Plurilingual or not plurilingual? Plurilingual competence and identity of Canadian EAL peers in a francophone post-secondary context

Abstract

Despite emergent research on Canadian additional language (AL) learners’ plurilingualism in post-secondary and officially monolingual school contexts, challenges persist in implementing plurilingual instruction: learners’ plurilingual identities (PI) and plurilingual and pluricultural competence (PPC) are often ignored in favour of the monolingual native speaker model. To help validate learners’ PPC and PI in AL classrooms, this article discusses parts of the results of a mixed-methods study pertaining to the self-perceived PPC and self-reported linguistic identities of adult English as AL student tutors and tutees (N = 20) in a francophone Montréal college. Data from a PI questionnaire, a PPC scale, and interviews reveal that: tutors tend to have higher PPC and identify as bi- or plurilingual; tutees tend to have lower PPC and identify as mono- or bilingual; a lower PPC level is directly related to identifying as monolingual; factors including AL competence level influence participants’ PI. Implications for AL education are discussed.