Portraits of multilinguals

To improve children's language acquisition, they need to be exposed to language of good quality and they need to grow up in a stimulating environment. When all things go well, parents and school work together on that task. But when there are different languages spoken at home and at school, co-operation doesn't always come natural. To get communication going on the subject, it is important to first become aware of what it means to be bilingual. The Science Shop Language, Culture and Communication made a book with portraits of a wide variety of multilangual Dutch citizens (in Dutch). Students in Applied Linguistics wrote these portraits.

A family with deaf and hearing children

More information in the Dutch version

The history of a dutch dialect: Twents

More information in the Dutch version

A portrait of South Africa

More information in the Dutch version

Comparing Nigeria to the Netherlands on minority languages

More information in the Dutch version

Integration in Oude Pekela

More information in the Dutch version

Pakistani roots and deaf parents

More information in the Dutch version

A portrait of multilangualism in Ireland and Northern Ireland  

For people who can't read Dutch there is also a English article available on the subject. On the basis of 3 interviews Charlotte Buijs describes the situation of English and Gaelic in the Republic of Ireland and on the other side of the border in Northern Ireland. Of course recent history plays a role in this article. You can download the article The leprechaun language in our repository.

The book

The book En ik spreek ook Nederlands, portretten van meertalige Nederlanders consists of 10 portraits that show the richness and variation of multilingualism. When you read the book you experience what it is to be multilingual, what the various languages mean to people, how parents try to raise their children bilingually. There are portraits of: A family of immigrants from Algeria, German students surviving in Groningen, primary school children first discussing multilangualism, a family with deaf and hearing children, a Frisian family moving to another part of the country. This book was presented in a meeting with students, linguists, multilinguals and their relatives. You can watch a movie on the presentation of the book on this page.