Language Test as Border Work
Wed, Feb 14, 10-11am PT (online)
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Language tests provide scores which are signs with social meaning. The social function of these tests are varied. Increasingly through reconceptualisations of language tests for immigration and settlement purposes, these scores relate to solutions for social problems. This talk will outline the role of security in shifting the terrain of language tests as education assessments to more ideological and securitised purposes which serve to reify differences between those deemed integrated and unintegrated citizens. This creates situations in which a lack of integration is discursively constructed as a threat to the nation. The talk will conclude by examining what this means more broadly for notions of justice.
Kamran Khan is Associate Professor in Language, Social Justice and Education at the University of Birmingham, UK. At Birmingham he directs the MOSAIC research group on multilingualism. Previously, he held a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Fellowship. His work on language and securitization and citizenship in relation to race has been supported by grants from the European Commission and the British Academy.
This events is co-sponsored with the UBC Centre for Migration Studies.