrading assumptions)
It is considered that being ascribed other memberships to groups against which discrimination persist systemically could have a different outcome. Education, perceived as one of the main ways in which the governmentality of the states is reproduced proved to be significant. Further research with participants of other educational levels should be developed to complete this research.
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11. ANNEX 1
A geolocation of tweets was undertaken making use of the online application ‘Follow the Hashtag’ available at www.followthehashtag.com which makes use of the CLD of Google Chrome for language detection and provides information of geocoded tweets. The algorithm of the application gets the tweets directly from the Application Programming Interface (API) of Twitter. The application provides the user with information which was published in the last 7 days and shares a maximum of 1500 tweets. The node of the search was placed in Innsbruck (Geolocalisation: 47.2692124, 11.4041024000000056) with a radius of 2000km around it.1 A temporal sample (between the 31st January and 7th February of 2015) was then provided for the tweets published in 41 languages. The final map shows the number of different languages in which tweets where posted in a given urban area.
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12. ANNEX 2. TRANSLATIONS
1 ‘However, they’re [grandsons] never wrong. They know perfectly what language they should speak with whom, that’s very curious. They do a strange mix at home; because they know that here there is porosity. Actually we speak a very weird language, because we “spanify” concepts. There is a game we do which is putting/translating all the streets in French. Also things like ‘La Courte Anglaise’, no? [Literal translation of ‘El Corte Inglés’ which is a very famous department store in Spain], in order to laugh and make a game out of the language. And they love it! Play with language, see how we do things, or use funny expressions and try to translate it... which does not work ’take for a ride’[equivalent in Spanish is ‘tomar el pelo’ which literarily means ‘to take/eat the hear’], but.. that does not mean anything! Languages are very handy for playing. They become recreational.’ (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)
2 [In what language do you speak with your husband?] Who knows? I think the management is curious. If there are French people, of course we speak in French. For him it is as easy as Spanish because his professional background is in French, he studied in Geneva. But when we talk to each other? Whatever comes to our mind first. Sometimes in Castilian, sometimes in French. I wouldn’t be able to say that. Actually, when people from the outside come home they tell us ‘but... what are you speaking?’ Carlos [Husband] says that we speak French all the time, but it is not true. I couldn’t even tell you if we spoke French yesterday. I really don’t know’ (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)
3 ‘I don’t distinguish between one or the other [Danish and German]. There is no difference for me. I can even jump from one to the other within the same sentence. If I know that the other person with whom I talk can understand me, I jump from one language to the other within the same sentence. Because there are words that can be better expressed in one language or another, or just out of laziness.., because you cannot find the right word in one language, then you say it in the other and you know that the other is going to understand it perfectly. There is quite a lot of mix with my friends of youth; we’ve done a language mix when speaking. I am not even aware of when I change it. Maybe now that living in Spain I notice it more, because here I basically speak Spanish. When I go back for holidays I realise how it is...”oops”. But back then when I was a teenager I didn’t even noticed. I noticed it maybe when there were people that wouldn’t understand one or the other language and would suddenly say to us ...”but what are you speaking!”’ (Mia, German woman living in Madrid, 40 years)
4 [What language did you speak with your parents?] I don’t know. I think I spoke both languages. I have no idea. Nowadays I also don’t know in what language we speak. We switch from one to the other, all the time.’
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[So, you don’t know if you’ve spoken in French or English?] No [What if there are more people?] I would change automatically to the language of the other people. I think that happens with many bilingual families. Words in other language will always come out, but generally you change the language depending on the context.’ (Mélanie, French woman living in Madrid, 30 years)
5 [What language do you speak with your family?] ‘I have two aunts on my dad’s side that live in Corsica and that came this weekend for the first time after 10 years. Since they’ve come alone, we can speak in German. But when they come with her children, they barely speak any German, so French has to be spoken. And that’s a tremendous pot-pourri, because not everyone speaks it... but in the end of the day we always manage’ (Lea, German woman living in Madrid, 36 years)
6 [How did you learn Spanish?] ‘They teach us since we were little. Actually at the beginning I use to mix the languages and my mother was really worried. Until I went to school I mix everything. Mi younger brother, which is also bilingual, took longer to learn Spanish. I lost my accent when I was around 12’ (Pauline, French woman living in Madrid, 28 years)
7 ‘I know I have defects… and my children laugh at me... But I mean they can do whatever they want, if they have fun with it, fabulous. But I don’t correct me because I am no longer able to discriminate if I do it right or not and actually I don’t care about it. I couldn’t care less about it. If I speak wrong… then I speak wrong, but I no longer have a barrier. I am as comfortable in both languages, and even more in Castilian.’ (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)
8 ‘To learn a language is to born again. It is to learn the world, to get to know the world again and/or a new world. This is my main motivation when I learn a new language. I could continue every time with a new language because through language you discover yourself and another world; you discover that there are words in Spanish where there is only one and in German, or Arabic or in Turkish there are four.’ (Ben, German man living in Madrid, 35 years)
9 138
[Why do you want your kids to learn German?] ‘German opens you, like everything. But it is not just the possibility to communicate with other people, it is also that it changes your way of thinking. Grammatically it is so different that you have to think differently. And I think that Germans wouldn’t have been Germans like we know them if it wouldn’t be because of their language. Isn’t it a very perfect language? Almost like Greek. That renders them methodical, obedient and hard-workers. What are the differences between Spain and Germany? “Germany always had greater elites…” no! Spain had as good elites as every other nation. The problem is that, we, the rest of the Spaniards are really messy and individualist’ (Lukas, German man living in Madrid, 41 years)
10 ‘And I have a ‘fantastic’ German English, with an accent that drives people crazy, like..where the hell is this guy from?’ (Lukas, German man living in Madrid, 41 years)
11 I learn the French grammar at school. The Spanish one: my mother is Spanish teacher at the University of Paris. Therefore she attached great importance to accents, etc. Actually I get really nervous here [in Madrid]. I have better writing skills than the average. When I read for example “Let’s meet soon” [“Haber si quedamos” is written wrong, the right spelling would be “a ver si quedamos”] [laughs].... we will never meet!’ (Pauline, French woman living in Madrid, 28 years)
12 ‘I regularly go to Paris in order to work with students of this master I we established some years ago (observation of tourist activity). There are a lot of foreign students in my classes and when I see what they write I have empathy, I understand their situation, but I also think that in the end of the day you have a French master, and therefore you should also be able to write in a good French. Maybe not as good as a French-French but good enough... As I am critic with this I am also exigent with myself. To write in Dutch, but not in a very professional Dutch is a problem for me.’ (Théo, French man living in Amsterdam, 35 years)
13 ‘Before I didn’t know how difficult it actually is to integrate when you don’t speak the language. Now I will pay much more attention. I’ll be more open toward the one’s that arrive without knowing, the ones that are a bit lost’ (Marion, French woman living in Madrid, 33 years)
14 To the interviewer: ‘It is the first time she stands up!’ To the baby: Very good Océane [name of baby]! You’re very strong, bravo…’ (Mathis, French man living in Amsterdam, 36 years) 139
15 [What language do you speak with your children at home?] ‘They keep talking in German to us, but between them –they’re all married to Spanish women- they speak Spanish… well sometimes they don’t but generally they do. But, when we are all together, we speak in German. Of course if there are my daughters-in-law we speak in Spanish. One speaks a little bit of German, because her dad speaks it perfectly; he is Spanish, but he speaks it. Mi grandson goes to the German school and speaks both languages perfectly. With this grandson they force me to speak in German. (Leon, German man living in Madrid, 73 years)
16 ‘Now we are heading in the opposite direction. Actually I am the Spanish part of the family for my French grandchildren’ [Do they live in France] ‘Yes, they live in Paris’ [Do you speak with them in French or in Spanish?] ‘My daughter wants me to speak to them in Spanish so that they learn it. They actually come here to do a Spanish course. They speak a bit both languages’ (Élodie, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)
17 [What language do you speak at home?] I speak French to my children and my wife speaks English and they speak Spanish with the nanny and at school and with friends. Between the couple it will be mainly French (80%) and (20%) English, it depends. The kids, and that’s quite impressive, identify you, stamp you, and then to me they speak always in French and to their mum always in English. [How does it work when you’re all together?] Then they will say 'papa es ce que tu vois sal' [French] and then 'and you mammy, do you want?' [English]. It is quite impressive. They identify the mother tongue of the person they just met and they’ll talk to them in their language. (Guillaume, French man living in Madrid, 45 years)
18 [Why do you want your kids to learn French?] ‘So that they have access to their family, so that they can communicate with the rest of the family because my family does not speak Dutch and is never going to speak it. When we go on holidays they communicate only in French’ 140
(Théo, French man living in Amsterdam, 35 years)
19 [Why was it important for you that your children learn French?] ‘So that they don’t lose their roots and culture. I wanted them to be integrated in their French environment. Above all, I think it is something natural, that you want to transmit your, your…’ (Élodie, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)
20 [What language did you speak at home?] ‘Always in French, I thought it was very important for my children, because they spoke Spanish already very good. They learned it in the streets and with the nanny and then at the French Lyceum. The mother tongue ‘la langue maternelle' [French] is very important for me. This is why I always spoke in French. The mother tongue gives you a structure in my opinion’ (Camille, French woman living in Madrid, 69 years)
21 ‘Back then language was studied in a different way. For example, when I learned English and German at school the goal was not so much to be able to speak, or even make business. For example in German we translated classic authors, but after we were in class and were not able to communicate. We didn’t learn languages in a colloquial way. In addition we learned the culture, the history and everything alike. It was a different way to learn languages which by the way is a shame that it has been abandoned. When I see the French book of one of my granddaughters, who is bilingual Spanish-Italian (the mother is Swiss from Lugano and speaks Italian with her family and children). This girl lives in Madrid and now has chosen French at school. I am going to help her, but when I first saw her book I almost burst in tears. Because it is so colloquial. She learns the language of the SMS. It gives her the feeling that she is going to learn French in 3 months. But she is learning the level you learn going there for a month. There are even texts I don’t understand (e.g. A+, au plus (tard)). I never saw it before. In my opinion, to learn a language like that is to put a very low level. And mainly, it generates the fake feeling that it is going to be an easy matter. It did surprise me, how the teaching of language has developed.’ (Élodie, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)
22 141
‘More than feeling French, it is that because of my educational formatting I am obviously French. In think in three parts: thesis, antithesis, synthesis.’ (Guillaume, French man living in Madrid, 45 years)
23 I feel more comfortable in Spanish tan in German… because of the vocabulary. I have more vocabulary in Spanish than in German. I mean, I consider my first language to be German, mi jaw is done to speak German, but I find it easier to write in Spanish than in German. Obviously, after so many years abroad… (Paul, born in Madrid, 33 years)
24 ‘Many dialects are spoken in Germany. In the area where I was born they speak Rheinish [German], let’s say Rheinfränkisch [German], but my parents are from the Palatinate, Pfals [German] from the southern part and that’s a really strong dialect. I didn’t learn it, I always tried to speak Hochdeutsch [German], High German, more or less. But of course, my parents would say sometimes words that are only used in the Palatinate, which are many French words, for example. Growing up in the Rhine Valley, some words are typically from the Rhine and the pronunciation… One of my brothers lives in the Palatinate; he came back to where my parents were born and the other [brother] lives close to the Check border. There they speak another very strong dialect. His wife was born there she is Niederbayrisch [German] ‘Youmei'... [imitating with strong accent], it is difficult to understand’ (Ben, German man living in Madrid, 35 years)
25 [When your children were younger, what language did you speak at home?] We tried French, I tried that they reply in French and most of the times they would do so. Mostly Natalia, the oldest one, because Natalia lived for 6 years in Geneva and her mother tongue is 100% French. With her I speak French nowadays. Jan came here when he was 3. He didn’t speak any Spanish and it was like a full rejection of French. He even changed his name to Juan. He went to a school where he was also bullied for being “franchute” [French guy, which in Spanish has a bad connotation], and then I decided not to force him because I saw that for him it was a problem. With him I spoke more Castilian. I tried both and since my parents came sometimes to visit, I thought he would maintain the language. Laura was born here and I spoke French to her but she would reply in Spanish. After she has moved to Paris and started to speak French and now we basically speak French to each other. Each child has a bit a particular way. (Chloé, French woman living in Madrid, 72 years)
26 142
‘Back then in Barcelona, the language was never a problem, but if I see it now “im Rückspiegel” [German, meaning ‘looking back’] there was. Once I actually wrote a letter to the municipality with regards to a Photo Archive where I had to browse pictures for a movie, and they didn’t want to attend me in Spanish. In that moment I had been here for 2 years and a half and my Catalan was still nonexistent, because my Spanish was developing. They almost preferred to talk to me in German or English tan in Spanish and above all: they wanted to speak in Catalan. I mean... It is about communication, not imposing a language. I thought “I’ve learned a language that we have in common”. But it really depends on the person, this was a very unpleasant person, and that produces rejection’ (Mia, German woman living in Madrid, 40 years)
27 ‘Work was the place where the fact of learning the language had a greater impact. I think at the beginning I worked only in English, but I had to read reports also in Dutch, so this is why it was quite important to learn fast to read the language. A second phase was participating in meetings where everyone would speak Dutch and I would speak in English and the last phase was to do everything in Dutch.’ (Théo, French man living in Amsterdam, 35 years)
28 ‘Really as German I had the possibility to work for many German companies here, big companies. They were looking for someone with whom they could communicate in their language. Big companies like Allianz, Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank, industries also.’ (Leon, German man living in Madrid, 73 years)
29 ‘I started to work with kids, teaching music in Spanish during two months. It was terrible, because I didn’t understand them. Now I work more in English at it has been a marvel. Languages, that’s what saved my life in Spain. I work quite a lot teaching music. Also teaching French and English: more conversation because I don’t have the training. Now I am working at a bilingual school (Kings College) and there I work in English and Spanish. I still have a piano student in French’ (Mélanie, French woman living in Madrid, 30 years)
30 [Hi Jan] ‘Yes, Hello, Carmen’ [Where are you from?] ‘Freiburg. South West of Germany. Born and raised there.’ [Do they speak any dialect there?] ‘Yes... Badish.. but in Freiburg it is rather high German’ [Do you speak High-German or Badish?] ‘No, no Badish but I understand it.’ [You told me that your mum is French?] 143
‘Yes, my mum is French from Paris her family and my dad is German from around the Schwarzwald, so he's been in Freiburg for quite some time... a couple of years and I grew up there.. So I was raised bilingual and we went on holidays a lot to France.’ (Jan, German man living in Amsterdam, 30 years)
31 ‘Obviously I already forgot it, but when we first arrived we turn absolutely crazy about the amount of administrative paperwork we had to do. In addition I couldn’t make then alone because I didn’t speak and every time my husband had to ask for a day off at work in order to do it together’ [Was there any possibility to do it in other language tan Spanish?] No, everything Spanish. (Marion, French women living in Madrid, 33 years)
32 ‘I’ve clearly seen that without knowing the language you’re out of society. I’ve seen myself. I didn’t even dare to go out of my house because I was scared to find a neighbour that would talk to me. I went to pick up the mail almost running. It puts you in an incredible position of insecurity. It had a big impact on me. You think you’re going to… but no.’ (Marion, French women living in Madrid, 33 years)
33 ‘My save places at the beginning were home and the school of the children, because there are many people who speak French. Also French friends homes. The supermarket and shops also, because you know you don’t have to talk much in these cases.’ (Marion, French woman living in Madrid, 33 years)
34 ‘In order to meet people I went to the French Church which was in the old Madrid close to Gran Vía [Street] in Tres Cruces [square] and there was a library. I used to work in a library in France and I went there saying ‘I have a lot of time and I know a bit of this work, so if you need something...’and from then on I started to know people, most of them were French’ (Camille, French woman living in Madrid, 69 years)
35 ‘My French friends live often around Chamartín [city district]. When I go to the market of Chamartin (in Potosí Street) I see a lot of my French friends. For example, the one that sells the cheese is French and we speak French.’ (Élodie, French woman living in Amsterdam, 72 years)
36 ‘It is true that here [neighborhood] sometimes we speak what is called 'Concha Espina Deutsch’, and it is true that sometimes you mix Spanish and German. With 144
my parents, with people in the streets.. You speak in German, but you spanify some words. (Paul, born in Madrid, 33 years)
37 ‘Around the French Institute I hear a lot of French. There are also shops where people speak French’. (Lea, German woman living in Madrid, 36 years)
38 ‘I like to be there [Goethe Institute] there mainly to be able to talk sometimes about your stuff in your language. With my Spanish friends I do not have problems to talk about feelings, but I think that if I wouldn’t have it, maybe I would miss it. It is not better or worse, but it is a part of me which I also enjoy. I think that in the end of the day it is about your cultural background. Let’s say, from your childhood… at least among people in the same age…having a similar childhood. With regards to literature, with regards to movies and stuff. Even though you don’t talk about it much, I think it is important to know which basis you share, don’t you think?’
39 ‘Here, English? Impossible! ’ (Chloé, French women living in Madrid, 72 years)
40 [Hannah]: ‘The lack of irony here in Spain. In German it is used a lot. At home we use it a subtle irony quite often and it is really funny, and I cannot use it outside of home because… [Max]: ‘it is a completely different sense of humour. If you don’t understand it and see it from the outside it looks stupid, but if you’re inside…’ [Hannah]: ‘It is not used. It is playing with words. It is not done with Spanish’ (Hannah, German woman living in Madrid, 50 years and Max, born in Madrid, 16 years) 41 ‘For example with Forges [graphic humorist], I took endless years to understand him. I really didn’t find him funny. Now I do… It is been already 40 years! (Chloé, French Woman living in Madrid, 72) 42 ‘With my ex it happened very often, that we had misunderstandings. But these were not problems caused by the language, but problems between a woman and a man. But at the beginning I still thought it was him not understanding me very good. But, no, it wasn’t the language; it was a lack of understanding between a woman and a man.’ (Lea, German woman living in Madrid) 145
43 ‘When I was a child I use to live in a very German world [in Madrid] and I didn’t asked myself whether I was integrated or not. When I was older I realized that I had to learn Spanish and enrolled in language courses and so on…’ (Lena, German woman living in Madrid, 49 years)
44 ‘In Ulm there were Spaniards that had been living there for more than twenty years and didn’t speak any German. Because they lived in closed German communities. They went to the ‘Spanish House’ to play cards, to drink whatever, to have their ‘tortilla’ and that was it. They mastered 4-5 terms necessary to survive ...not to live … and that was it. There was also a big non-Spanish, Spanish speaking community.’ (Lukas, German man living in Madrid, 41 years)
146