Abstract
This contribution treats “language immersion” as a linguistic ideology and explores narratives, practices, and subjectivities pertinent to that notion in the context of language-motivated voluntourism. Voluntourism programs offer short-term sojourns abroad, which combine voluntary work with holidays while promising “immersion” as an efficient alternative to classroom language learning. In the Mediterranean island state of Malta, whose population is mostly bilingual in English and Maltese, voluntourism has become an attractive product for the booming English language travel industry. Since there is a lack of critical sociolinguistic and second language acquisition research on the language learning trajectories of voluntourists, this piece examines the promise of immersion through the example of a hostel that figures as a workplace. Drawing on ethnographic data, it investigates how learning English through immersion while working abroad is imagined and promoted, whether or not it occurs, and what gains (linguistic or otherwise) it generates and for whom. The article argues that the voluntourism industry appropriates the discourse of immersion to responsibilize English learners for their linguistic self-skilling, thereby constituting them as neoliberal subjects that can easily be exploited as a cheap workforce.
Funding source: Office for Gender Equality, University of Bonn
Funding source: Maria von Linden Program
-
Research funding: This work was supported by the Office for Gender Equality of the University of Bonn (Maria von Linden Program).
References
Allan, Kori. 2019. Volunteering as hope labour: The potential value of unpaid work experience for the un- and under-employed. Culture, Theory and Critique 60(1). 66–83. https://doi.org/10.1080/14735784.2018.1548300.Search in Google Scholar
Baillie Smith, Matt & Nina Laurie. 2011. International volunteering and development: Global citizenship and neoliberal professionalisation today. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 36(4). 545–559.10.1111/j.1475-5661.2011.00436.xSearch in Google Scholar
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977. L’économie des échanges linguistiques. Langue française 34. 17–34. https://doi.org/10.3406/lfr.1977.4815.Search in Google Scholar
Brennan, Christopher. 2018. Northern lights instead of workers’ rights: Volunteer working tourists in Finnish Lapland. Nordic Journal of Working Life Studies 8(2). 43–61. https://doi.org/10.18291/njwls.v8i2.106154.Search in Google Scholar
Bröckling, Ulrich. 2007. Das unternehmerische Selbst. Soziologie einer Subjektivierungsform (suhrkamp taschenbuch wissenschaft 1832). Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp.Search in Google Scholar
De Costa, Peter, Joseph Park & Lionel Wee. 2016. Language learning as linguistic entrepreneurship: Implications for language education. The Asia-Pacific Education Researcher 25. 695–702. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40299-016-0302-5.Search in Google Scholar
Dlaske, Kati. 2016. Shaping subjects of globalisation: At the intersection of voluntourism and the new economy. Multilingua 35(4). 415–440. https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2015-0002.Search in Google Scholar
Doerr, Neriko M. 2012. Study abroad as ‘adventure’: Globalist construction of host–home hierarchy and governed adventurer subjects. Critical Discourse Studies 9(3). 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/17405904.2012.688211.Search in Google Scholar
Doerr, Neriko M. 2014. Desired learning, disavowed learning: Scale-making practices and subverting the hierarchy of study abroad experiences. Geoforum 54. 70–79. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2014.04.005.Search in Google Scholar
Doerr, Neriko M. 2017a. Phantasmagoria of the global learner: Unlikely global learners and the hierarchy of learning. Learning and Teaching 10(2). 58–82. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2018.1462147.Search in Google Scholar
Doerr, Neriko M. 2017b. Learning as othering: Narratives of learning, construction of difference and the discourse of immersion in study abroad. Intercultural Education 28(1). 90–103.10.1080/14675986.2017.1288482Search in Google Scholar
Doerr, Neriko M. & Richard Suarez. 2017. Immersion, immigration, immutability: Regimes of learning and politics of labeling in study abroad. Educational Studies 54(2). 183–197. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131946.2017.1356309.Search in Google Scholar
Gabowski, Simone, Stephen Wearing, Kevin Lyons, Michael Tarrant & AdamLandon. 2017. A rite of passage? Exploring youth transformation and global citizenry in the study abroad experience. Tourism Recreation Research 42(2). 139–149. https://doi.org/10.1080/02508281.2017.1292177.Search in Google Scholar
Gonçalves, Kelly. 2015. The pedagogical implications of ELF in a domestic migrant workplace. In Hugo Bowles & Alessia Cogo (eds.), International perspectives on English as a lingua franca. Pedagogical insights (International Perspectives on English Language Teaching), 136–158. Hampshire & New York: Palgrave Macmillan.10.1057/9781137398093_8Search in Google Scholar
Gonçalves, Kelly & Anne Schluter. 2017. “Please do not leave any notes for the cleaning lady, as many do not speak English fluently”: Policy, power, and language brokering in a multilingual workplace. Language Policy 16(3). 241–265. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10993-016-9406-2.Search in Google Scholar
Hardt, Michael. 1999. Affective labor. Boundary 2 26(2). 89–100.Search in Google Scholar
Heller, Monica, Sari Pietikäinen & Joan Pujolar. 2018. Critical sociolinguistic research methods. Studying language issues that matter. New York & London: Routledge.10.4324/9781315739656Search in Google Scholar
HelpStay. no date. https://helpstay.com/ (accessed 8 April 2019).Search in Google Scholar
Hochschild, Arlie R. 2003 [1983]. The managed heart: Commercialization of human feelings, 20th anniversary edn. Berkeley: University of California Press.10.1525/9780520930414Search in Google Scholar
Jackson, Jane. 2012. Education abroad. In Jane Jackson (ed.), The Routledge handbook of intercultural communication, 449–463. London & New York: Routledge.10.4324/9780203805640Search in Google Scholar
Jakubiak, Cori. 2012. “English for the global”: Discourses in/of English-language voluntourism. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 25(4). 435–451. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2012.673029.Search in Google Scholar
Jakubiak, Cori. 2019. “English is out there – you have to get with the program”: Linguistic instrumentalization, global citizenship education, and English-language voluntourism. Anthropology & Education Quarterly 2. 212–232. https://doi.org/10.1111/aeq.12332.Search in Google Scholar
Jang, In Chull. 2017. Consuming global language and culture: South Korean youth in English study abroad. Toronto: University of Toronto dissertation.Search in Google Scholar
Kanno, Yasuko & Bonny Norton. 2003. Imagined communities and educational possibilities: Introduction. Journal of Language, Identity and Education 2(4). 241–249. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15327701JLIE0204_1.Search in Google Scholar
Kauppinen, Kati. 2012. Subjects of risk. Neoliberale Gouvernementalität in einer gegenwärtigen Frauenzeitschrift. In PhilippDreesen, ŁukaszKumięga & ConstanzeSpieß (eds.), Mediendiskursanalyse, 189–206. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.10.1007/978-3-531-93148-7_8Search in Google Scholar
Kennedy, Kerrie. 2019. Malta’s ELT student numbers flatline after 2017’s high. In The Pie News. March 20, 2019. Available at: https://thepienews.com/news/maltas-elt-student-numbers-flatline-after-2017-high/ (accessed 13 July 2021).Search in Google Scholar
Lyons, Kevin, Joanne Hanley, StephenWearing & John Neil. 2012. Gap year volunteer tourism: Myths of global citizenship. Annals of Tourism Research 39(1). 361–378. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2011.04.016.Search in Google Scholar
Martín Rojo, Luisa. 2010. Constructing inequality in multilingual classrooms (Language, Power and Social Process 27). Berlin, Boston: Mouton De Gruyter.10.1515/9783110226645Search in Google Scholar
McGloin, Colleen & Nichole Georgeou. 2016. ‘Looks good on your CV’: The sociology of voluntourism recruitment in higher education. Journal of Sociology 52(2). 403–417. https://doi.org/10.1177/%2F1440783314562416.10.1177/1440783314562416Search in Google Scholar
Moyer, Melissa. 2018. English in times of crisis. Mobility and work among young Spaniards in London. Language and Intercultural Communication 18(4). 424–435. https://doi.org/10.1080/14708477.2018.1483939.Search in Google Scholar
Norton Peirce, Bonny. 1995. Social identity, investment, and language learning. TESOL Quarterly 29(1). 9–31. https://doi.org/10.2307/3587803.Search in Google Scholar
Park, Joseph S.-Y. 2011. The promise of English: Linguistic capital and the neoliberal worker in the South Korean job market. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 14(4). 443–455. https://doi.org/10.1080/13670050.2011.573067.Search in Google Scholar
Piller, Ingrid. 2015. Language ideologies. In Karen Tracy, Cornelia Ilie & Sandel Todd (eds.), The international encyclopedia of language and social interaction, Vol. 2, 917–927. West Sussex: Wiley.10.1002/9781118611463.wbielsi140Search in Google Scholar
Piller, Ingrid, Kimie Takahashi & Yukinori Watanabe. 2010. The dark side of TESOL: The hidden costs of the consumption of English. Cross-Cultural Studies 20. 183–201.10.21049/ccs.2010.20..183Search in Google Scholar
Pyysiäinen, Jarrko, Darren Halpin & Andrew Guilfoyle. 2017. Neoliberal governance and ‘responsibilization’ of agents: Reassessing the mechanisms of responsibility-shift in neoliberal discursive environments. Distinktion: Journal of Social Theory 18(2). 215–235. https://doi.org/10.1080/1600910X.2017.1331858.Search in Google Scholar
Ryan, Stephen & Sarah Mercer. 2011. Natural talent, natural acquisition and abroad: Learner attributions of agency in language learning. In GaroldMurray, XuesongGao & TerryLamb (eds.), Identity, motivation and autonomy in language learning (Second Language Acquisition), 160–176. Bristol, Blue Ridge Summit: Multilingual Matters. https://doi.org/10.21832/9781847693747-012.Search in Google Scholar
Silverstein, Michael. 1979. Language structure and ideology. In Paul R. Clyne, William F. Hanks & Carol L. Hofbauer (eds.), The elements: A parasession on linguistic units and levels. April 20–21, 1979 Including papers from the conference on Non-Slavic languages of the USSR, April 18, 1979, 193–247. Chicago: Chicago Linguistic Society.Search in Google Scholar
Simpson, Kate. 2005. Dropping out or signing up? The professionalisation of youth travel. Antipode 37(3). 447–469. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0066-4812.2005.00506.x.Search in Google Scholar
Stainton, Haley. 2012. TEFL tourism: The tourist who teaches. Tourism Geographies 20(1). 127–143. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616688.2017.1298151.Search in Google Scholar
Stainton, Haley. 2016. A segmented volunteer tourism industry. Annals of Tourism Research 61(C). 256–258. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2016.09.011.Search in Google Scholar
Strömmer, Maiju. 2016. Affordances and constraints: Second language learning in cleaning work. Multilingua 35(6). 697–721. https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2014-0113.Search in Google Scholar
Strömmer, Maiju. 2017. Work-related language learning trajectories of migrant cleaners in Finland. Apples – Journal of Applied Language Studies 11(4). 137–160. https://doi.org/10.17011/apples/urn.201712214863.Search in Google Scholar
Sundbo, Jon & Flemming Sørensen. 2013. Introduction to the experience economy. In Jon Sundbo & Flemming Sørensen (eds.), Handbook on the experience economy, 1–18. Cheltenham & Northampton: Edward Elgar.10.4337/9781781004227.00005Search in Google Scholar
Tabiola, Honey B. & Beatriz P. Lorente. 2017. Neoliberalism in ELT aid: Interrogating a USAID ELT project in Southern Philippines. In Mi-Cha Flubacher & Alfonso Del Percio (eds.), Language, education and neoliberalism: Critical studies in sociolinguistics (Critical Language and Literacy Studies 23), 122–139. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.10.21832/9781783098699-009Search in Google Scholar
Takahashi, Kimie. 2013. Language learning, gender and desire. Japanese women on the move (Critical Language and Literacy Studies 16). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.10.21832/9781847698551Search in Google Scholar
Underthun, Anders & David-Christopher Jordhus-Lier. 2017. Liminality at work in Norwegian hotels. Tourism Geographies 20(1). 11–28.10.1080/14616688.2017.1314546Search in Google Scholar
Veldstra, Carolyne. 2018. Bad feeling at work: Emotional labour, precarity, and the affective economy. Cultural Studies 34(1). 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/09502386.2018.1555269.Search in Google Scholar
Vella, Alexandra. 2013. Languages and language varieties in Malta. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 16(5). 532–552. https://doi.org/10.1080/13670050.2012.716812.Search in Google Scholar
Wearing, Stephen & Nancy G. McGehee. 2013. Volunteer tourism. A review. Tourism Management 38(C). 120–130. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2013.03.002.Search in Google Scholar
Workaway. no date. Information for language learners. https://www.workaway.info/en/info/information-language-learners (accessed 23 October 2020).Search in Google Scholar
Workaway. no date. Sign up for hosts. https://www.workaway.info/en/signup/host (accessed 13 July 2021).Search in Google Scholar
Worldpackers. no date. https://www.worldpackers.com/ (accessed 8 November 2020).Search in Google Scholar
© 2021 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
