Languages of Teaching – English in the Multilingual University
Research Alliance Project “Multilingualism as a Resource of the Sustainable University”
Subproject 3: “Languages of Teaching – English in the Multilingual University”
Researcher: Prof. Dr. Peter Siemund
This project investigates the role of English as a lingua franca in teaching at Universität Hamburg and how multilingual skills influence English usage. English as a lingua franca is usually learned as a third or fourth language. Despite this, many studies to date have limited themselves to comparative investigation of the use of English as a lingua franca and the respective official national language in academic contexts in order to furnish evidence of English as a lingua franca as either a threat or an enriching factor. In order to take into account the everyday multilingualism of students and teachers, this study pursues the question of which multilingual resources are available among students and teachers at Universität Hamburg and how these resources are deployed in English-language communication. During the first phase of the project, roughly 500 students and teachers at Universität Hamburg will be asked to participate in an online questionnaire in order to assess the multilingual resources of these groups. In addition to the online questionnaire, researchers will conduct around 50 semi-structured interviews with around fifty subjects.
Cooperation: Jessica Terese Mueller
Duration: 2015 - 2016
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