The linguistic context: “speaking Swiss”

If scholars and practitioners often have the impression that the language issue in Switzerland is a delicate one it is partly because it is as old as the country itself. Indeed, its history goes back to the time of Napoleon, who united the three language regions (German, French and Italian) by force and thus created the first plurilingual state (Elmiger and Forster, 2005). Today, with three official languages (German, French, Italian) and Romansh given a semi-official status, the Swiss context remains just as intriguing in terms of FL research but also holds a number of surprises.

The first is that, despite the coordinating role of the Swiss Conference of Cantonal Ministers of Education (CDIP), regulations on language, culture and education are formulated by cantonal authorities. Therefore, linguistic and educational governance can take different forms depending on the region or canton examined. First of all, while the three languages mentioned above are all Swiss official languages of equal status, their role varies from one canton, or even one municipality, to the other. Figure 2.3 below (Lüdi and Werlen, 2005) displays the distribution of Swiss national languages, spoken as census participants’ first language, in the different municipalities.

Figure 2.3 Geographical distribution of national languages in the Swiss municipalities (published in Lüdi and Werlen, 2005)

Out of the twenty-two constitutionally monolingual cantons seventeen are officially German speaking and are separated from the four French-speaking and the single Italian-speaking cantons by the Röstigraben, the metaphorical border between the two culturally and linguistically different regions (Grin, 2010). The term itself draws on the dissimilarities between the two regions as regards their culinary traditions, although their cultural heritage can be contrasted on a number of points. At the same time, French and German are both official languages in three bilingual cantons and this duality is also preserved in official documentation and road signs. The trilingual canton of Grisons (Graubünden in German, Grischun in written Romansh) has been the center of the fight for the preservation of Romansh and the initiative to support plurilingualism (cf. Grin, 2010). Last but far from least, in cantons like Geneva, where numerous multinationals and NGOs attract the international workforce, foreign residents account for a considerable portion of the population, further enriching the linguistic landscape.

As regards the linguistic compositions of the overall population, they generally correspond to the geographical distribution described above. Census results show that 63.7% are German L1 speakers, while 20.4% declared French, 6.5% Italian and 0.5% Romansh as their mother tongue (Lüdi and Werlen, 2005). It is interesting to note that, despite the importance of plurilingual trends in the population surveyed, participants were allowed to choose only one language. Even more interestingly, the question on languages used at home, which, by contrast, took plurilingual practices into account, yielded comparable answers with only a slight to moderate increase in all categories (ibid.). However, even these minor differences might be indicative of the individual plurilingualism of participants and the volume of second and third generation immigrants among Swiss residents.

The German-speaking cantons are also home to a wide range of local Swiss German dialects, collectively called the dialect. They are especially interesting as a case of diglossia, since the use of the dialect is mutually exclusive with that of Standard German. While the former has always been a metaphor for the home and everyday life, the latter traditionally represented the professional sphere. Therefore, it is not surprising that in these areas 90.8% of Swiss residents speak the dialect but not Standard German at home (Lüdi and Werlen, 2005). Moreover, in the course of the twentieth century, Schwyzertütsch started gaining ground and became an emblem of Swiss ideological and economic independence and gradually replaced Standard German in a number of contexts, so much so that French speakers have started to question the use of learning Standard German.

A different type of multilingualism is prevalent in the French-speaking region, where 18.4%

of residents marked a main language other than French (Lüdi and Werlen, 2005). In addition, foreigners constitute one fifth of the population nationwide and, while most are French or Italian mother L1 speakers, 37.7% of them speak a non-national language at home (ibid.). This trend is even more marked in urban areas, Geneva being one of the centers of this diversity. It is clear from Figure 2.4 that most speakers of English as a main language also live in these regions. In addition to English, many other languages were listed in this category, resulting in 390 different combinations of home languages. Along the same lines, the 375 participants in the study on which this dissertation reports spoke a total of 36 different languages. Similarly, a questionnaire survey that I coordinated and analyzed with the invaluable help of Profs. Claire Forel, Fabio Lorenzi-Cioldi and a class of second-year teacher trainees found 34 languages spoken in a sample of 151 Geneva secondary school pupils. Ranging from Albanian to Wolof,

these languages further enrich the linguistic makeup of the already multilingual Swiss society.

In a context where such a multitude of languages coexist, the question arises as to what language practices emerge in multilingual speakers’ daily interactions. Moreover, even more interestingly, how do speakers and institutions ensure efficient communication and negotiate situations where languages and interests are in conflict?

Figure 2.4 Distribution of speakers of English as a main language in the Swiss municipalities (published in Lüdi and Werlen, 2005)

Heller (2003) and others have suggested that the use of English could offer a solution, but a study of Swiss firms’ communicative practices (Lüdi et al. 2009) found the case to be entirely different, revealing that diversity and even linguistic virtuosity play an important role. The findings discussed by Lüdi and his colleagues (ibid.) show that multilingual speakers in professional settings make active use of plurilingual strategies that involve several languages, instead of relying on English as a lingua franca. Indeed, Murray et al. (2001) confirm this as a

general observation, stating that English is rarely used for communication among Swiss interlocutors of different mother tongues. While plurilingualism is not an exclusively Swiss phenomenon (cf. Breidbach, 2003), the concept is fundamental to understanding the linguistic landscape as well as the history and development of the country. In order to illustrate this, a series of studies (cf. Berthoud et al., 2013) was dedicated to investigating the economic and social advantages of such cultural and linguistic diversity and concluded that Swiss plurilingualism is not only a genuine, living example of successful multilingual communication and linguistic governance but, as I further illustrate below, it is also a key factor in many aspects of Swiss society.