Multilingualism as social relationalities: A linguistic citizenship approach
| dc.contributor.author | Jansen Keshia R. | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2025-11-19T12:54:45Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2025-11-19T12:54:45Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2024 | |
| dc.description.abstract | Multilingualism as a social phenomenon is particularly significant in South Africa, a country in which citizens pride themselves on its 12 official languages. Rethinking and deepening our understanding of multilingualism, and how this can help us work towards a more cohesive sense of belonging and social justice, has become the focus of research in recent times. In this paper, I deconstruct the dominant notions of multilingualism as named, separate languages by exploring how multilingualism functions as social relationalities. I draw on the experiences of a member of an internationally acclaimed choir which creates and performs original, multilingual songs. I argue that multilingualism and relationality are intrinsically linked by exploring the ways in which multilingualism functions, in the experiences of the participant, to build and shape relationships with others. Using a linguistic citizenship approach (Stroud, 2015), I look at how the participant repeatedly cares for the other and connects with the other across difference. Linguistic citizenship is understood as the “emergent and sensitive process of disinhabiting, stepping out of, imposed and linguistically mediated and entangled subjectivities” (Stroud, 2018, p. 5). Rethinking multilingualism as social relationality through linguistic citizenship presents an opportunity for learning how to engage with and coexist with different subjectivities, thereby stepping out of the colonial binaries that separate people. | |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/10566/21422 | |
| dc.language.iso | en | |
| dc.publisher | University of the Western Cape | |
| dc.subject | multilingualism | |
| dc.subject | linguistic citizenship | |
| dc.subject | vulnerability | |
| dc.subject | decoloniality | |
| dc.subject | South Africa | |
| dc.title | Multilingualism as social relationalities: A linguistic citizenship approach | |
| dc.type | Thesis |