Multilayered perspectives on language policy in higher education: Finland, Estonia, and Latvia in comparison

Abstract

This article analyses language policies in higher education in Finland, Estonia and Latvia, as well as the European Union. We take a multilayered approach to language policies in order to illuminate the complex and intertwined (and sometimes contradictory) nature of local, national and international language policies in higher education. We are particularly interested in the construction of national or local language(s) and the language(s) of internationalisation in our case countries. Finland, Estonia and Latvia share common features as relatively small non-Anglophone countries in the Baltic region, while simultaneously having somewhat differing political and cultural histories. The results of our discursive analysis indicate that while the three countries have relatively different national language policies, regarding e.g. the position of the national language(s), the institutional policies are more similar in the three cases. For universities, the positioning of English as the de facto language of internationalisation turns the ideology of language choice in higher education into a practical rather than political question. However, at the state level, the promotion of English runs contrary to national policies. The European Union higher education language policy seems to acknowledge the institutional level's practical demands of English as de facto language of internationalisation rather than follow its own formal language policy of official languages.

Language policy and the law

“…context of internationalisation (Soler-Carbonell, Saarinen, & Kibbermann, 2017). In the codes of conduct studied here, internationalisation was both an implicit and explicit motivation underlying language-policy decisions, although the term was never defined, nor was the rationale for pursuing it made explicit.…”

Global English: From “Tyrannosaurus Rex” to “Red Herring”

“…This is because it is not a language policy; it is an educational policy with unforeseen or ignored consequences for language. Policy initiatives like these indirectly lead to an increased use of English and can be said to constitute a type of "covert language policy" (Piller and Cho 2013;Soler-Carbonell 2017). However, crucially for the argument put forth here is that these are all policies that originate in a domain other than the linguistic one.…”

Young Finnish Adults Perspectives on Using English in Different Social Situations: Exploring the Influence of Affective Factors through Photo-Elicitation Interviews

“…Most studies in the Finnish context have focused on general attitudes towards learning and using English in Finland (Dufva et al, 2007;Leppänen & Nikula, 2007;Ranta, 2010;Taavitsainen & Pahta, 2003), or on its expanding adoption in higher education (Soler-Carbonell et al, 2017;van Splunder, 2016), while little research has explicitly attended to young Finnish people's perceptions of speaking English in common communicative situations. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to attempt to describe and understand how young Finnish adults feel when speaking English and how the influence of certain affective factors -the emotional characteristics affecting how one responds to any situation (Gardner & MacIntyre, 1993) -is perceived in different formal and informal situations.…”