Page 211 - Ana Kozina and Nora Wiium, eds. ▪︎ Positive Youth Development in Contexts. Ljubljana: Educational Research Institute, 2021. Digital Library, Dissertationes (Scientific Monographs), 42.
P. 211
mobilising the potential held by one’s entire linguistic repertoire ...
1. What can multilingualism, its research, and implementation in
education gain by exploring perspectives like PYD?
2. Which topics, issues and findings in the field of multilingualism
are relevant for shaping models and practical interventions that
enable adolescents’ strengths to be identified and promoted, ones
that would not normally be expected, and thereby change the
view often reflected in traditional assumptions on the role held by
positive youth development.
Our research forms part of a larger project Positive Youth Development
in Slovenia: Developmental Pathways in the Context of Migration (PYD-SI
Model), whose principal aim is to investigate the longitudinal pathways for
positive youth development. The project focuses on identifying individual
and contextual factors that promote positive outcomes on the levels of the
individual, school and society able to prevent risky or problem behaviour.
By recognising language as one such specific context in the PYD-SI Model,
we try to bring attention to the role of multilingualism in both education
and in the design of prevention programmes that assist young people to
more successfully develop their self-image and become aware of cultur-
al and linguistic diversity while strengthening their role in the communi-
ty (e.g., home, school). In this process, their plurilingual communication
competence also plays an important part, understood here as both a com-
posite competence of an individual’s knowledge and experience with dif-
ferent languages a nd cultures, and a fundamental means of making mean-
ing and establishing relationships with others (Coste et al., 2009, p. 11).
Multilingualism: some conceptualisations and contemporary
research
Multilingualism is a phenomenon as old as humanity. It is also a funda-
mental concept that has always defined Europe in social, cultural and po-
litical terms (Burke, 2004). The global political situation coupled with
economic and technological development, which have stimulated global
(transnational) mobility in the 21st century, have put multilingualism at
the forefront of different political, social and educational contexts (Cenoz,
2013b, p. 4). These contexts make multilingualism an essential element in
the everyday life of individuals, where an individual’s mastering of a com-
plex linguistic repertoire is associated with their cognitive, social, personal,
211
1. What can multilingualism, its research, and implementation in
education gain by exploring perspectives like PYD?
2. Which topics, issues and findings in the field of multilingualism
are relevant for shaping models and practical interventions that
enable adolescents’ strengths to be identified and promoted, ones
that would not normally be expected, and thereby change the
view often reflected in traditional assumptions on the role held by
positive youth development.
Our research forms part of a larger project Positive Youth Development
in Slovenia: Developmental Pathways in the Context of Migration (PYD-SI
Model), whose principal aim is to investigate the longitudinal pathways for
positive youth development. The project focuses on identifying individual
and contextual factors that promote positive outcomes on the levels of the
individual, school and society able to prevent risky or problem behaviour.
By recognising language as one such specific context in the PYD-SI Model,
we try to bring attention to the role of multilingualism in both education
and in the design of prevention programmes that assist young people to
more successfully develop their self-image and become aware of cultur-
al and linguistic diversity while strengthening their role in the communi-
ty (e.g., home, school). In this process, their plurilingual communication
competence also plays an important part, understood here as both a com-
posite competence of an individual’s knowledge and experience with dif-
ferent languages a nd cultures, and a fundamental means of making mean-
ing and establishing relationships with others (Coste et al., 2009, p. 11).
Multilingualism: some conceptualisations and contemporary
research
Multilingualism is a phenomenon as old as humanity. It is also a funda-
mental concept that has always defined Europe in social, cultural and po-
litical terms (Burke, 2004). The global political situation coupled with
economic and technological development, which have stimulated global
(transnational) mobility in the 21st century, have put multilingualism at
the forefront of different political, social and educational contexts (Cenoz,
2013b, p. 4). These contexts make multilingualism an essential element in
the everyday life of individuals, where an individual’s mastering of a com-
plex linguistic repertoire is associated with their cognitive, social, personal,
211
