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LANGUAGE AND MOBILITY IN SPAIN: A SOCIOLINGUISTIC

STUDY OF ERASMUS MUNDUS STUDENTS AT THE UCM

UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID

FACULTAD DE FILOLOGÍA

MASTER EN LINGÜÍSTICA INGLESA:

NUEVAS APLICACIONES Y COMUNICACIÓN INTERNACIONAL

MA DISSERTATION

PRESENTED BY: Jean Mathieu TSOUMOU

+34 602095198 / +242069956469

190589jeanmathieu@gmail.com

evelynetsoumou@gmail.cm

TUTOR: Pr. Gitte KRISTIANSEN

DATE: 30 September 2015

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AKNOWLEDGMENT

I would like to express my gratitude to Professor Gitte Kristiansen, my

supervisor, who accepted to supervise this project. I am deeply indebted to

my supervisor without her support, understanding, constructive suggestions

and patient advice this study would not have been possible.

I am also grateful to Professors Perucha Begoña Muñez, Ángel Martinez-

Martinez, Inés Ana Maria Pinto (University Complutense of Madrid),

Antoine Lipou, Josue Ndamba, Ndongo Ibara (Marien Ngouabi

University), and to Dr Ngombe-Apondza for advising and encouraging me

in the field of sociolinguistics. I should also thank the “participants” in this

study who, in spite of their daily occupations, have accepted to help and be

interviewed.

Above all these, I wish to express my heartfelt gratitude to my three

Brothers and Sister, their emotional support and patience have been

decisive, without them I could not have finished this project. Thanks for

enduring my absence with understanding, and for their unfaltering and

motivating belief in me. My thanks should also go to Mouho Nestor and

Nzalakanda Moukouyou who were always present in the moments of

despair.

I would finally like to express my gratitude to my parents, though they are

not here anymore, I can always feel their presence. And as time goes by my

love for them grows deeper and deeper.

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SUMMARY IN SPANISH/ RESUMEN EN ESPAÑOL

Sociolingüística es un término compuesto de dos partes esenciales que

coexisten y funcionan mutuamente. Una de ellas es la “parte social”, y la

otra es la “lingüística”. En la sociolingüística, la parte “lingüística” indica

que nos estamos centrando en cómo se utiliza el lenguaje mientras que la

“social” indica que realmente nos estamos centrando en mirar cómo se

utiliza el lenguaje en un contexto-social en la forma en que se utiliza

cuando las personas interactúan entre sí a nivel interpersonal, en grupos

más grandes o cultura, nacional e internacional. (Deckert y Vickers, 2011:

1).

Por lo tanto, cuatro orientaciones sociolingüísticas han sido dominantes en

toda la historia de la sociolingüística. Estas son: la sociolingüística

variacionista, la sociología del lenguaje, la lingüística y la antropología, y

la interacción sociolingüística. De hecho, pueden resumirse en micro-

sociolingüística o enfoques macro-sociolingüísticos. Por ejemplo, la

tradición variacionista puede estar relacionada con el enfoque micro-

sociolingüística, mientras que la sociología del lenguaje está más cerca de

los estudios macro-sociolingüísticos.

El presente estudio se centra en los estudiantes Erasmus mundus. Los

estudiantes Erasmus constituyen comunidades homogéneas y heterogéneas:

homogéneas porque pertenecen al programa Erasmus Mundus, que

relativamente tiene la misma duración de la movilidad, han aprendido

español, y probablemente se enfrentan a los mismos problemas

sociolingüísticos. Por otro lado, la comunidad es heterogénea ya que los

estudiantes vienen de diferentes partes del mundo que tienen diferentes

orígenes lingüísticos y en consecuencia, diferentes culturas. Por lo tanto, la

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sociolingüística en el marco de Erasmus Mundus debe tener en cuenta tanto

los aspectos sociales como los datos antropológicos.

Durante las últimas dos décadas, diferentes estudios han tratado de

investigar algunos problemas sociolingüísticos a los que se enfrentan los

inmigrantes y refugiados en los países de acogida. Este tipo de estudios se

han realizado en los EE.UU., la UE y Sudáfrica (Kerswill, 2000a, 2006;

Matras, 2000; Leconte, 1997; Bustos, 2002). En general, estos estudios

buscaban examinar la sociolingüística y los problemas socio-culturales

generados por la migración. Si bien la literatura abunda en el entorno de

migración, todavía se presta poca atención a la sociolingüística enfocad al

estudio de la movilidad de estudiantes Erasmus.

De hecho, desde la puesta en marcha de los programas Erasmus por la UE a

través de EACEA, dentro o fuera del espacio de la UE, muchos

universitarios estudian fuera de sus países. En el caso particular de Erasmus

Mundus, la movilidad estudiantil se caracteriza por dos aspectos

principales. En primer lugar, se trasladan de un país a otro. En segundo

lugar, se mueven de un continente a otro. En ambos casos, la lengua y los

efectos sociales están presentes. Recientemente, por ejemplo, varios

estudiantes de los países del Pacífico, de África, y del Caribe, se han

desplazado de sus países para estudiar en algunas universidades europeas.

Este estudio pretende describir y analizar los problemas sociolingüísticos a

los que se enfrentan los estudiantes en los países de acogido, en concreto

los concesionarios de Erasmus Mundus que viven en Madrid y que estudian

en la Universidad Complutense de Madrid. El objetivo es examinar el

conjunto de lenguas de los diversos estudiantes, tantas a nivel micro y

macro-sociolingüístico utilizando la sociología del lenguaje y el enfoque

gravitacional como se mencionó anteriormente. Cierta movilidad como la

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migración puede generar una serie de fenómenos sociolingüísticos en el

país de destino.

Como Rey y Van del Avenne (1998: 120) mencionan “la migración

conduce a una reorganización de la identidad lingüística de las personas”.

Del mismo modo piensan que la movilidad de los estudiantes reorganiza la

situación lingüística atribuyendo nuevas funciones sociales a los idiomas

que hablan. La presencia de los estudiantes cambia por tanto la función

social del lenguaje.

El estudio se estructura en cinco capítulos. El tema del estudio se resume

en el capítulo 1. El capítulo 2 presenta el marco teórico que consiste en

afirmar el objetivo de la ecología del lenguaje y su vínculo con los

fenómenos sociolingüísticos como la diglosia, el cambio de código, y la

actitud del lenguaje. El capítulo 3 presenta la metodología aplicada, la

muestra, y los métodos utilizados, particularmente los cuestionarios y la

entrevista. También incluye la descripción del experimento. Los datos y

análisis de la encuesta se presentan en el Capítulo 4. Por último, el Capítulo

5 contiene un resumen y la conclusión.

La investigación se centra esencialmente en el marco-lingüístico del

lenguaje y su relación con los fenómenos sociolingüísticos como la

diglosia, el cambio de código, y la actitud del lenguaje. La aplicación de

este modelo al contexto Erasmus Mundus y la constelación de las lenguas

deberían funcionar mejor. Los estudiantes Erasmus son hablantes de

lenguas a nivel 4. En este sentido, muestran una tendencia hacia el

plurilingüismo horizontal y vertical. Todos ellos pueden hablar un idioma

en el nivel 4 y al menos dos idiomas de nivel 3. Algunos de ellos pueden

hablar un idioma en los niveles 3, 2 o 1.

Sin embargo, es normal que cuando Calvet desarrolló el modelo, su

objetivo era aplicarlo a las sociedades inmóviles. Los ejemplos que se dan

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en ese libro se basan en este tipo de sociedades. No ofrece ninguna

explicación de cómo implementar el modelo de las sociedades con

movilidad social. En el caso de la movilidad, el modelo se vuelve más

complejo, y algunas lenguas cambian de función social. A pesar de este

inconveniente, el modelo parece ser adecuado y pertinente para el presente

estudio.

Los estudiantes de Erasmus Mundus son un grupo de estudiantes

seleccionados dentro de los programas de becas Erasmus para estudiar en el

extranjero. Los participantes en el presente estudio se limitan a los

estudiantes que viven en Madrid y que estudian en la UCM. Algunos de

ellos han estado viviendo en Madrid durante dos años; otros desde agosto

2014.

Los estudiantes Erasmus Mundus que se inscribieron en el curso académico

2014-2015 en la Universidad Complutense de Madrid fueron veinticinco.

Todos han sido admitidos como una muestra para el propósito del presente

estudio. Sin embargo, a la hora de la recopilación de datos, sólo veinte

estudiantes estuvieron de acuerdo y tuvieron la amabilidad de rellenar los

dos cuestionarios. Como resultado, esta cantidad se mantuvo como una la

muestra para todos los estudios. Hay que resaltar que, como la muestra era

pequeña, un solo método de investigación parecía insuficiente para reunir

pruebas en profundidad. Entonces, el método de la entrevista también se

incluyo a fin de no centrarse en solo el análisis cuantitativo, sino cualitativo

y cuantitativo.

Los análisis demuestran la confirmación de nuestra hipótesis planteada

anteriormente. La movilidad modifica o cambia la función social de las

lenguas de manera eficaz. Está claro que la situación lingüística de los

participantes dentro y fuera de los países de origen es diferente. Sobre su

anterior situación lingüística se añade la española en Madrid. Este último

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idioma (español), que había estado lejos de ellos, cumple varias funciones

en Madrid. Se convierte en el idioma principal de su interacción diaria; se

trata de una lengua franca en la interacción con los otros, y por supuesto, se

trata de la principal lengua académica. Por lo tanto, la hipótesis planteada

anteriormente se ha confirmado de diferentes maneras. Las tablas1 y 2

muestran una nueva organización lingüística en Madrid en comparación

con la que exista en sus países de origen.

Además, las actitudes de los estudiantes hacia las lenguas alrededor de

ellos muestran una especie de conflicto entre las lenguas que han aprendido

y aquellas que han adquirido. Este hallazgo supone una coincidencia

colateral con nuestra hipótesis de otra manera. Sin embargo, nuevas

investigaciones tratarían de abordar las actitudes lingüísticas de los

estudiantes cuando se preparan para estudiar en el extranjero con el fin de

comprobar si existe alguna diferencia con nuestros hallazgos. Puede ser

diferente en el sentido de que todo el mundo puede tener una percepción

diferente de la lengua con respecto a su capacidad de hablar o no.

Por otra parte, las funciones sociales de las lenguas vienen a confirmar

nuestra hipótesis del todo. De hecho, este hallazgo muestra diferentes

estrategias de uso de los estudiantes de comunicación, el papel principal de

la lengua española y el papel secundario de otras lenguas en el marco de

Erasmus Mundus. El español, que nunca había sido el idioma de los

alumnos en el fondo, aparece como el lenguaje fundamental para ponerse

en contacto unos con otros. Mientras, el francés, el inglés y el portugués,

previamente oficiales en los países ACP, juegan el papel de la unidad y la

solidaridad entre francófona, anglófona, y los estudiantes de habla

portuguesa. Por lo tanto, en Madrid existen cuatro comunidades lingüísticas

diferentes en términos de lenguas que deben ser habladas dentro y fuera del

contexto de Erasmus Mundus.

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En conclusión, el estudio muestra que desde los países de origen hasta

Madrid la situación sociolingüística en el marco de Erasmus Mundus ha

cambiado. Para ampliar nuestra perspectiva sobre los principios de la

ecología lingüística, podríamos decir que al vivir en el nuevo entorno

(Madrid), el español favorece como el idioma principal de comunicación.

Eso nos permite creer en la influencia del medio en las prácticas del

lenguaje, y quizás también en la forma de las lenguas. Sin embargo, cada

idioma ocupa un rango específico en el contexto multilingüe.

El documento también determina la actitud de los estudiantes, de acuerdo a

dos categorías de idioma. Una incluye idiomas más considerados como

lenguas útiles y de prestigio, y otra categoría incluye las lenguas habladas

por su atractivo. La primera se refiere a las lenguas aprendidas por el

grupo, mientras que el segundo se refiere a las lenguas adquiridas por el

grupo.

Por otra parte, el principal problema al que se enfrentan los estudiantes en

movilidad ha sido el fenómeno de la mezcla de idiomas. De hecho, Code-

switching (Cs) sigue siendo el tema central de Erasmus Mundus en Madrid.

Los participantes cambiaron entre el idioma español y otros idiomas

europeos. La razón de esto es doble: por un lado, el déficit lingüístico en

español, ya que acaban de aprender el idioma. Por otro lado, otros casos de

Cs se han explicado como la simple elección de idioma a utilizar en un

particular encuentro comunicativo continuo.

Uno de los hallazgos más destacados ha sido la aparición de las

comunidades lingüísticas. Este hallazgo vino a confirmar la hipótesis

básica de este estudio: la movilidad reorganiza la situación lingüística

atribuyendo nuevas funciones sociales para los idiomas que hablan. El

movimiento de los estudiantes cambia la función social del lenguaje. Por lo

tanto, el español, al convertirse en una lengua de contacto, crea una

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comunidad lingüística en la que todos los estudiantes viven como en el

entorno familiar a pesar de las diferencias lingüísticas de fondo. Además,

esta comunidad engloba tres comunidades lingüísticas particulares: la

anglófona, francófona y la portuguesa.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES ...................................................................................................... x

ACRONYMS ................................................................................................................................... xi

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................... 1

1.1. HYPOTHESIS AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS ..................................................................... 10

H1 ........................................................................................................................................ 10

RQ1 ...................................................................................................................................... 11

RQ2 ...................................................................................................................................... 11

RQ3 ...................................................................................................................................... 11

RQ4 ...................................................................................................................................... 11

1.2. ORGANISATION OF THE STUDY ...................................................................................... 11

CHAPTER II: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ................................................................................. 12

2.1. ECOLOGY OF LANGUAGES IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE CONSTALLATIONS OF

LANGUAGES: THE GRAVITATIONAL MODEL .............................................................................. 12

2.2. GRAVITATION AND DIGLOSSIA EMBEDDED IN THE ERASMUS MUNDUS SETTING .......... 13

2.2.1. THE GRAVITATIONAL MODEL AND CODE-SWITCHING ................................................... 15

2.2.2. GRAVITATION AND DIGLOSSIA ........................................................................................ 17

2.2. ATTITUDINAL APPROACH OF LANGUAGE IN LANGUAGE CONSTELLATIONS .................... 19

2.3. THE CONSTELLATION OF LANGUAGES ................................................................................ 21

CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY .................................................................................................... 24

3.1. PARTICIPANTS ...................................................................................................................... 24

3.2. SAMPLE ................................................................................................................................ 24

3.3. RESEARCH METHOD: QUESTIONNAIRES AND INTERVIEW ................................................ 25

3.3.1. QUESTIONNAIRE ONE ....................................................................................................... 25

3.3.2. QUESTIONNAIRE TWO ...................................................................................................... 26

3.3.3. INTERVIEW ........................................................................................................................ 28

3.4. PROCEDURE ......................................................................................................................... 29

CHAPTER VI: DATA ANALYSIS ..................................................................................................... 30

4.1. PARTICIPANTS’ LINGUISTIC BACKGROUND ........................................................................ 30

4.2. STUDENTS’ CURRENT SITUATION IN MADRID .................................................................... 33

4.3. LANGUAGES AND SOCIAL FUNCTIONS ............................................................................... 35

4.3.1. LEARNED LANGUAGES VERSUS ACQUIRED LANGUAGES ................................................ 35

4.4. MULTILINGUALISM AND LANGUAGE ATTITUDES IN AN EM SETTING ............................... 38

4.4.1. USEFUL LANGUAGES ........................................................................................................ 38

4.4.2. PRESTIGIOUS LANGUAGES ............................................................................................... 40

4.4.3. BEAUTIFUL LANGUAGES ................................................................................................... 42

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4.4.4. NICE LANGUAGES ............................................................................................................. 43

4.5. LANGUAGE CONTACT AND SOCIOLINGUISTIC PHENOMENA RESULTING IN EM SETTING 47

4.5.1. LANGUAGES AND CODE-SWITCHING ............................................................................... 47

4.5.2. LANGUAGES AND DIGLOSSIA ........................................................................................... 51

4.5.3. LANGUAGES AND LINGUISTIC SPEECH COMMUNITIES: FRANCOPHONE, LUZOPHONE,

HISPANOPHONE, AND ANGLOPHONE ....................................................................................... 54

4.6. LANGUAGES AND MANAGEMENT ...................................................................................... 55

4.6.1. LANGUAGES USED AT HOME ........................................................................................... 56

4.6.2. LANGUAGE USED AT UNIVERSITY .................................................................................... 57

4.6.3. LANGUAGES USED ON THE PHONE WITH PARENTS FROM THE HOME COUNTRIES ..... 57

4.6.4. LANGUAGES USED ON THE PHONE WITH OTHER ERASMUS STUDENTS ........................ 58

CHAPTER V: SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION .............................................................................. 61

5.1. SUMMARY ........................................................................................................................... 61

5.2. CONCLUSION........................................................................................................................ 62

BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................................ 65

APPENDIX .................................................................................................................................... 69

1. QUESTIONNAIRE ONE.......................................................................................................... 69

2. QUESTIONNAIRE TWO..................................................................................................... 71

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Figure 1: A picture of learned languages versus acquired languages in an Erasmus Mundus context……………………………………………………………….....................................................................37

Figure 2: A circle of code-switching………………………………………………………………………………..………48

Figure 3: Language and Management………………………………………………………………………….…………59

Table 1: Organization of student’s multilingualism by home country.......................................31

Table 2: The current students’ situation in Madrid...................................................................34

Table 3: Learned versus acquired languages.............................................................................36

Table 4: Evaluation of languages regarding their utility............................................................38

Table 5: Prestigious languages ..................................................................................................41

Table 6: Beautiful languages......................................................................................................42

Table 7: Nice languages.............................................................................................................43

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ACRONYMS

ACP : Africa, Caribbean, Pacific

Cs : Code-switching

EACEA : The Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency

EM : Erasmus Mundus

EMS : Erasmus Mundus Students

EU : European Union

US : United States

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CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

Recently, Deckert and Vickers (2011) have defined sociolinguistics as “a

field that looks at how people use language in their everyday lives across a

variety of life events and language experience”. That is to say, the

sociolinguistic field covers many facets of human daily life. Among these

facets, there are everyday practices, the integration of migrant people in the

host countries, and so forth. The field of sociolinguistics also examines

what people do with and through language. For instance, after just one

non-native linguistic feature pronounced by a non-native speaker of

Spanish, the following question “¿De Dónde Eres?” appears. That is

because someone is using these linguistic features in a different manner

from that of native speakers. In a parallel way, Spolsky defines

sociolinguistics as:

“The field that studies the relation between language and society.

Between the uses of language and the social structures in which the

users of language live” (1998: 3).

In this sense, all individual or group-related acts related to the language

(day-to-day conversation, the desire to learn or speak this language instead

of another) interest the sociolinguist.

As can be seen, the way people use language has an impact on the society

in which they live. Conversely the society in which people interact has an

influence on the kind of language to use the type of interaction, the belief

from one individual (or group of people) to another. For instance, an

individual who mixes words from two languages in the conversation lets

other participants think about his background. A concrete example comes

2

from Brazzaville city: in the Laari language, the word Kinkala is

pronounced tchinkala by the native speakers. Anybody else, who

pronounces “Kinkala” [kinkala] instead of [tʃikala], is soon identified by

the laari native speakers1 as an out-group individual. They then say “ka

wena wa beto ko” [s/he is not one of ours; s/he does not belong to our

group, our ethnic group]. In systematic ways, /k/ is pronounced [tʃ] in

initial position.

Broadly speaking, sociolinguistic is a term composed of two essential parts

that coexist and function mutually. One is the “social”, and the other is

“linguistic”. According to Deckert and Vickers (2011), the

[The]“linguistic” in the sociolinguistic indicates that we are

focusing on how language is used [whereas the] “social” in

sociolinguistics indicates that we are really focusing on looking at

how language is used in a social context- at how it is used when

people interact with one another on interpersonal levels, in larger

groups, culture, national, and international.(2011:1)

From this perspective, the scenario that happened on the battlefield after

the Gilead victory over the people of Ephraim about the way to pronounce

Shibboleth2 maybe related to the “linguistics” part in the sociolinguistic

field. Whereas the scenario that happened between Professor Higgins and

1Laari is a vernacular language spoken by people of the same name in Brazzaville and in

the Department of Pool (Republic of Congo) 2Tabouret-Keller, A. (1998)."Language and Identity." The Handbook of

Sociolinguistics . Coulmas, Florian (Ed). Blackwell Publishing, Blackwell Reference

Online. 28 December 2007

http://www.blackwellreference.com/subscriber/tocnode?id=g9780631211938_chunk_g

978063121193821

3

Eliza Doolittle in Eliza Doolittle’s speech shows the “social” part in the

sociolinguistic field.

Sociolinguistics then deals with what people do with language, everywhere

they are. People’s language practices, their attitudes, their styles, and the

way they consider themselves as members of the speech community, all

this is of interest to the sociolinguist.

That is what makes a slight difference between the field of sociolinguistics

and other social sciences. As Coulmas (1998) says, the focus of

sociolinguistics is different from other disciplines that also take an interest

in language. Such disciplines include autonomous or theoretical linguistics,

psycholinguistics, cognitive linguistics, neurolinguistics, and so on. These

disciplines are interested in the human mind, the individual’s acquisitions

and use of language, and the cognitive and apparatus of language storage

and processing.

However, it is important to emphasize that such a distinction cannot be

definitive. There exists only a partial difference within these disciplines

with respect to the sociolinguistic field. Recently, studies such as Geraerts

and Kristiansen (2014) have sought to decontextualise the variationist

sociolinguistic approach. They assert that cognitive linguistics has

theoretically and methodologically contributed, and still contributes to the

understanding of variationist sociolinguistics. Conversely, variationist

sociolinguistics has something to contribute to cognitive linguistics. In this

context, they state that:

“Cognitive linguistics embodies a far-reading paradigm shift in

linguistics, and the interest in interlinguistic and intralinguistic

language variation constitutes the cornerstone of that paradigm

(Dirk Geeraerts and Gitte Kristiansen, 2014:1).

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That means that cognitive linguistics has participated in the linguistic

evolution from structuralism to generativism. Otherwise, The Oxford

Handbook of Sociolinguistics (2013) sums up several different subfields

with distinct methods of interest that have developed since the 1960s. Four

orientations have been especially noted throughout the history of

sociolinguistics.

Firstly, variationist sociolinguistics, of which William Labov (Martha’s

Vineyard, 1963) is considered a pioneer. The basis of this orientation is

that the linguistics system of language is not homogenous and autonomous.

It is rather dynamic because the society in which the speakers of these

languages are living is also dynamic. Thus, Deckert and Vickers mention

that:

“Language variation began as soon as groups of people moved far

enough away from one another, socially, or geographically, for

their young generation of speakers to develop their language

identity from the young people in other groups"( op.cit.: 32).

The concern of variationist sociolinguistics consists of establishing a

correlation between language and social variables. Such variables are

mainly age, sex, social class and geography, and from these variables

different varieties of the same language result. The earlier Labov’s studies

were mostly based on those social variables. From the variationist’s

viewpoint, each language has a number of different varieties. Consider, for

instance, the following three languages: Spanish, English and French.

There are differences between Spanish spoken in Spain, in Latin America,

in the US, and in Equatorial Guinea. There also exist differences between

the English of Great Britain, Canada, the US, and a number of other

varieties of the language in the English-speaking countries (see Deckert

and Vickers, 2011:33). Likewise, there are differences between the French

5

of France, Canada, Senegal, Ivory Coast, and Congo-Brazzaville. Even

within the countries there are differences according to cities, provinces,

age, and social class. Spanish spoken in Huelva is different from the

Spanish variety of Madrid3; the French spoken in Paris is different from the

French spoken in Marseille.

The second tradition is related to the sociology of language that deals with

language and the behaviour of their speakers. According to Garcia and

Schiffman, (2008), “the sociology of language is centrally concerned not

only with societal patterned behaviour through language but with societal

patterned behaviour toward language, whether positive or negative”.

Fishman is considered as the “father” of this approach (see Garcia and

Schiffman, 2008; Spolsky, 1999, 2000). In 1972, he emphasized that:

¨language and societal behaviour are equal patterns rather than

one or the other of them being “boss” and “giving orders” to the

other” (Fishman, 1972a:301).

This tradition focuses on the relationship between languages and their

speakers. For instance issues such as multilingualism, language

maintenance, language spread, language attitudes, language shift,

bilingualism, diglossia, language policy, linguistic identity, language

management all belong to the sociology of language. To date, significant

authors of the sociology of language are Spolsky (1998, 2009), Garcia and

Schiffman (2006), and others.

The third tradition is the so-called Linguistic anthropology. Dell Hymes is

considered as the pioneer in this tradition. The concern of linguistic

anthropology is the effect of culture on speakers’ linguistic interaction. In

this sense, this tradition deals with language and the speakers’ culture. The

3Personal observation of my classmates Spanish speakers (Master 2014-2015)

6

language and culture of the speaker then are inseparable. Throughout the

speaker´s speech, there are many cultural features lying beneath. This

approach derives from the Sapir-Worf theory of linguistic relativity. It

considers communication as a keyword in the study of sociolinguistics.

One of the most well-known orientations of linguistic anthropology is the

ethnography of speaking. Dell Hymes suggests that any communication

using language or speech events is constituted by several distinct factors,

each associated with different functions (Spools, 1998: 14). Hymes’

famous SPEAKING model is, according to Shibamoto-Smith and Shand

(2013), a list of speech events, including but not limiting to language. This

tradition leads the sociolinguistic field to the cross-cultural analysis of the

language.

The last orientation mentioned in The Oxford Handbook of Sociolinguistics

concerns sociolinguistic interaction. This approach focuses on problems

that occur in daily communication. Such questions involve understanding,

misunderstanding, and identity when interacting in an intercultural

situation. Gumperz states that: “whenever problems of understanding arise,

they serve to create further differences in the symbolization of identity”

(1982:3). Discourse analysis is one of the several disciplines related to this

approach.

However, it seems important to bear in mind that the contrast between

Hymes and Gumperz is based slightly on the theoretical perspective. Both

ethnography of communication and interactional sociolinguistics have

strong links to linguistic anthropology. As mentioned earlier, linguistic

anthropology studies languages in order to understand culture. In a similar

way, Figueroa (1994:187), cited by Shibamoto-Smith and Shand (2013),

claimed that:

7

“Both Gumperz and Humes shared a theoretical base that was a

function of linguistics rather than form, holding that the structure

and function of linguistic elements are not and cannot be

independent, and took the position that the goal of linguistic

anthropology was understood and theorized communicatively,

rather than grammatical, competence” (Shibamoto-Smmith and

Shand, 2013:33).

In short, all these sociolinguistic traditions function in a complementary

way since some research, such as Calvet (2006), seem to bring together

variationist sociolinguistics, the sociology of language, and linguistic

anthropology. Using the ecology of language approach, Calvet attempts to

explain language variation using the gravitational model. This is based on

advantages from both the sociology of language and anthropology of

language traditions.

That is to say, the four sociolinguistic orientations mentioned above may be

summarised as micro-sociolinguistic or macro-sociolinguistic approaches.

For instance, the variationist tradition can be related to the micro-

sociolinguistic approach, whereas the sociology of language approach is

closer to macro-sociolinguistic studies. The anthropology of language

belongs to both, as Coulmas states:

“micro-sociolinguistics issues being more likely to be investigated

by a linguist, dialectologists, and other language –centered fields

whereas macro-sociolinguistics issues are more frequently taken up

by sociologists and social psychologists” (1998:5).

Beyond this broad light to the area, our own approach in the present study

is half-way based on the sociology and anthropology of language

approaches. Indeed, Erasmus students constitute homogeneous and

heterogeneous communities. Homogeneity because they belong to the

8

program Erasmus Mundus, they relatively have the same length of

mobility; they have learnt Spanish together, and probably face the same

sociolinguistic problems. Heterogeneity because they come from different

regions in the world, they have different linguistic backgrounds and

eventually different cultures. Thus, sociolinguistics in the Erasmus Mundus

context should take into account social and anthropological data.

In relation to this, Calvet (2006), instead of using explicit micro-

sociolinguistic and macro-sociolinguistic approaches prefers the term

“internal” and “external” organization of the world languages. In his view,

an internal structure relates the sociolinguistic study to the problems

generated by multilingualism whereas an external structure describes the

sociolinguistic study examining speakers’ linguistic practices, their

representation, and attitudes to the languages they use.

Being indispensable for a full understanding of how languages are being

used in a social context, these internal and external organizations

propounded by Calvet appear to be suitable in the Erasmus Mundus

context. In fact, in the two last decades, a number of studies have attempted

to investigate some sociolinguistic “problems faced by immigrants and

refugees” in the host countries. Such studies have been carried out in the

US, EU and South Africa (Kerswill, 2000a, 2006; Matras, 2000; Leconte,

1997; Bustos, 2002). In general, such studies sought to examine

sociolinguistic and socio-cultural problems generated by migration. While

literature abounds in the migration setting, little attention is still paid to the

sociolinguistics counterpart of Erasmus student mobility.

Bustos (2002), for instance, reported an issue of multilingualism from the

perspective of migrations and minorities. Etxebarria (2002) highlighted the

identity of an individual as a “definitory” trait in the linguistic plurality

depicted. He advocates the application of some measures that allow

9

multilingualism to get rid of its label as a socially conflicting element. In

addition, Soto (2000) examined the problems related to the acceptance and

adoption of linguistic and cultural diversity in Spain. They deal with this

problem as a result of the increasing influx of the migrant population in

Spain in recent years.

Elsewhere, Rey and Van den Avenne (1998) showed that Bambara in Mali

is an ethnic language, despised by Francophone Malians, which became the

language of a Malian migration community in France. They had worked on

a sample of thirteen people in a social community in France. Hence, they

concluded that Bambara, which is Lingua Franca in Mali, becomes in

France both Lingua Franca and the language of identity throughout the

immigrant Malian community.

In a similar way, Leconte (1997) worked on the languages of children of

African migrants in France, specifically in Rouen city, where she

interviewed 30% of the parents in the department. In her analysis, she

shows that of all African languages used by Africans in France, the

languages of West Africa are more prone to being transmitted compared to

those of Central Africa. Then she found that a vast majority of (West)

African people transmit more African languages to their children whereas

an exceptional minority prefers the French language. Through these

studies, it may be understood that migrations pose interesting

sociolinguistic problems in host countries. In this regard, the following

question should be asked: Is students’ mobility very different to migration?

We believe that the answer should be negative. This paper attempts to

clarify this answer.

In fact, since the launching of Erasmus programs by the EU through

EACEA, inside or outside the EU space, many students study outside their

countries. In the particular case of Erasmus Mundus, student mobility is

10

characterized by two main aspects. First, they move from one country to

another. Second, they move from one continent to another. In both cases,

language and social effects are present. Recently, for instance, a number of

students from African, Caribbean, and Pacific countries have come to study

at some European universities. In this context, Kristiansen et al. (2014:3)

state that:

“we [people or individuals] are not just biological entities: we also

have a cultural and social identity, and our language may reveal

that identity, i.e. languages may embody the historical and cultural

experience of groups (and individuals)”.

That lets us make an assumption by saying that students come to European

universities with their linguistic, cultural, social, and even educative

experience acquired in their home countries. This experience forms part of

their sociolinguistic integration in the host society.

1.1. HYPOTHESIS AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS

The present study seeks to describe and examine the sociolinguistic

problems faced by students on mobility, specifically the Erasmus Mundus

grantees living in Madrid and studying at the Complutense University of

Madrid. The aim is to scrutinise the set of languages in the student mobility

at both micro- and macro-sociolinguistic levels using the sociology of

language and gravitational approach as previously mentioned. Mobility like

migration may generate a number of sociolinguistic phenomena in the

destination country.

H1: As Rey and Van del Avenne (1998: 120) mentioned, “migration leads

to a reorganization of the linguistic identity of the individual”. We similarly

hypothesise that students’ mobility reorganizes the linguistic situation by

11

attributing new social functions to the languages they speak. Students’

movement changes the social function of language.

In relation to this, four research questions emerge.

RQ1: How is the sociolinguistic situation of the students’ home countries

organized as opposed to the situation of the host country (Spain)?

Throughout this paper, we will separate languages used in the home

countries from languages spoken in the host country. We will also be

examining the functional distribution of languages in this multilingual

environment.

RQ2: What are the typical sociolinguistic problems faced by the students?

RQ3: How do students manage the languages they use in social interaction?

Otherwise, it is reasonable to believe that if mobility may ascribe new

social functions to languages, then it may be plausible that the same

mobility has modified the way Erasmus Mundus students perceive the

languages surrounding them. In other words, mobility affects the students’

attitudes towards the language they speak.

RQ4: What are their attitudes towards those languages? Having brought

order into this setting, we will be evaluating the students’ language

attitudes using a Likert scale.

1.2. ORGANISATION OF THE STUDY

In The chapter above, we have presented the topic of the study, narrowing

down the subject. Chapter 2 presents the theoretical framework that

consists of stating the primary aims of the ecology of language, its link

with sociolinguistic phenomena such as diglossia, code switching, and

language attitude. Chapter 3 presents the methodology applied, the sample,

12

and the methods used, particularly the questionnaires and the interview. It

also includes the description of the experiment. The data and analysis of the

survey are presented in chapter 4. Finally, chapter 5 contains a summary

and conclusion.

CHAPTER II: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

This chapter is concerned with the theoretical approach adopted in order to

carry out the intended research.

2.1. ECOLOGY OF LANGUAGES IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE

CONSTALLATIONS OF LANGUAGES: THE GRAVITATIONAL MODEL

Ecology of languages is a term developed by Einar Haugen in the 1970s.

He defined it as “a study of the interaction between any given language and

its environment (quoted by Calvet, 2006:9). In 1994, Celso Alvarez

Caccano stressed that ecology in Haugen’s view was limited to the field of

production of knowledge about a language. According to Caccano,

Haugen does not add any proposal for ecolinguistic action aimed at the

management of Glotto diversity (see Calvet, 2006:23).

Furthermore, quoting Caccano, Calvet added:

“if ecology is the science that studies the relations between

organisms and their surroundings, linguistic ecology studies the

relations between languages and their surroundings, i.e. first and

foremost the relationships between languages themselves, and then

the relation between languages and society”(Calvet,2006:8)

The concept came to be a relevant framework when it aimed to examine the

language communicative function in society. In this perspective, ecology of

13

languages means a metaphor model that considers languages’ lives as

similar to species’ lives, organized by series of embedding.

In Calvet’s view “the basic idea is thus the practice which constitutes

languages, on the one hand, and their environment, on the other, form an

ecolinguistic system, in which languages multiply, interbreed, vary,

influence each other mutually or converge”(Calvet, 2006: 24).

The concern of the present study is not to control how languages multiply

as a result of the environment, but it seeks to look at how languages

influence each other in the multilingual context. In this sense, it is

preferable to use the gravitation which is an application of the ecology

language.

2.2. GRAVITATION AND DIGLOSSIA EMBEDDED IN THE ERASMUS

MUNDUS SETTING

Many scholars (Leconte, 2010; Calvet, 2000, 2006, Graddol, 1997) believe

that languages in the world are unevenly distributed according to the social

function they fulfil. In fact, Graddol (1997) developed a pyramid model to

highlight the hierarchy of languages in the world. Likewise, Swaan (1993)

invented the gravitational model that was modified by Calvet in 2006.

From the two points of view, multilingualism is a kind of pyramid with

four levels governed by the additive bilingualism (or diglossia embedded).

According to Calvet (2006:24), in [this] an eco-linguistic system, languages

coexist, multiply, interbreed, vary, and influence one another mutually,

complete or converge. They are also interconnected by embedded

bilingualism. This linguistic organization allows some languages to be

more powerful than others. For instance, while English becomes

economically and globally the strongest world language, other languages

14

such as Creole (in Cape Verde), Teke (in the Republic of Congo) remain

weaker languages.

In this context, the gravitational model brings a hierarchy into this unequal

distribution. Accordingly, some languages occupy the higher range (i.e.

English). Others belong to the super central range (i.e. Spanish, French).

Others again belong to the central range (i.e. Wolof). In the last scale, there

are languages belonging to what is the so-called peripheral field (i.e.,

Changana in Mozambique). In other words, certain languages like English,

French and Chinese, are highly evaluated while others are largely ignored.

Following this Calvet asserts:

“Even if all languages are equal in the eyes of the linguist, the

world’s languages are in fact fundamentally unequal. All languages

do not have the same value, and their inequality is at the heart of

the way they are organized across the world”. (op.cit: 297)

In this regard, many factors can account for this language distribution such

as economic, demographic, and technological ones.

In a similar way, Leconte (2010) believes that there are some languages

that seem to be “elephant” languages. She means languages of high value,

used by a billion people around the world, the languages of national and

international integration. Others are getting reduced and call them

“mosquito” languages in the world. This last group is constituted by

languages spoken by more or less a hundred people, usually mother

tongues, in the developing countries. Theoretically speaking, the scenario

of stronger versus weaker languages may happen in the Erasmus Mundus

context.

In the context of Erasmus Students, the concept of ecology is applied in the

sense that there are twofold relationships. Firstly, there exists the relation

15

within languages (stronger versus weaker). Secondly there is the

relationship students-languages (their attitudes towards the languages they

speak). As is known, from the home countries to this host (Spain) this

relationship cannot remain the same because of the complexity of

multilingualism.

2.2.1. THE GRAVITATIONAL MODEL AND CODE-SWITCHING

Code-switching is a sociolinguistic phenomenon that happens to language

speakers in a language contact situation. Coulmas (1998:6) believes that:

“The preconditions and consequences of language contact involve

a range of interesting phenomena, social and linguistic, which have

both micro- and macro-aspects. The following can all be viewed as

consequences of language contact: Language generation, i.e.,

pidginization and creolization; language degeneration, i.e.,

language displacement; and novel patterns of language use, i.e.,

code-switching”4.

In fact, Code-Switching (henceforth Cs), appears in the speaker’s

behaviour; it consists of unconsciously shifting from one language onto

another or by inserting one linguistic feature from one language into

another. It may occur in a monolingual context between two or more

varieties of a language as well as in a bilingual (or multilingual) context

between two (or more) languages. For instance Bullock and Toribio

highlight that:

4Coulmas, F. (1998). "Introduction." The Handbook of Sociolinguistics. Coulmas,

Florian (Ed). Blackwell Publishing. Blackwell Reference. Online.

28December2007<http://www.blackwellreference.com/subscriber/tocnode?id=g978063

1211938_chunk_g97806312119382

16

All speakers selectively draw on the language varieties in their

linguistic repertoire, as a dialect by their intention and the needs of

speech participants and conversational setting. Even monolinguals

are capable of shifting between the linguistic registers and the

dialects they command and, as such there are parallels that can be

drawn between monolingual and bilingual language. (Bullock and

Toribio, 2009: 2).

A number of reasons deploy this phenomenon. The speaker may shift from

one variety to another to achieve particular discursive aims, among others

(ethnic identity or solidarity). In this sense, Cs phenomena are related to the

speakers’ language attitudes and competence in using both codes (the

initial one and the target one).

However, literature on Cs has recently paid more attention to bilingual

contexts. Most studies, then, sustain the idea that Cs usually occurs when

speakers switch between two languages. Fewer studies, however, attempt

to pay attention to phenomena in which an individual can speak more than

two languages. In the case of Erasmus students, for instance, each student

is a native of a multilingual country. He or she is capable of speaking at

least two languages before leaving its home country. Then, after learning a

foreign language (or languages) he apparently becomes multilingual. In this

case regarding the set of interaction, he can shift from one language to

more languages.

Bullock and Toribio (2009: 6) assert that “Cs should not be confused with

diglossia described as a community where languages or language varieties

are functionally compartmentalized”. We believe that this point of view

makes the notion of Cs a bit unclear since linguistic reality admits that

equality between languages is almost impossible. In every situation of

language contact some languages are given more power than others. In

17

other words, while some languages occupy a high level and fulfil high

social functions, others remain in the lower level and play intermediate

social roles. Even within the same language styles, accents, and register

follow the same rules. The same rules apply for the same languages styles,

accents, and register. That is the reason why we believe that code-

switching, diglossia and language attitudes are interrelated sociolinguistic

phenomena.

2.2.2. GRAVITATION AND DIGLOSSIA

In 1930s, William Marçais defined diglossia as "a linguistic situation where

two linguistic systems coexist in an area. In this coexistence, one of the two

systems has a lower socio-political status."

In North American literature, Charles A. Ferguson5 introduced the term

diglossia for the reporting situation where two languages coexist in

completing additional communicative functions. Such situations were

German-speaking Switzerland, Greece, Haiti and the Arab Countries.

Then it should be born in mind that the term diglossia concerns two

linguistic systems playing different social and communicative functions.

Marie Louise Moreau (1997) points out, "the merit of Ferguson was to

show that equality between languages is impossible. Even between

prestigious languages such as English and French in Quebec there have

been always a high variety and low variety.”

This view is shared by Calvet (2001)6 who assumes that:

5An article 'Diglossia' appeared in the World magazine in 1959 6Actes du Colloque international : Trois espaces linguistiques face aux défis de la

mondialisation, Paris, 20-21 mars 2001

18

"Multilingualism is also a source of conflict; we meet all forms of

competition between languages, particularly in vehicular function.

Multilingualism is finally a factor of "domination"; some languages

are used in "high" and other functions in the "low" services, as

proposed by the diglossic model Ferguson. "

Therefore, it is important to notice that the diglossic situation is a conflict

because this phenomenon occurs when the languages in contact have

different functions. However, Moreau (1997) analyzes the African

sociolinguistic situations. She reveals that more than two languages are in a

contact situation in many countries in Africa. These languages also play

different roles in social life. In this case, these conditions are brought to

cases of embedded or juxtaposed diglossia.

According to Moreau, embedded diglossia is diglossia under diglossia. In

other words, when there are two or more diglossia facts, this is called

embedded diglossia. In Africa, for instance, one can observe a case of

diglossia between French versus Lingua Franca (Bambara, Wolof, Kituba,

etc.), on the one hand, these Lingua Franca and other vernacular languages

in the other hand. Calvet states that

"The African continent provides many examples of the in vivo

administration of multilingualism resulting in the emergence of

vehicular languages. There are identified many cases of

"diglossia", "triglossia" or "quadriglossia". That is to say, cases of

the functional distribution of applications between different

languages or more forms of the same language (...). “(Calvet, 2001,

March)

This position is widely assumed by Leconte for whom "many languages

may create an identity conflict for a teenager." Leconte thinks that in the

Francophone world, all languages are not on the same footing. That is the

19

reason why she describes some languages like "mosquito" and others like

"Elephant". One of the conclusions drawn from this study is "there is in

African countries a trifunctional language distribution: the official

language, Lingua Franca and vernacular (identity) language".

However, we may emphasize that the concepts of bilingualism and any

diglossia should work well in the Erasmus Mundus setting. Students use

the languages in the super central range depending on the hearer. For

instance, the French language is exclusively used among Francophone

students. All the students use the Spanish language within them in Madrid.

Portuguese is only used among Luzophone speakers. In these three cases,

only bilingualism is exclusive. In contrast, when they are addressing their

peers, or parents, from the home countries, they use the central or

peripheral languages alternatively. As can be seen, between super central

and central languages,the first case of diglossia is noted, on the one hand;

between central and peripheral languages another instance of diglossia is

noted. These two diglossia form an embedded diglossia.

2.2. ATTITUDINAL APPROACH OF LANGUAGE IN LANGUAGE

CONSTELLATIONS

The study of language attitudes is a long and rich history that began in the

1930s. Thomas Hatherley Pear is considered a pioneer in this area of

investigation. In 1931, Pear published “Voice and Personality”. In his

study, he questioned whether the voice was capable of yielding sufficient

cues for reliable and valid personality assessment. Since then, there have

been several scholars’ publications around the world (Malender, 2003,

Cargile and Giles, 1997). These studies fit two major approaches dealing

with language attitudes, the mentalist and the behaviourist views. What

20

makes a difference between both approaches is the number of components

related to each framework.

According to the behaviourist viewpoints, attitudes can be provided

directly by the responses people make to the social situation, which implies

behaviour. This approach only has one component: the affective one.

Thus, this approach comes to be scientifically underused since this kind of

behaviour is much easier to observe and to analyse, but it cannot be used to

predict other kinds of behaviour (Fasold 1984: 147). In contrast, the

mentalist view is the most represented one. It has three parts, the cognitive

(individual belief system, knowledge and perception), affective (emotion

reaction and feelings) and conative (behavioural intentions and interest). As

a result, according to Obiols cited by Melander (2003:5), it makes a

prediction of linguistic behaviour possible.

The present paper analyses language attitudes not in the sense of speaker-

listener but in the sense that any multilingual speaker perceives differently

all the languages he can speak. Calvet claims that:

“Languages exist because and since speakers believe in them,

because they have ideas about them and images of them, ideas and

images that constitute the second part of our system, namely

representations” (Calvet, 2006:7).

Using the Likert scale, we would like to group the languages the students

recognize as associated with solidarity versus those associated with status

according to their value. That is the reason why both approaches are

preferred since our purpose is not only to predict, but also to evaluate

students’ linguistic behaviour.

However, it is important to remember that the study of attitude is a matter

of many scientific fields such as psychology, social psychology, cultural

21

anthropology, ethnography, education and sociolinguistics. In the particular

case of sociolinguistics, the importance of the study of language attitudes

can be both to evaluate in order to predict a given linguistic behaviour.

As hypothesized above, the gravitational model emphasizes a connexion of

languages to one another. In this language galaxy, some of them not only

assume the prestigious function, but they are also highly perceived as

prestigious languages, whereas others assume the solidarity function and

are negatively perceived. That is what we will be examining in this study.

Language attitudes are the feelings people have about their language

variety or the language varieties of others. It is easy to agree with most

scholars who believe that the economic situation in the world may change

potential speakers’ attitudes to languages. If this is true, the Erasmus

Mundus students’ attitudes towards languages are not a stupid and

gratuitous issue. Their attitudes are related to their needs and interests.

That the reason is why Calvet states:

“[...] Moreover, this ‘selection’ is relatively limited: human beings

are not always able to choose their languages, their choice is

determined first and foremost by the milieu in which they find

themselves, by the languages that coexist in this niche and then by

their needs, and very little by the typological situation of the

coexisting languages” (Calvet 2006: 58).

2.3. THE CONSTELLATION OF LANGUAGES

The term constellation was used for the first time by Swaan in 1993 to

clarify the situation in which ex-URSS language speakers lived. The idea

behind it was that every bilingual person in the ex-URSS had had Russian

as a first (L1) language followed by L2, L3, and L4. In this perspective, L1

was the central language and the others peripheral languages. In 2006,

22

Calvet decontextualised the model in order to clarify the situation of world

languages in the world. According to Calvet, “Swaan considers the set of

world languages as a vast galaxy and suggests that these languages are

linked to one another by a bilingual speaker” (Calvet, 2006:59). Likewise,

we may emphasize that in the case of Erasmus Mundus each student has a

“vernacular or mother tongue” as a central language around which

peripheral languages gravitate or revolve.

Calvet considers Swaan’s model to be simple and proposes a much more

complex one. He defines gravitation:

“As a phenomenon by which two bodies attract each other with a

force proportional to the product of their mass and inversely

proportional to the distance between them. It is more or less the

same linguistic constellation.” (Calvet, 2006)

From Calvet’s perspective, beyond the two language categories, two others

were added. The model comprises four levels7. The first level corresponds

to the position of English in the world. Native English speakers show a

tendency towards monolingualism. The Second level corresponds to

languages such as Spanish, Chinese, French, Hindi, Malay, Arabic, and

Swahili. People who have one of these as their first language show a

tendency either to monolingualism or to bilingualism.

In Clavet’s view, two kinds of bilingualism should work within these

levels: horizontal and vertical. In this case, bilingualism within two

languages on the same level is called horizontal bilingualism. Whereas, the

7Level 1 being a hyper-central: English. Level 2 being super-central languages: French,

Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Arabic, Hindi, Malay, Russian. Level3 being central

languages: Wolof, kituba, Swahili, Bambara in Africa, Quechua in South America,

Czech, in Armenian in Eastern Europe, etc. Level 4 being peripheral languages: Serere,

Creole, etc. (Calvet, 2006: 61)

23

bilingualism that occurs between two languages pertaining on two levels is

called vertical bilingualism.

The third level corresponds to languages such as Bambara Tetun, Wolof,

Quechua and so forth. These languages are sometimes called vehicular

languages or lingua Franca in Africa, South America and Eastern Europe

(Armenian). The speakers of these languages show a tendency to

bilingualism with a language of level 2 (bilingual vertical) or with a

language of level 1 (double vertical bilingual or diglossia). For the fourth

level, the speakers of the languages show a tendency to vertical

multilingualism.

Applying this model to the Erasmus Mundus context, the constellation

model should work better. Erasmus students are speakers of languages at

level 4. In this sense, they show a tendency towards horizontal and vertical

plurilingualism. All of them can speak one language at level 4 and at least

two languages at level 3. Some of them can speak one language at levels 3,

2, and 1.

However, when Calvet developed the model, his objective was to apply it

to immobile societies. All the examples given in his book are based on

these kinds of societies. He did not offer any explanation of how to

implement the model in mobile societies. In the case of mobility, the model

becomes more complex, and some language social functions change.

Despite this drawback, the model seems to be suitable and pertinent to the

present study.

24

CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents the participants who took place in the study, the

research sample, method and procedure to collect data.

3.1. PARTICIPANTS

The Erasmus Mundus students are a group of students selected within

Erasmus scholarship programs to study abroad. The participants in the

present study are restricted to the students living in Madrid and studying at

the UCM. Some of them have been living in Madrid for two years; others

since August 2014.

The main characteristic is that the students constitute both a heterogeneous

and homogeneous social and linguistic community. It is heterogeneous

because students come from different countries. They have different

linguistic and socio-cultural backgrounds. Some of them come from Africa;

others come from the Caribbean and the Pacific. Meanwhile, they

constitute a homogeneous linguistic community because they have the

same aim (to study) and stay in Madrid more or less the same amount of

time. They also form a new social community by sharing the same

experience and a linguistic community by having Spanish as a new

language.

3.2. SAMPLE

The term sample means limited number of observations selected from

a population on a systematic or random basis, which yield generalizations

25

about the population8. In this order, the number of Erasmus Mundus

students who enrolled in the academic year 2014-2015 at the University

Complutense of Madrid was twenty five. Although at the first sight the

sample can be seen rather reduced, these twenty five students made up

100% of the total population of the UCM Erasmus Mundus students.

However, when gathering data, only twenty out of the twenty five students

agreed and were kind enough to fill in the two questionnaires. As a result,

this percentage eventually constituted the sample for our study.

Furthermore, being a tiny sample, one research method seemed insufficient

to gather in-depth evidence. Accordingly, the interview method became

relevant in order not to focus on a quantitative analysis alone but also on a

qualitative analysis.

3.3. RESEARCH METHOD: QUESTIONNAIRES AND INTERVIEW

In this section, we will present the research methods used, and the

procedure followed to collect data.

3.3.1. QUESTIONNAIRE ONE

The type of question was based on Calvet and Edmond’s (1999) categories.

These authors distinguish two kinds of questions for sociolinguistic

investigation, questions related to content and those related to form. The

first type refers to open-ended rather than closed questions. This type of

question allowed the participants to provide as much information as

possible in their answers (i.e., why it is good or bad to speak several

languages?)

8 http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/statistical-

sample.html#ixzz3YQBvMSBI having access on April 26th 15:27

26

However, the second one refers to closed-ended questions. These questions

implied two possibilities in the answer (the yes/ no; male or female). In this

paper, it was attractive to combine both ways, the questions related to the

content that allowed participants to give more information than with the

closed question alone.

The questionnaire had fifteen questions organized into three essential

sections. Such sections were the participant’s identity, the participant’s

linguistic background, and the participants’ current linguistic situation in

Spain.

3.3.2. QUESTIONNAIRE TWO

After the general questionnaire had been designed and distributed, another

questionnaire mainly focusing on linguistic attitudes was elaborated in

order to evaluate the students’ language attitudes.

In fact, the Likert scale is a test developed in order to measure people’s

attitude towards social phenomena. It is a technique for the measurement of

attitudes. Likert (1932) proposed scale is designed for the assessment of

survey respondents’ attitudes. As Murray9 mentions:

“This instrument (Linkert scale) usually requires respondents to

give their level of agreement or disagreement, which can range

from 1 to 5, to the statements/questions/items relating to the

attribute/trait being measured”(Murray, 2013: 2).

Indeed, the data used below are from a survey of twenty students that

measured the effect of mobility on student’s language attitudes. The

students were instructed to tick one-point scales ranging from 1=strongly

disagree to 5=strongly agree.

9 Murray, J. (2013). Likert Data: What to Use, Parametric or Non-Parametric? In International Journal of Business and Social Science Vol. 4 No. 11; September.

27

According to Malender (2003) one of the methodological debates regarding

the study of language attitudes concerns the use of direct and indirect

methodologies. However, without dealing in depth with this historical and

theoretical discussion, the data analyzed in the present study were collected

using the direct and indirect methods. This choice was motivated by the

purpose of the present study, which consists of examining the

sociolinguistic problems faced by students in mobility. Thus, in the generic

questionnaire (Q1), “open questions” were designed in order to allow

students more freedom to provide as much information as possible.

However, in the particular questionnaire (Q2), essentially focused on

language attitudes, a scale of evaluation was designed. This questionnaire

was designed as part of the auto-evaluation of languages by the

participants. Someone may argue that any multilingual person is aware of

how to arrange language regarding its value. For instance, in Middle

English, during the Norman Conquest (1066), French became the language

of the nobility while English remained spoken among the lower class and

Latin was the main language of the church. As a result, any person living in

England at that time was aware of the different value of English, Latin and

French. For that reason, four different adjectives could be used to qualify

these languages. Such adjectives are useful, prestigious, beautiful and nice.

Though let us examine the different meanings of the adjectives chosen in

the present study.

In the first place10, “useful” describes languages that can be used for a

practical purpose or in several ways. Next, “prestigious” qualifies

languages that inspire respect and admiration; languages that have high

status. Thirdly, the adjective “beautiful “describes languages that people

10http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/online

28

feel aesthetically pleased by. Lastly, the adjective “nice” qualifies

languages that are attractive when speaking them. That is to assume people

are proficient in many languages while recognizing that all the languages

cannot be classified at the level on the scale regarding their respective

values. One language can be perceived as useful in one domain while

another is nice in another domain. Therefore, the first two adjectives

describe the status of language, whereas the last two adjectives describe

languages related to participants’ identities or solidarity between speakers.

3.3.3. INTERVIEW

To examine in depth both quantitative and analytic aspects, another

research method seemed appropriate. Thus, a short interview was initiated

just after the student filled in the Q2. The interview was conducted using a

semi-structure format and the pre-planned questions were used similarly

with questions that were used in the Q1.

The procedure consisted of question-answer recording. Participants were

informed about the face-to-face interview, but they were not informed a

priori about the recording to avoid the observer paradox. The Motorola

XT1032 mobile phone served as an audiotape during the ongoing meeting

and interaction. About 15 minutes constituted the length of time spent with

each participant. Unfortunately, only 14 of the 20 participants were

interviewed because some of them had finished their mobility, but we

spoke with at least one student from each of the nine countries. In the end,

we followed a procedure used by Maíz-Arévalo et al., (2013:744)11. The

procedure consisted of using “Facebook itself (the ‘wall’) to inform

participants about the research”.

11Maíz-Arévalo, C. and García-Gómez, A. “You look terrific!' Social evaluation and

relationships in online compliments” Downloaded fromhttp://dis.sagepub.com/at

UnivComplutense de Madrid on March 20, 2014

29

By using these two research methods, we expected:

- To collect data directly by using the interview method;

- To diversify sources and techniques from which data were collected;

- To collect large amounts of information.

- To supplement and extend the knowledge about individuals, their

thoughts, feelings and behaviours, meanings, interpretations.

- Moreover, to make the data reliable.

3.4. PROCEDURE

As Deckert and Vickers (2011:177) pointed out “when we begin the

process of collecting data for a sociolinguistics project, we have to think

about how we will observe and record the people that we are studying”.

Following this statement, three methods were found suitable.

First, Q1 was sent to the participants through their e-mail addresses in

November 2014. 20 of 26 (76% of overall) students sent back their

completed questionnaires. Second, Q2 and the interview, some students

were interviewed at their flats, others at the central UCM library during

March 2015. Once the data were collected, we used the website

https://transcribe.wreally.com/login for the transcription.

30

CHAPTER VI: DATA ANALYSIS

The data come from two questionnaires involving twenty students and an

interview of 14 audio recordings. This paper represents a first attempt to

provide a description of the linguistic counterpart in the process of mobility

when previous languages are different from the target language.

4.1. PARTICIPANTS’ LINGUISTIC BACKGROUND

This paper takes its point of departure from Veronique Rey & Cecile Den

Avenne (1998: 120)12 analysis of languages in migration context and

applies to the flux of students in mobility. As is well-known, Africa (2138

languages), the Caribbean (23 languages) and the Pacific (1313 languages)

countries13 are regions characterized by sharing the largest number of

living languages in the world, compared to other zones. Consequently, the

multilingual aspect remains one of the main characteristics of people from

countries situated in those regions. Following that order, our participants

have admitted an ability to speak two or more languages. In Table 1, we

present participants, countries and languages as they responded in the Q2.

12Rey, Véronique et Cécile van den Avenne. "Langue et identité en situation migratoire:

identité ethnique, identité linguistique. ‘A chacun son bambara’." Clio en Afrique 4

(1998). 13http://www.ethnologue.com/browse/countries having access May, 1st 2015 23:20

31

Table1: Organization of student’s multilingualism by home country

N°

Gender H C HCL

1 F Congo-Brazzaville French, Lingala and Laari

2 F Rwanda Kinyarwanda, French and English

3 F Cape Verde Creole and Portuguese

4 M Angola Kikongo, Kimbundu, Portuguese

5 M Congo-Brazzaville French, Lingala and Kituba

6 M Haiti Creole, French, English

7 M Congo-Brazzaville Laari, Kituba and Lingala

8 M Cameroun French and English

9 M Mozambique Portuguese, English and Changana (local language)

10 M Timor Oriental Tetun and Malayu

11 M Senegal Serere, Wolof, French, English

12 F Senegal Wolof, Serere, Diola, Peul, Soce, Soninke

13 F Cape Verde We only speak Portuguese and Creole

14 M Senegal French, Pular and Wolof

15 M Mozambique Portuguese, Tsongay and English

16 M Cameroon French, English and Baasa

17 M Mozambique Portuguese and Macua

18 M Papua New Guinea English, Pidgin, Angar

19 M Mozambique Changana, Choopi, Ronga, Portuguese and Spanish, Solo

and Choua

20 M Mozambique Portuguese, Changana

Several possible analyses need to be done when looking at the table 1. The

first concerns the participants’ mother tongues. According to the

participants’ claims, their mother tongues are not any European language,

even if those languages had been introduced into their countries before they

were born. Their mother tongues are, in general, one of the local languages.

Such local languages are Laari, Kinyarwanda, Creole, Kimbundu, and

Kituba. In this respect, these languages constituted what Calvet (2006: 59)

called the centre of the “constellation”. In other words, as multilingual

people, the students have their L1s or local languages as the point of

32

departure. As an example, most of them admitted not having European

languages as a first language but a local language.

The second analysis is concerned the number of languages they could

speak before coming to Europe. As mentioned earlier, more or less two

languages characterize each student. They have stated that they could speak

more than two languages before coming to Spain. Table1 also confirms this

fact: the students are effectively multilingual.

The third analysis is concerned with the presence of European languages

such as French, Portuguese, and English. Their presence in these parts of

the world reveals the traces of the long period of Western domination. They

remind us of the historical relationship that had existed sometime between

European and ACP countries. Without dealing in detail with that aspect, let

us state that one of the traces that have remained visible from the slavery

and colonization in the ACP countries is the presence of the European

languages. Thus, in table1, we can see that those languages still fulfil the

principal roles in administration, education, and politics in ACP countries.

As an example, English is an official language in Papua New Guinea;

French is an official language in Cameroon, Congo, Haiti and Portuguese is

the official language in Mozambique and Angola.

To conclude this subsection, let us otherwise argue that the Calvet model of

four levels may be visible in table 1. In the first place, English belongs to

level1. In the second place, French and Portuguese as languages belong to

level 2. In the third place Wolof, Lingala, and Kituba belong to level3.

Finally, in fourth place we have the following languages in level 4:

Kinyarwanda, Kikongo, Angor, and others.

However, the Spanish language is not identified in table 1. That means that

the ACP countries included in the present study constitute the so-called

Anglophone, Francophone and Luzophone countries. The Spanish language

33

is not part of the linguistic niche in the home countries of our participants.

As can be observed, French, English, and Portuguese are principal

languages and the lingua franca of people in those countries. Others such as

Pidgin, Wolof, Lingala, and Kituba are languages spoken by people from

different ethnic groups in ACP countries to interact with one another.

Others, such as Laari and Serere constitute what can be called identity

languages or ethnical languages.

4.2. STUDENTS’ CURRENT SITUATION IN MADRID

The current situation is characterized by the presence of the Spanish

language, which is added to the rich and natural multilingual niche. In table

2; we present the participants’ languages spoken in Madrid.

In table 2 is Compared to table 1, first, we can observe that Spanish is one

of the principal languages spoken by the participants. It is spoken at home,

at university and in the street. This kind of immersion makes Spanish a

strong language in students’ memories/minds. Secondly, besides Spanish, it

may be observed that other languages identified in table1 continue to be

used in Madrid. That means that the participants are not only multilingual

in their home countries but also in the host country. As an example,

languages like French, Portuguese, and English are spoken in Madrid.

However, according to the context, Spanish, and other European languages

do not fulfil the same role or social function for the students. Firstly,

English, French and Portuguese are official languages in ACP countries.

This traditional role played in the students’ linguistic backgrounds is

changing in the new environment (in Madrid). These three languages come

to be a kind of vernacular spoken only by participants who can speak them.

For instance, French is only spoken by and among Francophone students.

Luzophone students speak Portuguese. Finally, Anglophone students use

34

English to talk to one another. Besides, Spanish assumes the role of Lingua

Franca among all of the participants in Madrid. That fits our hypothesis put

forward before. The functional distribution has changed.

Table 2: The current students’ situation in Spain

N° Gender FCL

1 F Spanish and English

2 F Kinyarwanda, French and Spanish

3 F Spanish, Portuguese and Creole

4 M Creole and Spanish

5 M Spanish and French

6 M Spanish, English, French and Creole

7 M Laari, Kituba, French, Spanish, and English

8 M English, Spanish, French, and Basa'a

9 M Portuguese, English, Spanish and Changana

10 M Spanish, English, and Tetum

11 M Spanish, English, French, Serere, and Wolof

12 F Spanish, English, Wolof, and Serere

13 F Creole, Portuguese, and Spanish

14 M Spanish, French, Wolof and pular

15 M Spanish, Portuguese, English, Changana

16 M French, Spanish,

17 M Portuguese, Macau and Spanish

18 M English, Spanish Pidgin, Angar

19 M Portuguese, Spanish,Changana, Choopi, Ronga, Solo and Choua

20 M Portuguese, Spanish, Changana

To put it briefly, Erasmus Mundus students experience a change in ongoing

multilingualism from their home countries to the host country. However as

Clynes claimed “the study of multilingualism embraces the study of the

language systems in contact, the functions of the languages in society, the

groups or communities in contact, and the speech of individuals using more

than one language. These facets should not be seen in isolation from one

another. They are part of a puzzle which can be disentangled only by

35

seeing them as part of a whole” (Clynes, 1998: 6)14. Let us therefore

closely explore those facets sequentially.

4.3. LANGUAGES AND SOCIAL FUNCTIONS

This subsection addresses the social function of languages in relation to

their acquisition.

In fact, it seems ironic to deal with the social function of languages without

being interested in their acquisition. In the 1980s, Krashen (quoted in

Gerakoupoulou, 2011: 6)15 distinguished between acquiring a language and

learning a language. In Krashen’s view, “the competence of acquiring a

language is a subconscious process that applies both to children and adults

while the learning of a language is a conscious procedure that is

accompanied by a series of rules”(Cited in Gerakoupoulou, 2011). Thus,

before analyzing social functions of languages, it is advisable to classify

those languages into two categories, languages learned, and languages

acquired. In a similar perspective, Calvet (2006), instead of using learning

and acquired languages, prefers “spontaneous acquisition” versus

“programmed acquisition”.

4.3.1. LEARNED LANGUAGES VERSUS ACQUIRED LANGUAGES

Table 3 presents both languages learned and languages acquired. These

languages were stated by the students when filling in Q1.

14CLYNE, M. (1998). "Multilingualism." The Handbook of Sociolinguistics. Coulmas,

Florian (Ed). Blackwell Publishing. Blackwell Reference Online. 28 December 2007

http://www.blackwellreference.com/subscriber/tocnode?id=g9780631211938_chunk_g

978063121193820 15Gerakoupoulou, O. (2011), Scaffolding oral interaction in a CLIL context: A

qualitative study. MA dissertation. Complutense University of Madrid.

36

Table3: Learned languages versus acquired languages

Learned languages or programmed acquisition Acquired languages or spontaneous acquisition

Spanish ( for all the students)

English (for Anglophone students)

French (for the Francophone students)

Portuguese (for the Luzophone students)

Kituba, Lingala, Laari (for Congolese students)

Wolof, Serere, Pular (Senegal)

Kinyarwanda (Rwanda)

Kincongo, Umbundu, Fiole (Angola)

Creole (Haiti, Green Cup)

Bassa, Marva, Mandara, (Cameron)

Changana, Macau (Mozambique)

Malayu, Tetun (Timor Oriental)

The necessary quantification of responses indicates that the languages

spoken by Erasmus Mundus students result from two processes of learning

and acquisition. About 90% of the languages are acquired. Among them,

Tetuan, Wolof, Creole; only 10% are languages learned. These learned

languages are, French, Spanish, Portuguese. As can be seen, the first

category belongs to the languages acquired as children while the second

group, are languages learned at school. That confirms Krashen’s two ways

of language acquisition. All of the students admitted that their first

languages were acquired not learned.

Concerning language families all learned languages are Indo-European

languages while the majority of acquired languages belong to other

language families. This fact is attributable to historical factors such as

slavery, trade, and colonization. The traces left by such factors are, for

instance, the Creole language birth and the high status of European

37

languages in ACP countries. In that way, the distinction between learned

and acquired languages can also be understood in parallel as they

distinguish between European and non-European languages. European

languages are learned, whereas non-European languages are acquired.

Figure 1: A picture of learned versus acquired languages in an Erasmus

Mundus context.

Finally, the following question emerges, what social functions are

performed by those languages in the Erasmus Mundus context? It can be

understood that a language assumes a social function when used to achieve

a particular purpose. Thus, any language used in the Erasmus context is a

tool for achieving the particular purpose. Let us situate the two categories

of Erasmus languages regarding their respective roles.

Acquired languages

Learned Languages

38

4.4. MULTILINGUALISM AND LANGUAGE ATTITUDES IN AN EM

SETTING

In this section, we will be examining students’ attitudes towards the

languages around them. As mentioned earlier, the evaluation of their

attitudes will be done through four adjectives of opinions.

4.4.1. USEFUL LANGUAGES

In this subsection, we attempt to examine how students rate a language. On

the Likert scale, there was a significant difference in evaluation of

languages concerning their utility. The Spanish language has been rated by

30% as very useful in the table below.

Table 4: Evaluation of languages regarding their utility (Q_1, Q_5, Q_9,

Q_13, Q_17, Q_21 see appendix).

---

Not at all Not very Neutral Somewhat Very TOTAL

Q_1

0,0% 15,0% 15,0% 40,0% 30,0% 100%

Q_5

0,0% 15,0% 40,0% 5,0% 40,0% 100%

Q_9

30,0% 0,0% 25,0% 5,0% 40,0% 100%

Q_13

25,0% 15,0% 20,0% 30,0% 10,0% 100%

Q_17

0,0% 10,0% 10,0% 15,0% 45,0% 100%

Q_21

0,0% 5,0% 20,0% 30,0% 40,0% 100%

Overall

9,2% 10,0% 21,7% 20,8% 34,2% 100%

In table 4 above, several possible analyses may be done. Firstly,

multilingualism is significantly evaluated much more positively as a useful

aspect. 34. 2% of students consider the phenomenon as very useful. 20, 8%

feel it is somewhat useful. 21, 7% of the students remain neutral. This

39

result coincides with some students’ statements collected through Q1. To

illustrate, let us look at the following extracts.

(1) “(Multilingualism) is important because I share different cultures;

understand people from other countries, and am understood by

others16.

(2) “Good, because it enables me to communicate with a lot of people

all over the world.”

However, 10. 0% rates the phenomenon as not very useful. 9, 2% believe

that it is useless.

Beyond this general view of multilingualism, let us examine the particular

aspect of students’ attitudes in depth. Although students’ attitudes to

multilingualism were favorably rated, it may be noted that those languages

are evaluate differently. Indeed, 30% of students believe that the Spanish

language is very useful; 40% consider it somewhat useful. Meanwhile,

French and English are ranked equally (40%). This means that Spanish is

not as useful as French, English and vernacular languages. The main reason

to explain this fact might be the difficulties the students faced when they

learned it and when they used it while interacting with native speakers. The

inability to speak the language fluently may lead to negative evaluations of

the language.

In the second place, other languages such as French and Portuguese have

been familiar for the students because of their status in their home

countries. They serve in several ways for the students. That is one reason

why they cannot be ranked on the same scale as Spanish, which they have

just learned.

16An Erasmus Mundus from Haiti.

40

In the third place, it may be argued that the fact of being a new language

learned can make the students compare its utility with the current situation

of English worldwide. Many of them have expressed a favourable desire to

learn English, as we will see later. These three possibilities of analysis

would be justified in the following subsection of prestigious languages.

However, the most useful languages in the table 4 are vehicular languages

(or lingua Franca of 45%). That may seem a strange aspect since these

languages are only spoken in some areas of ACP and in some cases

constitute the mother tongues of the students. They also constitute lingua

franca in countries such as Senegal (Wolof), Papua New Guinea (pidgin).

Lastly, their mothers’ tongues (vernacular languages) are as useful as

English and French. That may be explained by the attachment of the

students to their “roots”. In other words, this proves how strong L1 is in the

multilingual mind. To prove that, one of their responses, for instance,

claimed:

(3) “My children also need to learn Kinyarwanda because it is a

language that binds me to my roots. It is imperative to keep speaking

it.17

4.4.2. PRESTIGIOUS LANGUAGES

Just as with useful languages, in a multilingual context all languages cannot

be ranked as having the same status in the dimension of prestige. In the

Erasmus context, as in other given situations, participants’ answers were

different. First of all, most responses range languages as being somewhat

prestigious or very prestigious. In fact, instead of Portuguese and Spanish,

other languages are unevenly considered to be very prestigious beyond 40

percent. Secondly, French and Portuguese are regarded as not very

17An African student from Rwanda.

41

prestigious languages by 25% each. Finally, even if all participants do not

speak English or they do but not fluently, this language is highly (60%)

regarded as a prestigious language. In the table, 15%, consider Spanish as a

prestigious language; 60% regard English as prestigious; 45% consider

French a prestigious language. 15% think of Portuguese as paramount; 50

% believe vehicular languages are very prestigious and 45% think the same

of vernacular languages.

Table 5: Prestigious languages (Q_2, Q_6, Q_10, Q_14, Q_18, Q_22 see

appendix).

--- Not all Not very Neutral Somewhat Very TOTAL

Q_2 0,0% 5,0% 40,0% 40,0% 15,0% 100%

Q_6 0,0% 5,0% 20,0% 15,0% 60,0% 100%

Q_10 25,0% 5,0% 10,0% 15,0% 45,0% 100%

Q_14 25,0% 10,0% 20,0% 30,0% 15,0% 100%

Q_18 5,0% 10,0% 5,0% 10,0% 50,0% 100%

Q_22 0,0% 10,0% 20,0% 20,0% 45,0% 100%

Overall 9,2% 7,5% 19,2% 21,7% 38,3% 100%

The students regard English as a highly prestigious language. The evidence

in table 4 fits in part our argument that the lower percentage of Spanish is

due to its utility. The students attempt to compare Spanish with English in

terms of their respective value. In fact, English is the language of many

opportunities. People who speak English are widely considered as exposed

to the open world. This is one reason why students consider it more

prestigious than others. Another thing is that English is well-known as an

international and global language. This position of English in the world is

first and foremost the quest of its prestigious efficiency.

42

4.4.3. BEAUTIFUL LANGUAGES

The Oxford Dictionary of English defines “beautiful” as an adjective

meaning pleasing the senses or mind aesthetically. In a multilingual setting

some languages come to be ranked as beautiful languages. In table 6 below,

50% and 20% of students think that Spanish is somewhat beautiful while

20% think that Spanish is a very beautiful language. 30% and 35% think of

English respectively as a somewhat and very beautiful language. 20% and

25% think French to be somewhat beautiful and charming. 20% and 45%

think of vehicular languages as somewhat and very beautiful and, finally,

25% and 45% think of vernacular as somewhat and very beautiful

languages.

Table 6: Beautiful languages (Q_3, Q_7, Q_11, Q_15, Q_19, and Q_23See

Appendix).

--- Not all

Not

very Neutral Somewhat Very TOTAL

Q_3 0,0% 0,0% 30,0% 50,0% 20,0% 100%

Q_7 0,0% 10,0% 25,0% 30,0% 35,0% 100%

Q_11 20,0% 10,0% 10,0% 20,0% 40,0% 100%

Q_15 20,0% 10,0% 30,0% 15,0% 25,0% 100%

Q_19 5,0% 0,0% 10,0% 20,0% 45,0% 100%

Q_23 0,0% 10,0% 15,0% 25,0% 45,0% 100%

Overall 7,5% 6,7% 20,0% 26,7% 35,0% 100%

In table 6 above, vernacular and vehicular languages are seen as profoundly

beautiful languages. That means that these languages fulfil an aesthetical

role in this multilingual environment. They may not be as useful or

prestigious as French, English and Portuguese are. They are not spoken in

43

order to avail of any opportunities. They are useful because of their

aesthetic aspect even though some of them are not written. In other words,

they are excellent and interesting to speak. When comparing table 6 to

tables 4 and 5, things come to be clear to see the shift and consistency in

the student evaluation of vehicular and vernacular languages (45% or

more).

4.4.4. NICE LANGUAGES

Just as with beautiful languages, in the subsection related to nice languages,

participants evaluate some languages nicer than others. Such languages are

vernacular and vehicular (45% each of them).

Table 7: Nice languages (Q_4, Q_8, Q_12, Q_16, Q_20, Q_24 see

Appendix)

--- Not all Not very Neutral Somewhat Very TOTAL

Q_4 5,0% 10,0% 25,0% 35,0% 25,0% 100%

Q_8 0,0% 0,0% 40,0% 35,0% 25,0% 100%

Q_12 30,0% 0,0% 5,0% 25,0% 40,0% 100%

Q_16 25,0% 10,0% 25,0% 25,0% 15,0% 100%

Q_20 0,0% 5,0% 15,0% 20,0% 45,0% 100%

Q_24 0,0% 20,0% 15,0% 20,0% 45,0% 100%

Overall 10,0% 7,5% 20,8% 26,7% 32,5% 100%

To begin with, let us first highlight the lower percentages of European

languages and the higher scores for ACP languages in table7. Firstly, that

means that the acquired languages are seen as much more attractive than

learned languages. Perhaps this is because of the huge vocabulary the

students have of these languages. One has to admit that any language

speaker uses his mother tongue better than a foreign language. In this

44

respect, we need to underline that vernacular and vehicular languages are

sometimes used without distinction in some countries like Papua New

Guinea, Senegal, and others.

There are three main analytical points that we would like to draw from

these data and that are illustrated by the tables above. Firstly, when we

compare the four tables, we notice that the first two adjectives (useful and

prestigious) attribute more value to European languages than to ACP

languages. This can be illustrated with a look at the score for English,

Spanish, French, and Portuguese in the first two tables. The second

analytical point can be drawn out is the consistency of vehicular and

vernacular languages. These languages had scored almost the same value

on the four tables. They are always ranged between 40% and 50% as very

useful, prestigious, beautiful and lovely languages. In fact, this is not

strange for two reasons. On the one hand, these languages -specifically

vernacular languages- are the mother tongues for all the participants. By

being their mother tongues, they fulfil the identity function as we can

perceive in the answer to the following question “what language do you

feel comfortable speaking?

(4) I feel more comfortable in French, Wolof, and Toucouler18.

In this extract/case, it can be observed that the student can speak three

languages. One, of course, is the official language (French); others are a

vehicular and vernacular language. Instead of mentioning the two European

languages that she uses almost every day because she is living in Europe,

she prefers two Senegalese languages. On the other hand, the difference

between acquired and learned languages sometimes depends on the

proficiency in using the language. Spanish, English, Portuguese and French

represent L2 or L3 for Erasmus students. In this order, these languages

18An African student from Senegal.

45

cannot be spontaneously used as the case is for vehicular and vernacular

languages. The third point to be analyzed is the English score in the table

related to prestigious language. The importance of the English language is

today clearly visible. It is the strongest and, of course, the global language.

Its score (60%) as a prestigious language is not a surprise. Firstly, dealing

with Erasmus students implies talking about the elite from ACP countries.

Thus, as is well-known in the globalization of the world, the elite is a group

of upper and higher social class people. Then, the elite is includes people

who perhaps, now or someday will occupy upper and higher classes.

Besides, English, French, Portuguese and Spanish are mainly spoken by

upper and higher classes in respectively Anglophone, Francophone,

Luzophone and Hispanophone areas. Consequently, English comes to be an

issue for all Erasmus Mundus students. To illustrate that, let us take a look

at the following extracts.

(5) “I do not like Portuguese. I like English more because it is now an

international language, and I love that one day my children will

learn and speak it”.19

This Francophone student dislikes Portuguese not because Portuguese is a

harsh language but because, in today’s globalized world, Portuguese cannot

be compared to English. Portuguese presents fewer assets and opportunities

than English. That is one reason why the student expresses no desire to

learn or speak it. Note also that Francophone students do not think of

learning Portuguese and neither do Luzophone students wish to learn and

speak French.

Secondly, the fact of being students can explain why all the Erasmus

Mundus students believe that the English language is essential for scientific

research. Consequently, it makes sense to assert that English is an excellent

19 An African Student from Rwanda.

46

language. All of them need to learn or to improve their ability in English so

that they avail of the full opportunities offered by English. In the extracts

below, the participants openly express their attitude to English.

(6) “Yes, in fact, I would improve my English because of the scientific

documents. Almost all publications are written in English. Then, if I

want to work in any organization or whatever, it may appear that we

are a diversified public. Then it must be important for me to speak

English fluently. I must take some English classes during the next

holidays after my Master’s dissertation”20.

(7) “After Spanish I will surely learn English. I need to learn it. I know

some words, but I cannot build a sentence. I cannot speak”.

(8) “If I had a chance as you to study a Master’s in English, I would be

so proud because my country (Mozambique) is situated between

Anglophone countries where English is spoken. Then, in my country,

English is a language for work, to buy and sell commodities (to do

business). It allows you all opportunities to do everything you want.

To me, English is at the top. Even here in Spain, teachers give

articles written in English”21.

English offers assets inside and outside ACP countries in scientific

research, to get a job, to do business, and to travel abroad. That is one

reason why the participants think English is a useful and a prestigious

language. In the view of consideration, we can easily see the scores in table

4 (40%) and table 5 (60%). Besides this result, we have to argue that all the

Erasmus Mundus grantees from Luzophone, and Francophone areas have

expressed their desire to learn or to improve their English. In this last line,

we may assume that English is needed thanks to its status, whereas

20 An African student from Senegal 21An African student from Mozambique

47

vehicular and vernacular languages are languages that reflect the students'

identities.

4.5. LANGUAGE CONTACT AND SOCIOLINGUISTIC PHENOMENA

RESULTING IN EM SETTING

In this section, we identify different sociolinguistic problems that are

supposed to appear in the Erasmus context.

4.5.1. LANGUAGES AND CODE-SWITCHING

Cs is one of the most recurrent phenomena observed in the Erasmus

Mundus sociolinguistic context. It is observed in writing and speaking. To

understand this language contact phenomenon in the Erasmus setting, we

might refer to the Calvet (2006:59) constellation model to make it clear.

48

Figure 2: A Circle of Code-switching

The first consideration is the presence of five language levels instead of the

four developed by Calvet (2006:59). That is the one main characteristic of

the sociolinguistic situation in the Erasmus Mundus context. Spanish

becomes the new lingua franca, a target language for all of them. That is

the reason why we add an in-between level 4 and 3 (for the Spanish

language). In the first place, they started talking using languages at level 4

such as Kituba, Shanguan and Tetun. Then, in order to communicate with

people from other ethnic groups inside their homeland some of them have

learned another lingua franca, such as Wolof or Pidgin. Next, at school

they learned the ex-colonial languages, French, Portuguese, and English.

Recently, they have learned Spanish. As can be seen, the issue of language

contact is salient, and each language fulfils a specific social function. One

may argue that we do not have Indo-European languages only around them

in contact. In addition, we also have Indo-European in contact with other

language families. As an example, there are Bantu languages (for the

students from the Bantu area countries such as Congo, Cameroun, and

0123456789

Language of level 4:English (Papua New

Guinea, Haity)

Language in-Betweenlevel 4 and level 3:

Spanish

Languages of level 3:French, Portuguese

(Mozambique, Senegal,Timor, Anglola Republic

of Congo, Cameroon,Cape verde)

Languages of level 2:Creole, Wolof, Tetum,Pidgin, Kituba, Lingala

(All the countries)

Languages of level 1:Serere, angar, Laari,

Malayo, Baasa,Changana, kimbundu,Kinyarwanda (Senegal,Congo, Mozambique,

Angola, Camerou,…

49

Rwanda), Creole (for the students from CapeVerde), Atlantic and Mande

families (in the case of Senegal). Thus, Cs may manifest itself in different

levels and go far beyond what some scholars have called the insufficiency

of proficiency.

Code-switching as a language shift in a stretch of conversation or discourse

in a language is differently expressed by the Erasmus Mundus students. In

general, that phenomenon is observed more in languages at level 2. This

can be illustrated in the following extract:

(9) “I do mix between Spanish and Italian because I also learned

Italian. For example the Italian word "spoke" which means "speak" I

often used to express “habla” in Spanish. This is very common22.

(10) “All the time I mix Spanish and English words”23.

(11) Yes, sometimes... For example, when I am writing in French...,

sometimes I am on the phone with my family. I sometimes use Spanish

words instead of French or Wolof and the other way around. When I

speak Spanish, I use the French word24.

(12) To me, the real thing is opportunities because when speaking

several languages, it may allow several possibilities. The wrong thing is

confusing things. Sometimes you mix languages. For example, when I

am speaking in Spanish, I usually mix Portuguese words. Spontaneously

when you are speaking, you may introduce words from Portuguese into

the Spanish conversation25.

(13) “Much confusion, moreover, people who speak Portuguese

have more problems writing in Spanish than people who speak French.

Because the first impression we have is to think of similarities existing

22An African student from Rwanda 23 A Pacific student from Papua New Guinea 24 An African student from Senegal. 25A student from Timor- Lest

50

between Portuguese and Spanish. I am sorry for my teachers who have

to do an enormous amount of work on my writing. Dictionary. In the

street, I do not have many problems because it is a street vocabulary”.

From these extracts as featured in figure 2, Cs is general. All the students

admitted mixing languages, whether in speaking or in writing. On the other

hand, it might be noted that Cs does not occur between L1 and L2 of the

students. However, it occurs between the languages they had learned before

(French, Portuguese and English) and the new language (Spanish). This

may be justified as follows. Firstly, sociolinguists believe that one of the

causes of Cs is the lack of sufficient proficiency to go in the opening

language. That might be true when all the students assert that when writing

in Spanish, they sometimes introduce Portuguese or French words instead.

That usually happens when they lack Spanish words. Bullock et al. are

right when highlighting Cs in the following terms: “Cs comprises a broad

range of contact phenomena, and it is difficult to characterize definitively.

Its linguistic manifestation may extend from the insertion of single words to

the alternation of languages for a larger segment of discourse. It is

produced by bilinguals of differing degrees of proficiency who reside in

various types of language contact setting, and as a consequence their Cs

patterns may not be uniform (Bullock et al.., 2009:2).

Cs may, in this sense, effectively be understood as insufficient proficiency

in the target language. The extracts (9, 10, 11, 12, and13) mentioned above

might serve as examples. The students admit difficulties in writing and

speaking Spanish. In other words, they use their linguistic backgrounds to

solve difficulties occurring in the Spanish language, as highlighted in figure

2.

However, Cs is not only a simple result of insufficient proficiency since

one Francophone student stated that when communicating with parents

51

from her home country, she usually code switches between French, Wolof,

and Serere. That is not because she lacks proficiency in the three languages

but because being able to speak several languages she has a choice to make

in order to fulfil or to express her thought. In that way, switching becomes

a matter of a simple choice. As can be seen, her mother tongue is Serere.

Wolof (in Senegal) is a Lingua Franca between people from different

ethnic groups. Then, French is the official and school language. In this

perspective, Cs is understood as the result of the language choice. This

decision is related to language abundance and the sufficiency proficiency

of interlocutors involved in the conversation.

It may be reasonable to assume that multilingual individuals dispose of

several degrees of language proficiency in languages they use daily.

Sometimes language choices, attitudes, and the feeling of identity may

cause the Cs phenomenon. In the Erasmus Mundus context, each student

code-switches between Spanish and any other European language.

4.5.2. LANGUAGES AND DIGLOSSIA

When looking closely at the Erasmus Mundus setting, unevenness between

languages is first revealed. The cases of bilingualism and plurilingualism

always generate diglossia between languages. Indeed, in the case of the

Erasmus context, we do not deal with diglossia for two varieties of the

same language but we do examine diglossia for the cases where more than

two languages are involved.

As mentioned earlier, binding both acquiring and learning languages, the

linguistic niche of Erasmus Mundus is plurilingual. The first case of the

diglossia is presented in their L1 and L2. In other words, acquired

languages are considered as having less importance than learned languages.

For instance, a student from Mozambique, who acquired Shenguana as a

52

first language, finds this language has less importance than Portuguese.

However, he acknowledges that this language serves to construe his

identity in Mozambique. That is the first level of diglossia between

Shenguam and Portuguese (Shenguan Lower language and Portuguese

High language, see figure 2).

To understand this diglossia, we need to go back to black slavery, trade and

colonization respectively in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and twentieth

centuries. These events were based on the banishment of the local

languages by replacing “the Masters Languages” in order to make savage

black people more cultured and educated. That is true not only in Africa

but also in the Caribbean (for example, in Comore) or the Pacific (for

example in Papua New Guinea). In fact, this idea remains in the

commonsense view that local languages need to be used only at home and

within the family.

The second case of diglossia within the Erasmus Mundus context concerns

the strongest power of the English language. They all believe and agree that

English is the most important language in the world. Besides, French,

Portuguese and Spanish languages are seen as having less value than

English.

English is globally recognized as a multifunctional language. It is actively

used in business interaction (or meetings), in international communications.

It is arguably considered as a scientific language. In fact, more students

ascribe value to English because, according to them, their academic

documents are written in English. All of them desire to speak it.

To sum up, when referring to spontaneous acquisition versus programmed

acquisition or learned versus acquired languages, it sounds easy to

conclude that spontaneous-acquired languages are weak languages whereas

programmed languages are high languages. In this case of several

53

languages unevenly distributed there is not only a simple diglossia

phenomenon but embedded diglossia. The first set of diglossia begins with

languages at level 4 versus languages at level 3. For instance, one student

from Papua New Guinea asserted that there are about 800 languages

spoken in that country (information confirmed by Ethnologue, 851

languages are spoken throughout the Country)26. However, only three are

the dominant languages: English, Pidgin and Angor. At this level, a case of

diglossia may be noted between the two dominant languages and other

languages still spoken throughout the country. He added that he could only

speak three languages out of the 800 languages before coming to Madrid:

English, Pidgin and Angor. In daily interaction, the first diglossia occurs

between Angor and Pidgin. Angor is only used when talking to parents,

whereas Pidgin serves to interact with Wutung, Ningera, Puare, and others,

to people in informal situations. The second, case of diglossia observed is

between English and Pidgin. Even if English is also used in formal and

informal situations it is mostly used in formal situations. Pidgin, however,

is only used in informal situations. That makes English the higher language

and Pidgin the Lower language.

However, after coming to Madrid and learning Spanish, a new diglossia set

occurs between English which is an international and global language and

Spanish, which becomes the schooling language for him. In this last case,

English remains a higher language and Spanish a Lower.

In other words, this Erasmus Mundus student is living in the sociolinguistic

situation in which three cases of diglossia occur. That is what Moreau and

Calvet called embedded diglossia, Angor versus Pidgin; Pidgin versus

English, and English versus Spanish.

26http://www.ethnologue.com/country/PG [April 12th 2015, 19:07]

54

4.5.3. LANGUAGES AND LINGUISTIC SPEECH COMMUNITIES:

FRANCOPHONE, LUZOPHONE, HISPANOPHONE, AND

ANGLOPHONE

Zeigler describes a speech community as “a group of speakers, whether

socially or geographically located, who share unique and mutually

accepted linguistic norms for communicating understanding, values, and

attitudes.”(Zeigler B. Mary, 2008:50). From this definition, the question

we have to answer is “Does any speech community exist in the Erasmus

Mundus context?” The answer is affirmative. There are not only one but

four speech communities created as a result of mobility. First, there is the

Spanish speech community that includes all the students. That is the

standard speech community in the Erasmus Mundus context. When

answering our questions, students confessed almost similar beliefs.

Accordingly, they have acknowledged that few had time allocated for

learning Spanish before studying their degrees at UCM. Hence, they have

been suffering in their study process. In the end, most of them did not

believe they will continue studying at the UCM next academic year.

Secondly, there is the English speech community that only concerned with

students who speak English and those who tend to speak it.

Pragmatically speaking, Spanish constitutes for our participants not only a

linguistic community, but also a community of practice. This is clearly

observed in their interaction at school and outside school. In this sense, the

Spanish linguistic community created in Madrid may also be understood as

a community of practices.

Another feature shared by the Erasmus Mundus students belonging to the

speech community is that in their academic writing they usually switch

from their L2 or L3 to L4, which is Spanish. The two last speech

communities are Francophone and Luzophone. One includes students from

55

Francophone countries. The other is concerned with students from

Luzophone countries.

4.6. LANGUAGES AND MANAGEMENT

In this subsection, we provide a qualitative analysis of the students’ daily

interaction. It aims to examine the choice of language they make when inter

acting at home, at university, on the phone, and so forth. In language

policy, these spaces are called “domains”. As Spolsky (2009) argued,

language is about choice. Bilingual or multilingual people usually have to

choose which language to use in any given situation. Even monolingual

speakers have a choice of dialects and style (2009:01). A similar view is

held by Calvet (2006) who thinks that languages are not merely an

intervention of linguists, they also exist in the minds of speakers who say

that they are “speaking one language or another, and know, or think they

know, what languages are spoken in one country or another (2006:06). In

the two standpoints, two aspects attract our attention. Firstly, we may

believe as most scholars do that the choice we make in language use is the

result of non-linguistic factors. Such factors may be the status of the hearer,

the milieu, the topic, and so on. Secondly, the process of language practices

can be understood as correlated to the social structure situations with

linguistic repertoire. One may believe that language choice depends on the

ecology or the environment in which people interact.

One purpose of a theory of language policy is to account for the choice

made by bilingual speakers on the basis of rule-governed patterns

recognized by the speech community or (communities) of which they are

members (Spolsky, 2009: 01).This subsection attempts to address the issue

about language policy in the Erasmus Mundus community.

56

4.6.1. LANGUAGES USED AT HOME

When observing the students in their home interaction, different language

choices were made. However, language choices are far from being

universal. In relation to what was said in subsection1.2, their home

language choices may be classified into three categories. The first category

concerns acquired languages that are usually used when interacting with

parents from the homeland. The second category regroups learned

languages that are used when in both situations when interacting with

educated people from home countries and when interacting with Erasmus

Mundus students.

Spanish in the Erasmus Mundus setting plays the role of Lingua Franca. It

is used between Francophone, Luzophone, and Anglophone students. When

sharing a flat, some Erasmus Mundus students believe that even though

there are Luzophones, Spanish must be overused in order to interest others

in their conversation. However, when information needs to be kept secret,

Francophone students use French. The Spanish choice depends on the

importance of what we would like to express. French and Portuguese

assume the solidarity role of language among students who speak them.

Another aspect, when sharing a flat, Francophone, Luzophone or

Anglophone students overuse either French (for Francophone students) or

Portuguese (for Luzophone students). In this case, the Spanish language is

underused at home.

Erasmus Mundus is a speech community whose members have various

linguistic norms. It is at the same time homogeneous and heterogeneous

because of the Spanish language. Members have more or less the same

proficiency in it. They have faced and continue to face the same

difficulties. It is a heterogeneous community because there are within it

57

other speech communities such as the Francophone and Luzophone

communities.

4.6.2. LANGUAGE USED AT UNIVERSITY

When observing their interaction at University, the language choice is

exclusively Spanish. According to Spolsky “the regular language choices

made by an individual are determined by his or her understanding of what

is appropriate to the domain”. That is to say, the university domain obliges

students to conform their speech to the environment. Even though their

accent remains negatively perceived by native speakers like Spanish

teachers and students, they attempt to feel more or less comfortable when

using Spanish at university.

Other languages are useless in this domain not only for miscommunication

or misunderstanding with other stakeholders, but also they are

inappropriate there.

4.6.3. LANGUAGES USED ON THE PHONE WITH PARENTS FROM

THE HOME COUNTRIES

Data gathered when observing the Erasmus Mundus students provides

different kinds of language choices made by them when talking on the

phone with parents from home countries. As said before, the acquired

languages are overused when interacting with parents on the phone. That

can be explained as the desire to establish the identity link between them

and their parents. One student states:

(14) Yes, on the phone sometimes we use French, sometimes our

language. For instance, with my mother, who does not speak French

58

or Spanish, we communicate either in Wolof or in our language

(Toukouler)27.

As the oral tradition preserves the heritage of African, this Senegalese

Erasmus Mundus student does not keep some principles of her tradition

secret. In addition, she considers the Toukouler language as “our”

language. That is to say, those other languages she speaks are foreign

languages. The Toucouleur language reflects her identity.

4.6.4. LANGUAGES USED ON THE PHONE WITH OTHER ERASMUS

STUDENTS

When interviewing students for their choices of language when phoning

other Erasmus Mundus students, they admit that they feel more

comfortable when using Spanish. Moreover, when observing their talk on

the phone, things change. The language used among Francophones is

obviously “French”. The language used among Luzophones is “Portuguese.

Something really true is that they switch from one language to another.

In relation to this let us take a closer look at the relationship between

languages in that multilingual setting. In fact, Calvet pointed out that

“languages as practices that are inscribed within a worldwide gravitational

system, itself organized into constellations, within which every language

has its niche, defined by its relations to other languages and by its functions

in the milieu (2006:57). Even though used in different “domains”,

languages spoken by the Erasmus students are interrelated according to the

ecology in which they are spoken. Let us use figure 3 to illustrate the way

languages are linked to each other.

27 An African student from Senegal.

59

Figure 3 Language and management

Figure 3 shows that languages play an influential and important role in

Erasmus students’ daily life. Calvet states that “human beings are not

always able to choose their languages. Their choice is determined first and

foremost by the milieu in which they find themselves, by languages that

coexist in this niche and then by their needs, and very little by the

typological situation of the coexisting languages” (2006:58). That is to

admit that the use of English, Spanish, English, and Portuguese is not the

result of their belonging to the Indo-European family. They are chosen to

achieve a particular goal. The need for Spanish is determined by education

and integrative purposes in Madrid. French, English, and Portuguese are

chosen because of their strong status in home countries and by remaining

for a long time the schooling languages. Finally, vehicular and vernacular

languages reflect and make forceful the family relationship. They enable

students to keep their linguistic identity alive.

Language of level 4: English (Papua

New Guinea, Haity)

Language in-Between level 4

and level 3: Spanish

Languages of level 3: French,

Portuguese (Mozambique, Senegal, Timor,

Anglola Republic of Congo, Cameroon,

Cape verde)

Languages of level 2: Creole, Wolof,

Tetum, Pidgin, Kituba, Lingala (All

the countries)

Languages of level 1: Serere, angar,

Laari, Malayo, Baasa, Changana,

kimbundu, Kinyarwanda

(Senegal, Congo, Mozambique,

Angola, Camerou, Rwanda, Timor,

Papua New Guinea,

60

However, these languages, even though they are not assuming similar

social functions, each is necessary by playing the role that it is the only one

to play in this milieu. Observing the students’ languages used at university

one may believe that in Spain, the Spanish language is the only language to

be used at university. In contrast, when observing student uses of their L1s

one may assume that these languages are only used when communicating

with parents or with other people of the same ethnic group. This particular

choice of the language expresses the meanings of the term “identity”28.

That is the reason why we believe as many other scholars do, that people

do not learn or acquire a language by chance. Every language serves and

plays a particular role in a multilingual environment.

28Tabouret-Keller, A. (1998). "Language and Identity." The Handbook of

Sociolinguistics.Coulmas, Florian (Ed). Blackwell Publishing, Blackwell

ReferenceOnline.28December2007http://www.blackwellreference.com/subscriber/tocno

de?id=g9780631211938_chunk_g978063121193821

61

CHAPTER V: SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

In this section, we present a summary of the data analyzed above. We also

present a general conclusion of the study.

5.1. SUMMARY

In summing up, the analyses above provide evidence that match our main

hypothesis posed at the start. Mobility effectively modifies or changes the

social function of languages. It is clear that the linguistic situation of

participants inside and outside home countries is different. Onto their

former linguistic situation, Spanish is added while being in Madrid. This

latter language (Spanish), which had previously been unknown to them,

fulfils several new roles in Madrid. It becomes the main language of their

daily interaction; it is a lingua franca when interacting with one another,

and of course, it is a main at college. Therefore, the hypothesis posed

earlier has been confirmed in different ways. In the first place, tables 1 and

2 show a new linguistic organization in Madrid compared to that in their

home countries.

In addition, the students’ attitudes towards the languages around them show

a kind of struggle between languages they have learned and those they have

acquired. Mostly there exists consistency about the way acquired languages

are ranked in tables 4, 5, 6 and 7. Furthermore, this finding slightly comes

to match our hypothesis in another way. However, further research would

attempt to address students’ language attitudes when they intend to study

abroad in order to validate findings in terms attitudes towards learned

versus acquired languages.

Moreover, the social functions of languages come to confirm our

hypothesis entirely. In fact, this finding shows different strategies of

communication the students use and the main role of the Spanish language

62

and the secondary role of other languages in the Erasmus Mundus setting.

Spanish, which had never been the students' languages in their background,

appears as the central language to get in touch with one another. On the

other hand, French, English, and Portuguese, previously official languages

in ACP countries play the role of unity and solidarity between

Francophone, Anglophone, and Luzophone students. Therefore, in Madrid

there exist four different linguistic communities in terms of the languages

that should be spoken inside and outside the Erasmus Mundus context.

5.2. CONCLUSION

The main purpose of this paper has been to show what sociolinguistic

problems students faced, and how they manage language practices in

mobility. Specifically when the target language is very different from the

language or languages they have previously spoken before going on

mobility. Specially, the study has focused on applying linguistic ecology as

a framework suitable to investigate the relationship between languages and

their milieu (Calvet, 2006: 240). By doing so, it has been found relevant to

explore several sociolinguistic notions such as language attitudes, language

contact, and language management.

The study has shown that the sociolinguistic situation in the Erasmus

Mundus context is different in the home countries and in the host country.

To broaden our perspective on the principles of linguistic ecology, we

could say that by living in the new milieu (Madrid), the Spanish language

endeavours to be the primary language of communication. That allows us

to believe in the influence of the milieu in language practices, and perhaps

also in the form of languages. However, even though Spanish becomes the

Lingua Franca, the new language in the dense multilingual niche, all the

63

other languages constituting that niche continue being used. That is to say,

each language occupies a specific range in the multilingual context.

Concerning the assessment of language attitude in a multilingual

environment, this paper ascertained the students’ attitude, according to two

categories of language. One includes languages more regarded as useful

and prestigious languages, and another category includes languages spoken

because of their attractiveness. The first group is concerned with learned

languages, whereas the second group is concerned with acquired languages.

Furthermore, the main sociolinguistic problem the students faced in

mobility has been the phenomenon of mixing languages. In fact, Cs

remains the central issue in Erasmus Mundus in Madrid. Participants

switch between Spanish and other European languages. The reason for this

is twofold: on the one hand, the linguistic deficit in Spanish because they

have just learned the language. On the other hand, other cases of Cs have

been explained as the simple choice of language to use in a particular

ongoing communication encounter.

Another finding has been the appearance of linguistic communities. This

finding came to confirm the basic hypothesis of this paper: mobility

reorganizes the linguistic situation by attributing new social functions to

the languages they speak. Students’ movement changes language’s social

function. Therefore, Spanish by becoming a Lingua Franca creates a

linguistic community in which all the students live, as in the family setting

despite the linguistic background differences. Besides, this central

community, three particular linguistic communities have been ascertained,

the Anglophone, Francophone, and Luzophone.

The present study has drawn a point of departure for any researcher

interested in investigating the linguistic cultural facets of students who are

studying aboard, specifically those coming from Africa, the Pacific and the

64

Caribbean to study in Spain. Therefore, the study reported in this paper and

its findings represent the first attempt to provide a comprehensive

description of language in connection to mobility. Despite the contribution

that this study makes to our understanding of mobility and its linguistics

counterpart, much work, as ever, remains to be done. This study has been

an attempt at a preliminary adventure into the Erasmus Mundus context. In

addition it has aimed at offering a sociolinguistic basis for future research

in student mobility. For instance, a cross-cultural study aiming at

comparing cultural differences (between host cultures and the target)

should provide interesting findings. Likewise, similar studies should be

encouraged to examine conditions in which students could learn Spanish as

soon as they arrive in Spain since the findings of the present study have

shown the absence of Spanish in the linguistic backgrounds of the

participants.

65

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APPENDIX

1. QUESTIONNAIRE ONE

A- PARTICIPANT’S IDENTITY

1- Gander M F

2- Home

country :…………………………………………………………………………

……………

3- How long have you been living in

Madrid?.....................................................................................

B- PARTICIPANT LINGUISTIC BACKGROUND

4- What is the official language in your

country?..............................................................................

5- What is/are the school language(s) in your

country?...................................................................................

6- Of all languages spoken in your country, which languages do you

speak?....................................................

7- What is the most important language in your

country?...................................................................................................

a- The

second ?:……………………………………………………………………

b- The third……………………………………………………………………

c- Other

languages :…………………………………………………………………

8- Could you tell me the language (s) you spoke first when you were a

child?..........................................

a- The

second ?.............................................................................................................

..........................

b- Other

languages ?.......................................................................................................

9- What language (s) other those spoken in your country do you

speak?.....................................................................................................................

Where did you learn

them?.......................................................................................................................

70

C- PARTICIPANT’S ATTITUDE TOWARDS LANGUAGES

10- Has your experience in this country changed your attitude about this/ these

languages

?...............................................................................................................................

11- Here in Spain, how many languages do you

speak ?................................................................................

a- Where do you speak

them?.................................................................................................................

b- What is your schooling language

now ?.................................................................................................................

c- How do you perceive the fact that today, you are speaking

Spanish?......................................................

d- Why?....................................................................................................

12- Now you can speak many languages, in which context speaking many

languages is helpful/

useful?.....................................................................................................................

And in which context speaking many languages is useless

a- Why?................................................................................................................

13- What that do African and European languages represent

14- In your view, is it important to continue to speak African

languages ?..............................................

a- Why ?...............................................................................................................

15- What language (s) would you like to use in your family

context?...................................................................................................................

a- Why...................................................................................................................

Madrid, ……of………... 2014

Researcher, Jean Mathieu TSOUMOU

71

2. QUESTIONNAIRE TWO