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http://www.alsace.iufm.fr/travailler/formateu/gtd-gts/anglais/tout.htm

Biographical information

Dr Christine Hélot is Maître de Conférences at the Institut Universitaire de Formation des Maîtres (IUFM Alsace) and a researcher at the Université Marc Bloch ( Strasbourg ) in the field of bilingualism, bilingual education, educational language policies and language awareness. In 1988 she was awarded a PhD from Trinity College Dublin for her thesis on "Infant Bilingualism: a Sociolinguistic and Linguistic study". Since then, she has published in English and French on bilingualism in the home and school context, the ignored bilingualism of children from migrant backgrounds, language policies in the primary sector in France , the ideology of bilingual education, and language awareness. She is involved in various European projects dealing with intercultural approaches and has a particular interest in children's literature. As teacher edu cator she works mainly with primary teachers and is interested in developing an approach to language edu cation which takes into account a multiplicity of languages and cultures, as well as an international experience involving teaching practise abroad.

Abstract

As the author of a thesis on infant bilingualism in an elitist context, and a firm believer in the value of bilingual education, I agree with de Mejia (2002) that prestigious bilingual education contexts have made a very valuable contribution to the study of bilingualism both at the individual and societal level, in many parts of the world. But I am concerned by the growing gap between the attention given to bilingual edu cation for mainstream monolingual children and the lack of support and recognition of the bilingualism of minority language speakers. The problem is multifaceted and can be considered from different perspectives: pedagogical, cultural, social and, perhaps mainly, political. A systematic study taking into account all these dimensions is not possible within the scope of this paper, but I shall propose some suggestions, in particular on the interplay of cultural and political factors.
The paper will start with a review of the traditional opposition between elite and folk bilingualism. It will then consider the question of using these two terms to describe language education policies in France , policies which, on the whole, have favoured prestigious forms of bilingual education for monolingual learners and neglected the bilingualism of minority language speakers. Hornberger & Skilton-Sylvester's (2003) Continua of Biliteracy model will be used to conceptualize the data provided by the official texts and the new curriculum for primary schools (MEN, 2003) and to put them into perspective. This theory will help to elucidate the (mostly implied) ideological principles and biases which inform language edu cation policies and, in some respects, give rise to a certain amount of confusion. As an example of the ambiguities which prevail regarding minority languages, two examples will be given: the status of German in Alsace and the status and place of Arabic in the primary curriculum.
The last part of the paper will present an alternative approach to the question of minority languages and culture s b y reporting on an experiment carried out in a primary school in Alsace where the teachers decided to reverse the relations of power imposed by the curriculum through opening their school to parents and making their classrooms inclusive of all the languages and cultures of their pupils. This case study may suggest some of the way s b y which edu cation to linguistic and cultural diversity can help to stress the cultural value of all languages irrespective of their political and social status, to legitimize the bilingualism of minority language speakers, and to transform this diversity into a cultural resource to be shared by all.

References
- De Mejia, A.M. (2002): Power, Prestige and Bilingualism. International Perspectives on Elite Bilingual Education. Clevedon , UK : Multilingual Matters.
- Hornberger, N. & Skilton-Sylvester, E (2003): "Revisiting the Continua of Biliteracy. International and Critical Perspectives" in: N. Hornberger (ed) Continua of Biliteracy: An Ecological Framework for Educational Policy, Research and Practice in Multilingual Settings. Clevedon , UK : Multilingual Matters. (pp. 35-70).