From a Monolingual Mind to a Multilingual Heart: An Autoethnography through Dominant Language Constellation

Abstract

This article narrates and analyzes the author’s life experiences as a learner, teacher, and researcher of diverse languages across three contexts: mainland China, Hong Kong, and Norway. Deconstructing the influential episodes in the writer’s life trajectory, this autoethnography explores the author’s transformation from a monolingually-minded individual to a border-crossing, multilingually hearted scholar. The analysis is undertaken through the theoretical lens of language ideology and dominant language constellation (DLC) and epitomizes the profound influence of sociocultural structures on an individual’s identity search and development. Confronting the multilingual turn in education and echoing the call to centralize identity in language teaching, this self-study exemplifies autoethnography as an empowering method for an ideological shift from perceiving “language(s)-as-problem” to advocating “language(s)-as-resource.” The study also illustrates how the construct of DLC can be deployed as a tangible model of multilinguals’ ever-evolving linguistic identities. This article narrates and analyzes the author’s life experiences as a learner, teacher, and researcher of diverse languages across three contexts: mainland China, Hong Kong, and Norway. Deconstructing the influential episodes in the writer’s life trajectory, this autoethnography explores the author’s transformation from a monolingually-minded individual to a border-crossing, multilingually hearted scholar. The analysis is undertaken through the theoretical lens of language ideology and dominant language constellation (DLC) and epitomizes the profound influence of sociocultural structures on an individual’s identity search and development. Confronting the multilingual turn in education and echoing the call to centralize identity in language teaching, this self-study exemplifies autoethnography as an empowering method for an ideological shift from perceiving “language(s)-as-problem” to advocating “language(s)-as-resource.” The study also illustrates how the construct of DLC can be deployed as a tangible model of multilinguals’ ever-evolving linguistic identities.