FROM INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES TO
VULNERABILITY AND PRIVILEGE IN
MULTILINGUALISM: A NEW RESEARCH AGENDA?
LOURDES ORTEGA
Georgetown University
Birkbeck College
May 16, 2019
The Michel Blanc Lecture in Applied Linguistics 2019
Department of Applied Linguistics and Communication
Please cite as:

Ortega, L. (2019). From individual differences to vulnerability and privilege
in multilingualism: A new research agenda? The Michel Blanc Lecture in
Applied Linguistics 2019, Department of Applied Linguistics and
Communication at Birkbeck, University of London, May 16, 2019.
Copyright © Lourdes Ortega, 2019
Many thanks to
Jean-Marc Dewaele
Penelope Gardner-Chloros
Bojana Petric
Hamers & Blanc (1983, CUP 2nd ed. 2000)
In 1965, Michel Blanc established the
Language Research Centre (now the
Department of Applied Linguistics and
Communication) to do research in Applied
Linguistics and the Psychology of Learning
Languages
1. Setting up the scene
Why learn languages today?
humanistic values have traditionally justified world
language education
6
Elizabeth’s foreign language learning biography (from research paper by
undergraduate Michaela Harrington at Georgetown, cited with
permission):
In middle school, my Japanese teacher drew a diagram of
little plots of land divided by fences. My teacher said that
when a person speaks one language, they can only speak
to people inside their own fenced area. She then erased
one of the fences and said that learning a new language is
like tearing down a fence, and every time a person learns
another language they expand the number of people they
can communicate with and their horizons. The metaphor
stuck with me: “That image, for me, was a very powerful
image, and I always felt the desire to make my world
bigger.”
(now Elizabeth is a Spanish teacher)
7
learn a new language is…
…mind broadening, horizon expanding
8
But the world is becoming more and more divided by real and
symbolic fences…
http://megahurtz-wcdb.herokuapp.com/
conflict &
war
nonsolidarity
anti-diversity
antiimmigratio
n
anti-welfare
state
populism
widening
poverty
gaps
June 2016:
British referendum, the Brexit
November 2016:
U.S. Presidential Elections, Donald Trump
45th President of the United States
the
comfort of
fences…
the invitation of
no fences…
11
And how plurilingual can the world be?
English, the killer language
(e.g., Skutnabb-Kangas & Phillipson,
2010)
12
Youth voices in schools in the UK:
(Lanvers, 2016)
I feel there is no point in learning languages,
everyone speaks English
I think in 100 years or so you can just
speak and a computer will
automatically translate
13
constantly searching for persuasive reasons
14
2. Vulnerability and
privilege:
individual and
systemic !
(the humanistic values that traditionally justified
world language education are in crisis)
globalization provides a different justification:
competitiveness in global markets
16
really…?
value of bilingualism in
job market?
Subtirelu (2017):
Online job advertisements
294 requiring Spanish
273 no Spanish mentioned
carefully statistically matched for
level of education, sector, required experience, etc
widely ranging in advertised pay from $15,080 to $150,000
A wage penalty for jobs requiring Spanish!
Estimated between $919.88 to $5,732.12 lower
(same state, sector, education, experience…)
language learning is
supported and
valued or not
depending on
whose bilingualism
clearly…
multilingual learning
will be experienced by
some as a boon and by
others as a liability
and we may see different
individual responses to
similar experiences, less
or more resilience…
harmonious & conflictive
bilingualism (De Houwer, 2015)
Harmonious bilingualism (as not a life burden)
9 year-old heritage Portuguese speaker in Germany:
“Draw yourself speaking the languages you know”
(Melo-Pfeifer & Schmidt, 2012)
Conflictive bilingualism (as a burden that erodes well-being)
Drawn by 10 year old: Portugal vs. Germany, family vs. loneliness
Portuguese & German flags, sun, sky, my family, sea water, rain & lightening
17-year old Mexican-American Carmen in the United States
(Borrero, 2015, p. 17):
But like my Spanish is getting a little bit bad, but I still
try to have it. I still speak Spanish—sometimes I speak
Spanglish. It’s just like when I don’t know a Spanish
word I’ll say it in English, and if I don’t know it in
English, I’ll say it in Spanish. It’s just like, it’s like an
everyday thing. I think it’s something that I’m going to
use, like, everyday. Yeah, I use it, I translate for my mom
or my grandma and just here in school too. I like being
bilingual.
Vietnamese-American high school student (Carreira &
Kagan 2011, p. 47):
[…] I think that as an elementary and
middle school student, having an Asian
heritage has made it somewhat difficult for
me. Although I was born here, and speak
English with no accent, administrators
often tested me for ESL even though I
explained many times that my English was
fine. In fact, I learned to never put down
that Vietnamese was my first language,
because that just caused more trouble and
landed me in ESL programs that slowed
down my education.
why these different
responses to the same
experiences?
… nevertheless, there are
systemic-structural forces
stacking the deck against
certain groups more than
others
race/ethnicity
class/occupation/
wealth
religion
let’s face it, is it ever just
about language…?
gender
language
age
sexual orientation
Piller (2016)
“Aren’t you really
exaggerating?”
Jane Hill’s (2008)
social alexithymia,
inability to attend to
the feelings of
people who are the
target of systematic
discrimination (p. 114)
How should
researchers of
multilingualism
respond to the
challenges of the
present times (not only
as private citizens, but
as researchers?)
Response? Study privilege
and vulnerability in
multilinguals, include
structural, systemic inequity
head-on in the research
What would this look
like, in research
programs into
multilingualism?
3. The study of
individual
differences in
language learning
Dörnyei (2005)
Dörnyei & Ryan (2015)
Mercer, Ryan, & Williams (2012)
Dewaele (2012)
Granena, Jackson, & Yilmaz (2016)
Self
-concept
-esteem
-efficacy
(linguistic confidence)
Identity
Groups
Group dynamics
Motivation
Beliefs
attributions
mindsets
Individual
differences
Goals
Strategies
self-regulation
agency
autonomy
Learning styles
Cognitive styles
Affect
anxiety
enjoyment
Aptitude
Personality
Metacognition
Awareness
working memory
musicality
executive control
“Other”
WTC
Creativity
4. Searching for new
research
programs…
What research
questions, for
example?
Does learning languages expand people’s world horizons?
Does it help “break down fences” and prejudice?
Does it make people more tolerant of difference, more empathic
towards fellow humans, less xenophobic?
Does it mitigate racism, xenophobia, nationalistic isolationism?
Surprisingly little direct or empirical evidence!
CONSTRUCTS?
• human empathy
• democratic values
• critical global citizenship
Dewaele & van Oudenhoven (2009): the
experience of immigration and multilingualism
was linked to higher openmindedness
Yashima (2010): Japanese youth who volunteered
abroad started off with higher intercultural
predisposition (aka international posture) but also
became more interculturally predisposed after the
experience
Peltokorpi & Froese (2012, International
Business Review): expats in Japan were
better adjusted if they had higher
openmindedness, emotional stability, and
cultural empathy
Dewaele & Li Wei (2012):
active multilinguals who used
Dewaele & Li Wei (2013): the more
multiple languages more
multilingual, the more tolerant of ambiguity
frequently had higher cognitive
(but levelled off after 3 languages or 3
empathy
months abroad)
Gross & Dewaele (2018):
8 to 12 year-year-olds in South Tyrol
1. with immigrant-multilingual backgrounds (N=139, 35%)
2. without migration experience and incipient foreign language learning
experience (N=259, 65%)
Totally contrary to expectations… the incipient bilinguals scored higher on the
basic human value of openness to change than the functional bi- and
multilinguals!
“too much unwanted change” for the immigrant kids?
South Tyrol context very different from large metropolis like London in Dewaele &
van Oudenhoven (2009)?
“the mere presence of more languages and cultures in a certain
environment does not guarantee a higher openness to change” (Gross
& Dewaele, 2018, p. 49)
nor does the mere study
of a new language…
Does foreign language learning invite you to
reflect on issues of race, gender, class, and
social justice?
“not really (and
why should
it?)”
Kubota, Austin, & Saito-Abbott (2003): Survey of students
taking Spanish, Japanese, and Swahili in college in the
USA
“language
really???????
learning
too!”
5. New constructs…?
What new constructs or questions would help
individual differences in language learning explicitly
address social justice goals?
Dewaele
Basic human values
Xenophilia
(& tolerance of ambiguity)
Empathy
(& empathic concern)
ID+
Yashima’s
international
posture
Cosmopolitanism
Patriotism/Nationalism
Dewaele
Basic human values
Xenophilia
(& tolerance of ambiguity)
Empathy
(& empathic concern)
ID+
Yashima’s
international
posture
Cosmopolitanism
Patriotism/Nationalism
6. Cosmopolitanism?
Cosmopolitanism
Constrained definition: Feelings of commonness in an interconnected world
and interest in cross-border social contact
Yashima’s
international
posture?
Broader definition: Seeing oneself as a citizen of the world, not just of a particular
country, and feeling a responsibility toward all of humankind
Martha Nussbaum, philosopher & 2016 Kyoto Prize in Arts and Philosophy
2013
Cosmopolitanism:
feeling like a world citizen
primary allegiance to the community of
human beings in the entire world
2018
Martha Nussbaum in 2008:
must be tempered by patriotism
Patriotism is ok if not malign, but
“purified” to be globally sensitive:
we accept the constraints of some strong duties to humanity, and
then ask ourselves how far we are entitled to devote ourselves to the
particular people and places whom we love
(p. 80)
We just need to be sure that citizens develop a type of
‘purified’ patriotism that is reliably linked to the deeper
principles [of democracy and basic human values…] and
that focuses on suffering humanity wherever it occurs
(p. 83)
purified patriotism requires education about foreign
cultures and domestic minorities. Panic and xenophobia
are always more difficult to sustain when people are
acquainted with complex historical facts regarding the
groups they encounter.
(p. 86)
“travel+
language
learning +
cosmopolitan
altruism
through
education”
But we definitely need patriotism in cosmopolitanism:
If people interested in economic equality, justice for
minorities, and global justice eschew symbol and rhetoric,
fearing all appeals to emotion and imagination [i.e.,
patriotism] as inherently dangerous and irrational, the
Right will monopolize these forces, to the detriment of
democracy.
Nussbaum (2008, p. 93)
7. How do patriotism and
nationalism intersect
with multilingual
learning?
patriotism/nationalism
benevolent and pernicious
specific contexts and histories
languages & the nation-state!
one nation =
one language
= one people
WHO DESERVES THE PRIVILEGES
AND DUTIES OF CITIZENSHIP?
must speak the majority (national) language?
must have been born here?
must have been raised here?
civic, inclusionary
(vs. ethnocultural,
exclusionary)
must pay taxes here?
must obey the nation’s laws?
“true”
and
“loyal”
citizen?
In the USA, sociologists Bonikowski and DiMaggio (2016): a cline of
four nationalist belief profiles that emerged from latent class
analysis in a nation-wide survey sample of about 1,000
four nationalist belief profiles
anti-immigrant,
xenophobic
Restrictive, 38%:
low income
low education
minorities included
Creedal 22%:
minorities upon whom fate has
smiled
experienced both privilege &
marginality
college degrees
highest income
Catholic, Jewish
mixed attitudes
Ardent, 1 in 4:
well off, older
less educated
Evangelical Republicans
South
Disengaged, 17%:
young, prosperous, welleducated
life experiences of success and
minoritization:
either foreign-born immigrants
or native-born secular
Democrats
from the two coasts of the U.S.
many African American
many less religious
positive attitudes
What’s behind four nationalist belief profiles in the USA?
Restrictive
(38%)
Ardent
(1 in 4)
Creedal
(22%)
Disengaged
(17%)
Felt closed to USA
Pride of country
USA best
True Americans?
moderately
selective
not really
ethnocultural,
exclusionary: must
speak English, be born
in the U.S. and live all
their lives here, be a
Christian…
√
√
√
ethnocultural,
exclusionary
√
√
√
civic, inclusionary: taxpaying, law-abiding
no
lukewarm
no
civic, inclusionary
anti-immigrant
attitudes, racial
and ethnic
exclusion and
xenophobia
strong
mixed: strongest
negative attitudes
towards migration and
fear of cultural foreign
intrusion but not
extreme in some
respects, for example
favoring government
protection of minorities
strong
positive views towards
policy supportive of
human diversity and
immigration
Connecting political ideologies to language attitudes
Karolina Hansen et al. (2018), Centre for Research on Prejudice, University of Warsaw
linguistic purism vs. linguistic liberalism
e.g., “loanwords”:
• enriching lexicon of a language?
• a necessary evil?
• a threat that can and should be combatted?
Are conservative ideologies and personal identification with one’s nation
linked to purist approaches to native language  not in this study
In agreement with Nussbaum, and Bonikowski & DiMaggio, Hansen et al.
conclude that research will need to disambiguate personal identification with
one’s nation from intolerance of others, so the connections with ideologies of
language can better be understood.
less “political”: tolerance of
ambiguity, openmindedness
Connecting tolerance of ambiguity to positive attitudes
towards language variation
van Compernolle (2016):
• tolerance of ambiguity linked to positive
attitudes towards linguistic variation…
• particularly if more multilingual, older, more
educated, and having studied/lived abroad 3+
months
Grammar books and dictionaries are usually out of touch with how people
really use language
1
2
strongly disagree
3
4
5
strongly agree
All ways of speaking a language are acceptable, as long as two or more
people are able to communicate
1
2
strongly disagree
3
4
5
strongly agree
van Compernolle (2017): positive attitudes towards more informal or less
standard/normative language
preference for informal/less standard language linked to more
favorable attitudes toward linguistic variation, higher tolerance for
ambiguity, and abroad experience of +3 months
As a rule of thumb, it is better to use overly polite language than to risk
being too informal
1
2
3
4
5
strongly disagree
strongly agree
The sooner I start using more informal language with a new acquaintance,
the more comfortable I am with our relationship
1
2
strongly disagree
3
4
5
strongly agree
more linguistically
prescriptive/conservative
….
more likely victims &
victimizers of linguistic
insecurity?
learning a language is
construed as a ladder to…
educated monolingual
native speaker perfection
8. To conclude: An open
invitation
In language learning, inequities manifest themselves in:
whose multilingualism is accepted, praised, and rewarded
whose multilingualism is viewed as a problem
whose multilingualism remains invisible
experiences of privilege and inequity can be responded to
differently by different people, even within the same groups
or in similar contexts
privilege and vulnerability are on a continuum, and
non-deterministic, open to individual agency
systemic and structural
about much more than just language
forces modulating language
learning… typically investigated?
+/- (type of) instruction
but what is missing…?
73
age/timing of learning
motivation
crosslinguistic influences
aptitude
genres, tasks, goals
actual usage (input,
frequency)
factors missing and needed?
+/- (type of) instruction
colonization, migration
marginalized multilinguals
74
ethnicity/race
literacy, wealth
age/timing of learning
motivation
crosslinguistic influences
aptitude
genres, tasks, goals
actual usage (input,
frequency)
Clearly, what I am proposing
calls for a change of mindset…
politicization of
multilingualism &
language learning
against the fear to politicize
science
(Ortega, 2005)
“facts” are neutral:
Knowledge can…
“
(post)positivism”
… and must be
neutral, objective
values are “irrational”:
Values are a matter of
personal choice…
“emotivism”
(MacIntyre, 1984)
…they escape
rational scrutiny
Should the politics of
emotions and ideologies in
language learning remain
relegated to “unloved
variables” in
multilingualism research?
there are complex, difficult
relationships between
language learning and…
Globalization
Immigration
Conflict
Poverty
Colonialism
White Supremacy
harmonious vs.
conflictive
bilingualism
Privilege
Vulnerability
challenge:
recognizing systemic-structural
privilege and vulnerability while
guarding against essentialism
and allowing for agency (i.e.,
“individual differences”)
less or more elite
less or more
harmonious,
less or more
conflictive
less or more
monolingual
less or more
multilingual
often
different
responses to
similar
experiences/
contexts
less or more marginalized
Many multilinguals in marginalized
communities constantly experience their
multilingualism as a burden and
vulnerability rather than a fact of life…
… all along while many multilinguals with
more privilege are able to experience it as
a (romanticized and commodified) gift that
adds to that privilege
… and the world is becoming more and more
dangerous for multilinguals who are members of
marginalized communities
http://megahurtz-wcdb.herokuapp.com/
Worth investigating?
1. How can language learning help
build capacity for social justice?
2. How can we ensure equitable
multilingualism for all, not just the
elites?
Would you be
willing to explicitly
address social
justice goals in
your individual
differences
research?
What would it
take, and what
would it look like,
in your own
research
program?
comments welcomed!
lourdes.ortega@georgetown.edu
References:
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Please cite as:

Ortega, L. (2019). From individual differences to vulnerability and privilege
in multilingualism: A new research agenda? The Michel Blanc Lecture in
Applied Linguistics 2019, Department of Applied Linguistics and
Communication at Birkbeck, University of London, May 16, 2019.
Copyright © Lourdes Ortega, 2019