Towards a Multilingual Future: The Ecology of Language at a University in Eastern Ukraine
type: CreativeWork
description: In Ukraine, the Russian and Ukrainian languages have historically alternated in policy and practice in their official status and social prestige. As in many areas of the world, English is emerging in Ukraine as a language of economic value, social prestige, and education though it is not a language of wider communication. The goal of the research was to explore the ecology of language at a university which is implementing English as a medium of instruction in all subjects for multiple groups of students in Dnipropetrovs&rsquok, Ukraine. Ethnographic fieldwork was conducted over the 2010-2011 academic year to answer the following questions: 1) What are the discourses about English language instruction at the university? 2) What is the day-to-day reality of English language instruction at the university? 3) How are English and English-language classroom practices situated in or reflective of the larger language ecology of the university? and 4) How is English language education practically and discursively connected with: Ukrainian language policy, international education policy, and goals of economic development or integration, especially integration with the European Union? Data were interpreted through the lenses of ethnography of communication, discourse analysis, and Conversation Analysis (CA). It was found that English is a source of prestige and achievement for the university, and is an attempt to recruit students by offering a &ldquoEuropean&rdquo level of education. Using English as a medium of instruction poses the challenge of finding teachers and textbooks and requires adjustments to classroom management, but also affords opportunities to learn academic content and language. Russian is the predominant native language used to support learning in EFL and English-medium classes. Ukrainian appears to be most prevalent in the written domains of use regardless of the medium of instruction, and in formal spoken situations. Russian was a predominant spoken languag…
abstract: In Ukraine, the Russian and Ukrainian languages have historically alternated in policy and practice in their official status and social prestige. As in many areas of the world, English is emerging in Ukraine as a language of economic value, social prestige, and education though it is not a language of wider communication. The goal of the research was to explore the ecology of language at a university which is implementing English as a medium of instruction in all subjects for multiple groups of students in Dnipropetrovs&rsquok, Ukraine. Ethnographic fieldwork was conducted over the 2010-2011 academic year to answer the following questions: 1) What are the discourses about English language instruction at the university? 2) What is the day-to-day reality of English language instruction at the university? 3) How are English and English-language classroom practices situated in or reflective of the larger language ecology of the university? and 4) How is English language education practically and discursively connected with: Ukrainian language policy, international education policy, and goals of economic development or integration, especially integration with the European Union? Data were interpreted through the lenses of ethnography of communication, discourse analysis, and Conversation Analysis (CA). It was found that English is a source of prestige and achievement for the university, and is an attempt to recruit students by offering a &ldquoEuropean&rdquo level of education. Using English as a medium of instruction poses the challenge of finding teachers and textbooks and requires adjustments to classroom management, but also affords opportunities to learn academic content and language. Russian is the predominant native language used to support learning in EFL and English-medium classes. Ukrainian appears to be most prevalent in the written domains of use regardless of the medium of instruction, and in formal spoken situations. Russian was a predominant spoken languag…
author: Goodman, Bridget A.
language: en
date published: 2013-01-01
date modified: 2026-07-24T03:47:40Z
provider: University of Pennsylvania
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Pennsylvania