Multilingualism and Wellbeing

Dick Smakman is a Sociolinguist for Leiden University, the Netherlands.Jemima Asabea Anderson is a Sociolinguist at the Department of English, University of Ghana, Legon.Gladys Nyarko Ansah is an Applied/Cognitive Linguist for the University of Ghana, Legon.

• Part I: 1. Wellbeing and Multilingualism 2. Multilingualism and Happiness 3. The Wellbeing of Being Multilingual in Bulgaria Part II: 4. Multilingualism in Ghana’s Healthcare: A Neglected Barrier 5. Multilingualism: Happiness and Wellbeing in South-Western Nigeria and Greater Accra, Ghana 6. Multilingualism and Wellbeing: Reflections from Ghana 7. Multilingualism as a Tool for Destressing: Evidence from Northern Ghana Part III: 8. The Impact of State Language Knowledge on Georgian Ethnic Minority Student’s Wellbeing 9. Conceptualization of Wellbeing: Kuleana ‘Responsibility’, Revitalization, and Reclamation of the Hawaiian language 10. Multilingualism and Social Wellbeing: The Sierra Leone ‘Wan Pot’: The Official, the Lingua Franca and the Indigenous 11. The Language Chameleon: Between Happiness and Worries about Being Bilingual in Catalonia Part IV: 12. Linguistic wellbeing in Multi-ethnic The Hague 13. Rethinking Migrants’ Wellbeing in Germany through a Multilingual Lens 14. Multilingualism and Economic Wellbeing of Female Migrants in Accra 15. Verfremdung Part V: 16. Sweet Sounds of Melancholy: Brabantish as a Language of Culture 17. Multilingualism and Wellbeing in Japan: The Case of Yomitan Village in Okinawa 18. The Relation between Degree of Multilingualism and Experiences of Wellbeing in Catalonia 19. Multilingualism and Wellbeing in Timor-Leste

'The volume Multilingualism and Wellbeing, edited by Dick Smakman, Jemima Anderson, and Gladys Ansah, offers a refreshing new outlook on multilingualism by focusing on its psychological and emotional impact, and by positively associating it with the well-being of multilingual speakers. It provides a new perspective in the study of multilingualism, moving beyond the well-trodden paths of research into language choice, identity construction, power, and functionality. This is definitely a book I would like students in my Sociolinguistics class to read.'Nadia Shalaby, Professor of Linguistics, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt'This book is a ground-breaking contribution to multilingualism research, moving beyond questions of social identity and towards the felt experience of language. Multilingualism, the authors argue, is essential for the well-being of speakers and is thus closely linked to affect. The message is as simple as it is important: multilingualism makes us happy and brings us pleasure.'Ana Deumert, Professor of Linguistics, University of Cape Town, South Africa