- Title
- Reimagining Language in Higher Education: Engaging with the Linguistic Experiences of Students with Refugee and Asylum Seeker Backgrounds
- Creator
- Burke, Rachel
- Relation
- Higher Education in Central Perspective: Practices and Policies 5
- Publisher
- Berghahn Books
- Resource Type
- book chapter
- Date
- 2022
- Description
- University initiatives to facilitate more equitable entry to higher education for people with refugee and asylum seeker backgrounds provide much-needed alternative pathways to enrolment. Yet there is an urgent need for institutions to critically engage with students’ linguistic experiences as they progress through university studies. Language and academic literacy requirements are among the chief barriers to success for many students with refugee and asylum seeker backgrounds (see Hirano 2014; Naidoo 2015; Fagan et al. 2018; Hartley et al. 2019). Linguistic challenges, which are frequently exacerbated by past experiences of disrupted education due to war and/or poverty, may significantly impact learners’ academic progress and social inclusion, undermining the transformative potential of widening participation initiatives for both the individual student and the university. Critically reflecting on the linguistic experiences of learners with refugee and asylum seeker back-grounds provides an important opportunity to challenge assumptions about the universality of the literate practices privileged in higher education, reconceptualise institutional approaches to language support, and explore the need to better recognise and engage with students’ diverse linguistic repertoires.
- Subject
- linguistics; higher education; refugee backgrounds; asylum seeker backgrounds
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1466571
- Identifier
- uon:47592
- Identifier
- ISBN:9781800733114
- Language
- eng
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