Today our lab hosted Dr Dina Mehmedbegovic from Institute of Education (UCL). Dr Mehmedbegovic discussed the processes that lead to “language hierarchies” in education- for example, why in countries like the United Kingdom languages such as French and Spanish are considered “high value” languages and their teaching is promoted over other languages, which are considered “low value”. She also talked about the concept of a “healthy linguistic diet“, a proposed intervention to policy and practice aiming to raise awareness in additional language learning and to eradicate language hierarchies in education. In all, a very interesting talk!
