Multilingualism

Adrian Blackledge is Professor of Bilingualism at the School of Education, University of Birmingham, UK. Angela Creese is Professor of Educational Linguistics at the School of Education, University of Birmingham, UK.

• 1. Opening up multilingual spaces; 2. Multilingualism, ideology and practice; 3. Ethnography of multilingualism; 4. A multilingual research team; 5. Multilingualism in local and global spaces; 6. Inventing and disinventing the national; 7. Contesting 'language' as 'heritage'; 8. Multilingual literacies across space and time; 9. Official and carnival lives in the classroom; 10. Flexible bilingualism in practice; 11: Multilingualism: Future trajectories; Index.

"In this groundbreaking study of multilingual youth in the United Kingdom, Blackledge and Creese disrupt common-sense notions of language, literacy, heritage, and identity. Drawing on innovative research in eight complementary schools in four cities, the authors bring insightful analysis to a complex set of data, arguing persuasively that time and space remain central motifs in the investigation of multilingualism in contemporary society. Researchers, students, and teachers will find the integration of theory and practice both compelling and engaging. Multilingualism represents linguistic ethnography at its very best." - Professor Bonny Norton, University of British Columbia, Canada