AH-108 Learning in a Globalized World: Scenario Planning, Brain Research, and Linguistic Diversity
Bruno della Chiesa
Globalization means, among other things, that a broader set of linguistic competencies is requested from more individuals than ever before. But what languages are we talking about? Is English the lingua franca of globalization, or is it “Globish”? Is there a transculture attached to Globish? In other words, can one talk about a cultura franca? Apart from the mother tongue (if not English), is it sufficient--to begin with in order to be competitive in the labor market--to be fluent in English/Globish? And what does this all mean for education policy and practices internationally? Cultural diversity represents a potential enhancement, but it is also a source of immense challenges facing our education systems today, as migration flows and demographic trends alter the socio-ethnological composition of our populations. This transdisciplinary course examines international approaches to education policies and practices in contexts of linguistic and cultural diversity. Specifically, it will develop hypotheses about the role that individual representations (defined as perceptions, values, beliefs, identity images and alterity/“otherness”) play in motivating language learning, offer analytical tools for assessing the economic and social outcomes of successful language acquisition, and introduce recent developments in educational neuroscience in order to deepen current understandings of how the brain works/learns and what its role is in (foreign) language acquisition.
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