Multilingual Immigrant Learner Identities (MILI): using translanguaging and the mirrors-and-windows framework as a pedagogy of integration

Abstract

Migration and multilingualism have become defining features of contemporary education systems across the African continent. This shifting linguistic demography has rendered classrooms fluid, porous, and linguistically diverse. Classroom practices continue to reflect a monolingual bias, often treating African immigrant learners' linguistic resources as marginal and isolated. Much has been written about transnational mobility and language exclusion, but little is known about how immigrant learners in intra-African contexts negotiate their identities through their multilingual repertoires. This study investigates how Grade 6 immigrant learners in a South African school originating from South African neighboring countries use their home languages as part of their identity work and academic participation. Drawing on translanguaging pedagogy, the study employed facilitated classroom sessions and metacognitive reflection tasks to elicit the learners' simultaneous language use and self-positioning. The findings show that immigrant learners' fluid linguistic repertoires serve as vital cultural and cognitive capital. We theorise these identity negotiations through the Multilingual Immigrant Learner Identities (MILI) model - an integrated framework that draws from translanguaging, mirrors and windows (Bishop 1990). and double consciousness (Du Bois 1901, 1903). Finally, we propose a translanguaging-based pedagogy of integration that affirms immigrant learners' linguistic identities.