Francesca D'Angelo

Multilingualism in Canada has captured the interest of applied linguists from a socio-political, cognitive, and pedagogical point of view to discover the effects of the phenomenon in terms of both policy and educational practices. Language and linguistic diversity are a political issue in Canada in that the country has two official languages, English and French, an official multiculturalism policy that encourages the retention and use of non-official languages, and basic measures for the promotion of aboriginal languages. The work aims at filling the gap between official language policy on one hand and research on multilingualism in Canada on the other. In particular, it investigates the important question of language policy choices. That is, the reasons why Canada privileged English and French over other languages, including aboriginal languages. It provides an overview of recent discussions on Canadian policy in the most predominant literature on bilingual education, current research on multilingual learners, and emerging innovations in multilingual pedagogies with a special focus on translanguaging. Indeed, the research on multilingual learners reveals how multilingual language practices are complex, dynamic, and aiming at the construction and retention of multiple identities. Innovative pedagogical practices, in multilingual countries, suggest that more and more educators acknowledge the importance of shifting the focus from the target languages to the multilingual learners. First, this is crucial to teach students of diverse origins in order to meet their complex linguistic, cognitive, and socio-cultural background. Second, the focus on the multilingual learners allows a rethinking of the concept of multilingualism to convey multiple identities, representations, and pedagogical practices.