Cover not available

In:World Englishes in their Local Multilingual Ecologies
Edited by Peter Siemund, Gardy Stein and Manuela Vida-Mannl
[Hamburg Studies on Linguistic Diversity 9] 2025
► pp. 384–395

Get fulltext
PDF logo with download linkDownload Chapter PDF
EPUB logo with download linkDownload Chapter EPUB

Chapter 17
Envoi

How diverse is multilingualism research?

 | University of Zurich
Open Access logo
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 24 April 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/hsld.9.17pfe
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Relying on a diverse participant pool
  • 3.Making research applicable to various cultural contexts
  • 4.Discussing English on a par with other (local) languages
  • References
References (37)
References
Andringa, Sible & Aline Godfroid. 2020. Sampling bias and the problem of generalizability in applied linguistics. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 40: 134–142. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Baltes, Paul B., Ulman Lindenberger & Ursula M. Staudinger. (2006). Life span theory in developmental psychology. In Richard M. Lerner & William Damon (eds.), Handbook of Child Psychology: Theoretical Models of Human Development, 6th edn, pp. 569–664. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Barrett, H. Clark. 2020. Towards a cognitive science of the human: Cross-cultural approaches and their urgency. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 24(8): 620–638. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bigelow, Martha & Elaine Tarone. 2004. The role of literacy level in second language acquisition: Doesn’t who we study determine what we know? TESOL Quarterly 38(4): 689–700. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Blasi, Damián E., Joseph Henrich, Evangelia Adamou, David Kemmerer & Asifa Majid. 2022. Over-reliance on English hinders cognitive science. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 26(12): 1153–1170. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bylund, Emanuel, Zainab Khafif & Robyn Berghoff. 2023. Linguistic and geographic diversity in research on second language acquisition and multilingualism: An analysis of selected journals. Applied Linguistics 45(2): 308–329. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Christiansen, Morten H., Pablo Contreras Kallens & Fabio Trecca. 2022. Toward a comparative approach to language acquisition. Current Directions in Psychological Science 31(2): 131–138. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Collins, Laura & Carmen Muñoz. 2016. The foreign language classroom: Current perspectives and future considerations. Modern Language Journal 100: 133–147. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cox, Jessica G. 2019. Multilingualism in older age: A research agenda from the cognitive perspective. Language Teaching 52(3): 360–373. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Evans, Nicholas & Stephen C. Levinson. 2009. The myth of language universals: Language diversity and its importance for cognitive science. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 32(5): 429–448. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fishman, Joshua A. (ed.). 1977. Bilingual Education: Current Perspectives. Arlington, VA: Center for Applied Linguistics.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Han, Huamei. 2013. Individual grassroots multilingualism in Africa Town in Guangzhou: The role of states in globalization. International Multilingual Research Journal 7: 83–97. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haugen, Einar I. 1972. The ecology of language. In Anwar S. Dil (ed.), The Ecology of Language: Essays by Einar Haugen. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Havinga, Anna & Nils Langer (eds.). 2015. Invisible Languages in the Nineteenth Century (Historical Sociolinguistics 2). Bern: Peter Lang. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Henrich, Joseph, Steven J. Heine & Ara Norenzayan. 2010. The weirdest people in the world? Behavioral and Brain Sciences 33(2–3): 61–83. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2013. The weirdest people in the world? In Stephen M. Downes & Edouard Machery (eds.), Arguing about Human Nature: Contemporary Debates, pp. 198–216. London: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kidd, Evan & Rowena Garcia. 2022. How diverse is child language acquisition research? First Language, 42(6): 703–735. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kormos, Judit & Anna Sáfár. 2008. Phonological short-term memory, working memory and foreign language performance in intensive language learning. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 11(2): 261–271. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kramsch, Claire (ed.). 2002. Language Acquisition and Language Socialization: Ecological Perspectives. London: Continuum.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mackey, Alison & Rebecca Sachs. 2012. Older learners in SLA research: A first look at working memory, feedback, and L2 development. Language Learning 62(3): 704–740. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Majid, Asifa & Stephen C. Levinson. 2010. WEIRD languages mislead us, too. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 33(2/3): 103. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nielsen, Mark, Daniel Haun, Joscha Kärtner & Cristine H. Legare. 2017. The persistent sampling bias in developmental psychology: A call to action. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 162: 31–38. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Norcliffe, Elisabeth, Alice C. Harris & T. Florian Jaeger. 2015. Cross-linguistic psycholinguistics and its critical role in theory development: Early beginnings and recent advances. Special issue of Language, Cognition and Neuroscience 30(9): 1009–1032. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ortega, Lourdes. 2005. For what and for whom is our research? The ethical as transformative lens in instructed SLA. Modern Language Journal 89: 427–443. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2019. SLA and the study of equitable multilingualism. The Modern Language Journal, 103(S1): 23–38. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pakendorf, Brigitte, Nina Dobrushina & Olesya Khanina. 2021. A typology of small-scale multilingualism. International Journal of Bilingualism 25(4): 835–859. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Piller, Ingrid, Jie Zhang & Jia Li. 2022. Peripheral multilingual scholars confronting epistemic exclusion in global academic knowledge production: A positive case study. Multilingua 41(6): 639–662. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Plonsky, Luke. 2016. The N crowd: Sampling practices, internal validity, and generalizability in L2 research. Presentation at University College London.
. 2023. Sampling and generalizability in Lx research: A second-order synthesis. Languages 8: 75. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pot, Anna, Merel Keijzer & Kees de Bot. 2018. The language barrier in migrant aging. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 23(9): 1139–1157. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pye, Clifton. 2021. Documenting the acquisition of indigenous languages. Journal of Child Language 48(3): 454–479. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Romaine, Suzanne. 1998. Early bilingual development: Fromelite to folk. In Guus Extra & Ludo Verhoeven (eds.), Bilingualism and migration, pp. 61–73. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Share, David L. 2008. On the Anglocentricities of current reading research and practice: The perils of overreliance on an “outlier” orthography. Psychological Bulletin 134(4): 584–615. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Singer, Ruth. 2018. A small speech community with many small languages: The role of receptive multilingualism in supporting linguistic diversity at Warruwi community (Australia). Language & Communication 62: 102–118. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Slobin, Dan Isaac. 2014. Before the beginning: The development of tools of the trade. Journal of Child Language 41(S1): 1–17. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Spinner, Patti. 2011. Review article: Second language acquisition of Bantu languages: A (mostly) untapped research opportunity. Second Language Research 27(3): 418–430. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tarone, Elaine & Martha Bigelow. 2005. Impact of literacy on oral language processing: Implications for second language acquisition research. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 25: 77–97. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue