The chapter discusses discourses of "language" indexing social tasks of universities. We are interested in how talk of "language" is used to index the political, economic, educational, cultural etc. nature of higher education; in other words, what we talk about when we think we talk about language. We are mainly focusing on the position Swedish in the tensions of national language policies, higher education policies and internationalisation. In the chapter, we show the various ways in which higher education policies and language policies are intertwined, producing both intended and unintended language policy outcomes. ; peerReviewed
In this article, we discuss the position of Finnish constitutional bilingualism in higher education in the context of internationalisation in English, by focusing on two universities: one dominantly monolingual (Finnish), one dominantly bilingual (Finnish–Swedish); in addition, both teach in English. This article investigates how discourses around language choices (language policy documents, selected staff and student interviews) construe these universities as monolingual, bilingual or trilingual, and what these discourses say about the universities as organisations themselves. Results suggest that, although lack of clarity remains regarding language choices in many practical situations, Finnish and English are seen as self-evident primary languages of the universities; Swedish, as the third language, occupies a more contested place. ; Dans cet article, nous discutons de la position du bilinguisme constitutionnel finlandais dans l'enseignement supérieur dans le contexte de l'internationalisation en anglais, en nous concentrant sur deux universités: l'une à dominante monolingue (langue finnoise), l'autre majoritairement bilingue (finno-suédoise); en outre, les deux enseignent en anglais. Cet article étudie comment les discours sur les choix linguistiques (documents de politique linguistique, personnel sélectionné et entrevues avec les étudiants) interprètent ces universités comme monolingues, bilingues ou trilingues, et ce que ces discours laissent voir à propos des universités en tant qu'organisations elles-mêmes. Les résultats suggèrent que, malgré le manque de clarté concernant les choix de langue dans de nombreuses situations pratiques, le finnois et l'anglais sont considérés comme des langues primaires évidentes des universités. Le suédois, en tant que troisième langue, occupe une place plus contestée. ; peerReviewed
The present article examines university language centres in Finland, their current role, and the challenges they face. The aim is to provide a point of comparison to Ivan Poljaković's article on language centres in European higher education. In Finland, the framework and basic functions of university language centres are well defined by legislation and long-standing practices within the universities. The strategic planning of language studies in Finnish higher education takes place on the European, national, university and language centre levels. In this process , the language centres have their own roles and responsibilities. It is also important that the centres define their particular identity and status in relation to their basic tasks. Due to their multidisciplinary nature, involving several languages and various fields, today's language centres foster and promote interdisciplinary scholarship and research in language pedagogy. Defining the role and tasks of a language centre entails defining the kind of research best suited to its strategy and goals. Pedagogical expertise is a salient characteristic of Finnish language centres, distinguishing them from many academic fields and departments. By employing a well-conceived recruitment policy resulting in a highly professional faculty, Finnish language centres can establish a strong identity and can benefit greatly from internal expertise and know-how. In addition, active cooperation is undertaken both internally and with outside partners, for example national (FINELC) and international (CERCLES) networks. Finally, the concept of integration in language centre teaching is central. For language centres in general, the practice of integrated teaching would be an effective way of promoting their expertise and enhancing their visibility. ; peerReviewed
