Abstract
dc:description.abstractIn March 2023, a societal debate on the use of English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI) flared up in Flanders when the Ministry of Education rejected a request from the region’s three largest universities to offer 19 master’s programs in engineering entirely in English (Maenhout, 2023). In Flanders, Dutch is the official language, which serves as the standard medium of education at all levels. Now heavily protected, Dutch’s role as an academic language is the result of a sociolinguistic and language policy shift throughout the 20th century, when higher education transitioned from French-medium to Dutch-medium following sustained protests by students, staff, and political activists. In this context, the use of English as a language of teaching is tightly regulated through qualitative restrictions (i.e., requiring justification, such as the presence of international students or lecturers, or the disciplinary relevance of English) and quantitative restrictions. As part of macro-level language-in-education policies, regulations currently allow a maximum of 9% of bachelor’s programs and 35% of master’s programs to be entirely English-medium, provided a Dutch-medium equivalent exists or an exemption from this rule is granted3. Additionally, up to 18.33% of courses in Dutch-medium bachelor’s programs and 50% in Dutch-medium master’s programs can be taught in English. In the instance reported above, it was the universities’ request for an exemption from the equivalence rule that was denied.
Degree
thesis:*- Grantor dc:publisher.institution
- University of the Western Cape
- Year dc:date.issued
- 2025
Author and committee
dc:creator, dc:contributor.*- Author dc:creator
-
- De Soete, Alexander