Like many other sub-fields of sociolinguistics, two seemingly unbridgeable gaps exist in the sociolinguistic study of multilingualism and identity in urban settings. First, existing studies tend to examine Western and/or English-speaking societies only; and moreover, they do so by using either quantitative or qualitative methods and rarely considering both approaches. As a result, relevant theories have been developed without taking into consideration cases outside these sites using a more comprehensive methodological approach. This chapter presents a case study of urban multilingualism in Ningbo in Eastern China to demonstrate how investigations of non-Western/non-English multilingual settings incorporating interdisciplinary methodologies can help to validate, challenge and, more importantly, expand our understanding of the sociolinguistics of multilingual identity, both theoretically and methodologically. Informed by a variationist approach and mixed-methods designs, the case study not only presents the multilingual sociolinguistic reality of Ningbo, but also shows how an interdisciplinary perspective enriches the field of sociolinguistics.

This chapter returns to a long-standing issue in in language and identity research based on life story interviews - the need for theoretical and methodological rigour (Pavlenko, 2007). It begins with background: first a brief discussion of identity that highlights those aspects of the construct that later come to the fore, and second, presentation of a version of positioning theory (PT) recently developed by the author (Block, 2017). This version draws on the original PT model developed by Rom Harré and his associates but importantly, it expands on this model with the addition of constructs taken from sociolinguistics, sociology and social theory, including authenticity and authentication (Bucholtz, 2003), belonging (Guibernau, 2013), field and habitus (Bourdieu, 1993, 2000), discourse formations and gaze (Foucault, 1989, 2003) and resistance (Seymour, 2006). The second half of the chapter examines an excerpt from an interview with an English-medium instruction lecturer, drawing on constructs developed in the first part. The aim is to show how the version of PT presented can lead to a detailed and nuanced interpretation of the construction of identity, turn by turn, in an interaction.

This chapter focuses on young students’ attitudes towards the partner languages in dual-language immersion (DLI) programmes, as well as attitudes towards the speakers of these languages with implications for students’ identities as bilingual/biliterate learners in this educational context. The chapter uses example findings with primary school students (5–8 year olds) acquiring Spanish and English in a US DLI programme who are part of a multi-year research and evaluation project. Students are compared with student peers in their school’s English-medium classrooms to help understand potential differences in language attitudes stemming from their instructional experiences. This work is part of a growing call to consider the ‘whole child’ in developmental contexts and a need to employ multidisciplinary and longitudinal methods to better understand the impact of bilingual educational settings on children’s growth and well-being, moving beyond a narrow focus on academic achievement and language proficiency outcomes.

This introductory chapter reviews how researchers across a range of disciplines have critically reassessed their conceptions of language and of the relationship between language and identity, especially in multilingual or superdiverse contexts. Key elements of the ‘multilingual turn’ are elaborated, including the focus on the construction and negotiation of identity and the view of languages as part of a multimodal repertoire, thereby broadening and problematizing the definition of multilingualism. In a second section, the terminology used to describe multilingual speakers and practices is analysed, and its relation to the values and identities ascribed to them is assessed. The chapter then presents the three major themes around which the volume is structured: situated multilingualism and identity, multilingual identity practices and multilingual identity and investment. The final section explores the extent to which interdisciplinarity is represented both within the chapters and across the volume, and how far ‘integration’ and ‘common ground’, considered key aims for successful interdisciplinary work, have been possible.

This chapter examines the tensions inherent in how languages and identities are mapped geographically and cognitively, and the particular issues which multilingualism brings out in this mapping. Linguistic atlases require clear boundaries to be drawn within messy realities – a utopian undertaking with significant uses, which, on balance, may or may not outweigh the risks of declaring this or that language as belonging to, or dominant in, this or that place. There has in addition been a strong tendency to represent the cognitive dimensions of multilingualism and identity using the same mapping techniques developed in geographical representation, both with fMRI research and in recent work based on a crossing from geographical to cognitive (including emotional) representation, as multilingual children are asked to divide up and colour in an outline figure representing which of their languages represents which part of their personal identity. The aims of this chapter are to probe the ways in which multilingualism and identity are conceived and mapped, to establish the limits of their representation, and to enrich understanding of the linguistic phenomena which they are designed to capture.

This chapter discusses the changing local and global contexts in which Chinese (i.e., one or more Chinese languages or dialects) is being learned by multilingual youth and adults. Case studies of heritage- and non-heritage transnational learners of Mandarin in Canada, the United States, Australia and China illustrate the multi-scalar influences and enactments of larger geopolitical initiatives, ideologies, investments, and power relations in Chinese education and the many forms of Chinese-involved multilingualism(s) that can result. The chapter then explores how these and other factors shape learners’ identities, forms of agency, and linguistic histories as well as their trajectories and (sometimes fraught) subjectivities as multilingual Sinophones. The chapter concludes with a call for additional research representing a wider range of multilingualisms, raciolinguistic identities (especially among non-Anglophone learners), and migration histories and trajectories in Chinese language learning.

Contemporary Urban Vernacular (CUV) French is a way of speaking that is associated with the banlieues of French cities, settings which are often strongly multilingual. Drawing on focus-group methodology and indexicality theory, this chapter explores listeners’ perceptions of a series of linguistic features in relation to macro-social categories (such as gender, age, region and socioeconomic status) and the speech styles of particular groups of speakers. Our analysis demonstrates the fluid nature of the socio-semiotic values associated with linguistic features, highlighting the importance of the speech context (for example, whether a feature occurs in isolation or with other CUV features), the complex mix of social meanings associated with certain features, and the role played by the listener’s experience. Where an explicit link to the banlieue is identified, we find a group of interconnected stigmatizing associations. Our analysis underscores the importance of understanding the link between language practices and perceptions of social categories in contemporary France, where the power and prestige of ‘standard French’ remains considerable.

Cross-disciplinary research in recent years on the intersections between both translation and translanguaging and translation and identity has sought to emphasize the diverse multilingual practices of translators while acknowledging the agency of translators in negotiating power and meaning, and foregrounding the often marginalized practice of translation itself as a creative and multiply boundary-crossing activity. In this chapter, we review current research on translation, translanguaging, and identity in order to better understand the ways that identity is operationalized in multilingual and collaborative translation practice; propose a new model of translator identity that addresses the diversity and collaborative nature of much translation work; analyze multilingual translator identity in practice by highlighting two examples of collaborative translation data from a global multilingual literacy project; and make the case that recognition of the multifaceted, translingual practices of translation, together with our enhanced model of translator identity, may help reconcile divergent understandings of translanguaging and the role of the translator across disciplinary boundaries.

The dominance of research into multilingualism and multilingual education produces a privileging of work within urban settings. The multilingual city; the superdiversity of urban wards; the institutions of language learning – the libraries; the cinemas; community language schools; cafés for language conversation; ethnically diverse restaurants, shops and take-aways where languages proliferate and live – all produce particular urban language ecologies. Policy is largely framed for languages according to needs of urban settings and rural multilingualisms are framed as ‘indigenous’, or of ‘the margins’. By tracing genealogies of language learning in and for rural settings and for research outside of urban environments the chapter deconstructs ways in which multilingualisms serve dominant policies, especially of colonial powers. Taking case studies from AHRC Large Grant Researching Multilingually at the Borders of Language, the Body, Law and the State, the chapter considers the dimension of rurality in working towards equity and parity in language positions, and the way that arts and indigenous knowledges might serve a decolonizing agenda as it receives renewed critical attention.

Recent assertions about ‘post-multilingualism’ (Li Wei 2016, 2018) are based on the growing body of work in what may be called the ‘4T’ approach or perspective: translanguaging, transmodal, transindividual, transspecies. If this is seen as superseding multilingualist approaches, such a subtractive development stands to impoverish understanding of language use. This chapter argues for them instead to be conceived of in an additive, complementary way – not in opposition to one another, but in joint use to provide as strong as possible an alternative to deeply rooted views concerning purported disadvantages of multilingualism and the erasure of its existence in various areas of linguistic research.

Ukraine is the largest country by territory within the European continent and a global geopolitical flashpoint. At a time of trauma and transition, Ukrainian cultural producers have begun to confront questions of Ukraine’s national identity and linguistic diversity with new urgency and fresh perspective. This chapter sheds light on the evolving dynamic between multilingualism and identity in contemporary Ukrainian culture by employing the practices of both sociological and literary analysis. Through semi-structured interviews and close readings of prominent artistic texts, we focus on the ways in which Ukrainian cultural producers embrace linguistic diversity while simultaneously privileging the Ukrainian language and promoting national consolidation in wartime. This ‘practical multilingualism’ is particularly evident in literary and cinematic dialogues that feature characters discussing their belonging to Ukraine across languages. In the field of nationalism studies, such ‘scenes of talk’ (Herman 2006) invite a reassessment of the almost exclusive emphasis on narrative in analyses of the role of culture in the life of the nation.

In this chapter we explore how sociocultural identities are formed and enacted in narrative practices – specifically, in joke-telling about migrants that takes place in multilingual communities in Veneto, Italy. Multilingual speech participants often communicate and reconfigure their fluid and heterogeneous sociocultural identities through joke-telling practices. By taking a particular stance while telling a joke, for example, speakers can inhabit identities in which ‘exclusionary intimacies’ vis-à-vis migrant groups might emerge – identities which reinforce intimate connections between joke-tellers and audience members who share the same history and traditions, while excluding migrants. In order to describe how joke-telling in northern Italy positions longstanding residents and migrants, we explore how identity performances can be fluid, as speakers shift in and out of heterogeneous memberships in multilingual communities, but nonetheless often end up excluding migrants.

This chapter explores how participative reflective practice in the languages classroom facilitates multilingual identity development. We appraise constructs such as metacognition, sociolinguistic competence, language awareness and identity’s place in education generally, and languages education specifically. On these theoretical bases, we present an innovative identity-driven pedagogy entitled 'We are multilingual', which aims to raise learners’ awareness of language- and sociolinguistics-related issues and create a space for learners to understand and acknowledge their existing multilingual repertoires, and those of others. The goal is for learners to reflect on new language-related knowledge, to relate it to their own lives and future goals, and to offer learners agency to identify as multilingual if they so wish. The pedagogical content, example activities and teacher comments are included. Finally, we emphasise the importance of embedding personalized identity-based reflection into languages education, particularly in Anglophone contexts, where language learners often see themselves as monolingual, and where language learning has commonly suffered from low uptake and interest.

This chapter investigates the identities and motivations of learners of small, endangered and minoritized heritage languages, especially adults. Our case studies are from two contexts which have both similarities and contrasts: Guernesiais, a small, highly endangered language in Guernsey, Channel Islands; and Māori, a larger minoritized language spoken in New Zealand. We compare and contrast our findings with regard to salient factors that emerge as adults decide to learn these languages: motivation, identity construction and empowerment. Established frameworks of motivation and identity did not to match our contexts and emerging findings. Many interviewees reported being motivated by a desire to reconnect with roots, or to reclaim elements of their identity or culture which they feel have been denied to them. Our new speakers of minoritized languages actively seek revitalization through language as an enrichment of their individual or group identity, rather than profit- or prestige-related orientations, or lofty yet vague aspirations to ‘save the language’. The concept of muda, or ‘act of identity’ as a pivotal stage in learning a new language, is especially salient to our findings.

In this chapter, we explore the potential of conceptualizing identity as a complex dynamic system. The chapter begins with a critical reflection on how problematic dichotomies in discussions of self and identity have created unhelpful barriers between different areas of self-related work. Exploring integrative approaches to conceptualizing self, we suggest ways in which identity can be viewed as a complex dynamic system. In particular, we focus on the characteristic of emergence and how this can accommodate the notion of a continuously dynamic, adaptive and emergent sense of self. Additionally, we argue for a greater integration of both the psychological and the social in discussions of identity. We draw parallels to developments in multilingualism and notions of translanguaging which also point to the merits of a complexity perspective. Considering the implications for research, we stress the need to capture complexity which involves the psychological and social as well as dynamics across different timescales. We illustrate our line of thinking with data extracts from a study with English-Medium Instruction (EMI) teachers working in Austria.