This article aims to establish the significance of the role played by multilingualism among students involved in discussing academic work with special reference to a selected South African university, namely the University of Venda. Multilingualism refers to the ability of an individual to speak many languages. The study is qualitative in nature and was conducted in the natural setting of the participants. Purposive sampling was used to select two groups consisting of ten students each. Data was collected through use of both non-participant observation and interview techniques. Three discussion sessions with the two selected groups were audio-taped. The audio-taped data was transcribed word for word to create texts for analysis. Although there is evidence to support the view that English is the dominant language used by students in academic discourse, African languages are also used, and research results show that multilingualism plays a prominent role. The study is important to people interested in multilingualism, especially in the promotion of the previously marginalised African languages.

中文翻译：

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多种语言在南非选定大学的学术环境中的作用

本文旨在确定在参与讨论学术工作的学生中，使用多种语言所扮演的角色的重要性，并特别参考选定的南非大学，即Venda大学。多语制是指个人说多种语言的能力。该研究本质上是定性的，是在参与者的自然环境中进行的。目的抽样用来选择两组，每组十名学生。通过使用非参与者观察和访谈技术收集数据。与两个选定的小组进行了三场讨论会议。录音数据逐字转录，以创建文本进行分析。尽管有证据支持英语是学生在学术演讲中使用的主要语言的观点，但非洲语言也被使用，研究结果表明，多种语言起着重要作用。这项研究对于对使用多种语言特别是对先前被边缘化的非洲语言感兴趣的人们很重要。