Pöyhönen, S and Simpson, J orcid.org/0000-0002-2087-7008 (2021) Contesting language policy for asylum seekers in the Northern periphery: The story of Tailor F. Language Policy, 20 (2). pp. 261-285. ISSN 1568-4555
Abstract
This article is about navigating asylum, employment and language policy in a new country as an asylum seeker. Through the story of one individual, we show that profound inequalities are exacerbated when forced migrants are limited in their choice of language they might study or use. The individual is Tailor F, an Iraqi man seeking asylum, and the country is Finland, officially bilingual, with a majority language (Finnish) and a minority language (Swedish). Finland’s official bilingualism does not extend evenly to language education provided for asylum seekers, who are taught Finnish regardless of the region where they are placed. Upon arrival, Tailor F was housed in a reception centre for asylum seekers located in a Swedish-dominant rural area of the country. Through our linguistic ethnography we examine how he navigates multilingually in his early settlement, his current work and his online life. We relate his story to explicit and implicit official bilingualism in Finland and discuss his lived experiences in relation to the contexts of asylum policy and employment. Tailor F’s story shows how, through his practices, he has contested implicit language policy for asylum seekers in order to gain membership of the local Swedish-dominant community, achieve a sense of belonging, and potentially realise his aspirations for the future.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s) 2020. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
Keywords: | Asylum · Bilingualism · Language education · Linguistic ethnography · Rural superdiversity · Finland · New speaker |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Education, Social Sciences and Law (Leeds) > School of Education (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 24 Sep 2020 12:45 |
Last Modified: | 25 Jun 2023 22:26 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Springer Nature |
Identification Number: | 10.1007/s10993-020-09554-0 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:165693 |
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Filename: Pöyhönen-Simpson2021_Article_ContestingLanguagePolicyForAsy.pdf
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