Abstract
Aims and Objectives:
Increased contact between Dutch-speaking and international, English-speaking students and employees at universities in the Netherlands prompts an investigation into how multilingual communication could be used effectively. Using a council at a Dutch university as a case study, this paper examines the role of the chairperson in maintaining a bilingual language policy in meetings that strive to use receptive multilingualism: international participants speak English and use their receptive proficiency in Dutch to understand their interlocutors. It explores how speech actions realized by the chairperson construct the multilingual discourse structures used in meeting practice.
Approach:
A functional-pragmatic discourse analysis is used to reconstruct the activities of the chairperson within the question/answer speech action pattern. Such an analysis aims to reveal how multilingualism is used to fulfill the institutional purposes of the council.
Data and Analysis:
The data collection consists of 18 plenary meetings of a Dutch university participatory body over three academic years. Transcripts of interactions with international, English-speaking council members are used to conduct the discourse analysis.
Findings/Conclusions:
The results show that the chairperson uses Dutch, English, or both languages at four distinct pattern positions: appointing speaker, appointing hearer, checkpoint, and closing the pattern. The chairperson’s use of language at particular pattern positions and with particular addressees shows how languages are used for different purposes. Overall, Dutch is used to address the group, whereas English is used to address individual international members.
Originality:
This paper illustrates how the chairperson of a council meeting can take an active role in steering speakers’ language use and checking understanding when certain hearers lack proficiency in a language being spoken.
Significance/Implications:
Inclusive multilingual modes, including receptive multilingualism, can be effective when interlocutors share institutional knowledge. Careful management is needed to ensure that interlocutors maintain the language policy and can understand one another.
Introduction
This study explores the potential of receptive multilingualism/lingua receptiva (Backus et al., 2013; Rehbein et al., 2012) as an effective communication mode in university settings. Using a council at a Dutch university as a case study, this paper analyzes the role of the chairperson in managing a bilingual language policy.
Context
In recent decades, European universities have experienced increasing internationalization and anglicization (Horta, 2009). The Netherlands especially has seen significant growth in its international student population (Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek, 2022). Proposals from the Dutch government to control language use and the inflow of students (e.g., Dijkgraaf, 2023) can be seen as a counter-run (Rehbein, 2013) against the hegemonic use of English. Language use within participatory bodies (in Dutch: medezeggenschapsorganen) has become a discernible issue in recent years (Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, 2017). A bilingual approach in which both Dutch and English are used could be especially relevant in such bodies where students and staff members have the right to represent the university, irrespective of their language background.
This study investigates the role of a chairperson in leading council meetings in which both Dutch and English are spoken. The chairperson is responsible for leading the meetings according to a set agenda. Following the implementation of a bilingual Dutch/English-language policy in the researched council, the chairperson also assumed the role of mediating multilingual communication. The language policy aimed to take a receptive multilingual approach (e.g., Backus et al., 2013; Rehbein et al., 2012) in which Dutch-speaking participants speak Dutch, as the council historically did, and non-Dutch-speaking international participants (hereafter referred to as “internationals”) speak English and sufficiently understand Dutch.
Aim of this study
This study aims to answer how the chairperson maintains a bilingual language policy in council meetings by reconstructing underlying discourse structures. The first sub-question is: what pattern positions does the chairperson realize within the question/answer speech action pattern? The second sub-question is: how do the realizations of these pattern positions show the concurrence of institutional and multilingual discourse structures?
Theoretical framework
Analyzing communication in institutions
This study takes a functional-pragmatic approach to analyze multilingual discourse, which seeks to gain insight into the routines of social life as expressed through speaking and writing (Rehbein, 1984). It builds upon previous research on receptive multilingualism (e.g., Bahtina-Jantsikene, 2013; Beerkens, 2010; Herkenrath, 2012; Şimşek & Ünlü, 2019) by reconstructing the concurrence (Koole & ten Thije, 1994) of institutional and (receptive) multilingual discourse structures.
Institutions are units of organizations made to satisfy human needs (Malinowski, 1944), and functional pragmatics views institutions as sites of linguistic acting (Beerkens, 2010; Ehlich, 1991). The complexity of institutions creates the potential for contradictory tendencies (Bührig & ten Thije, 2023). A contradiction in a council meeting, for example, is that all students and employees have the right to democratic participation, though language policy could potentially exclude people. The aim of conducting a functional-pragmatic analysis of institutional communication is to make actions underlying the discourse visible and accessible to critique (Redder, 2008).
Speakers and hearers within an institution communicate with each other in a series of learned, organized, and repetitive speech action patterns that fulfill purposes in the institution as well as the immediate interaction (Ehlich & Rehbein, 1986; Koole & ten Thije, 1994). The alternation between speaker and hearer in a pattern represents an alternation in action potential in which interlocutors can fulfill their purpose (Koole & ten Thije, 1994). In council meetings, the question/answer pattern (Redder, 2008) is the fundamental pattern underlying the discourse, as the council convenes for council members (speakers) to ask questions to board members (hearers). A council meeting appears to be a series of one-on-one interactions between a council member and a board member; however, the onlooking council members and board members, in addition to the chairperson, are present and listening. Applying Goffman’s (1981) dramaturgical approach, these onlooking meeting attendees are considered ratified participants, though they appear to be unaddressed. Communication in a group brings the potential of utterances achieving multiple address, meaning that utterances can simultaneously realize two illocutionary acts, depending on the addressee (Koole & ten Thije, 1994). The utterances of the chairperson especially may achieve multiple address, as the chairperson manages the group as well as the actions of individuals. Unlike the onlooking council members and board members, the chairperson mediates throughout the question/answer pattern to appoint speakers, keep track of the agenda, check participants’ understanding of each other, and—through the addition of a bilingual language policy—manage language. While question-answer interactions have been analyzed through the performances of board members in meetings (e.g., Pernelet & Brennan, 2023), this study focuses on the chairperson’s involvement in leading meetings where questions and answers may be provided in two different languages.
Democratic institutions
Cheney et al.’s (1998) essay on workplace democracy and Gazzola and Grin’s (2007) paper on efficiency in multilingual communication offer conceptual frameworks in which to analyze council communication. Cheney et al. (1998) mention that workplace democracies involve multiple rationalities, referring to the duty to balance efficiency and social needs. According to Gazzola and Grin (2007), efficiency “refers to resource allocation, and in particular to how resources should be employed to get as much output as possible out of a certain amount of resources used” (p. 88). In council meetings, there is a need for efficiency as interlocutors have a limited time frame to speak. The social distinction between Dutch-speaking and English-speaking members is also salient. In this study, attention is paid to how the chairperson maintains efficiency while addressing social needs through language choice. The interactions of the chairperson with internationals can reveal how a particular discursive interculture (Koole & ten Thije, 1994) develops from multilingual contact. Similar to Lave and Wenger’s (1991) community of practice, which describes a group of people who collectively act toward a common interest, a discursive interculture refers to a culture whose communicative structures result from the intercultural contact between its members.
Effective and inclusive multilingual communication
Efficiency is just one component of effective communication. Gazzola and Grin (2007) characterize effective communication in terms of its ability to achieve the main goals of the activities taking place. Rehbein (2013) argues that multilingualism is critical to effective communication in global institutions. He conceptualizes multilingualism across institutions as a helix of two counter-acting spirals: a movement toward multilingualism on the one hand and a monolingual counter-run on the other. This counter-run refers to ideological barriers that hinder multilingual communication (Rehbein, 2013), similar to a monolingual habitus, which is an organized structure of human activity that assumes monolingualism as the norm (Gogolin, 2013; Piller et al., 2024). Ideological barriers must be broken down for successful multilingual communication to occur. Furthermore, a paradigm shift from additive to inclusive multilingualism is needed. Additive multilingualism is the use of languages alongside each other, while inclusive multilingualism is the use of several languages and/or varieties at the same time (Backus et al., 2013). Speakers perform inclusive multilingualism through the use of one or more communicative modes, including English as a lingua franca (ELF), regional lingua franca, lingua receptiva (receptive multilingualism), codeswitching, and mediation by interpretation/translation. By utilizing these different modes, interlocutors focus on achieving effective communication in the respective context (Backus et al., 2013). At the same time, the mere use of so-called inclusive multilingual modes, without regard for how the modes are integrated in a particular context, could potentially reinforce additive multilingualism, enabling a monolingual counter-run (Rehbein, 2013) and perpetuating a monolingual habitus (Gogolin, 2013; Piller et al., 2024).
One inclusive multilingual mode of particular interest is lingua receptiva/receptive multilingualism. Receptive multilingualism is a communicative mode in which interlocutors speak different languages but understand each other through passive proficiency in the other’s language without additional aid (Backus et al., 2013; Rehbein et al., 2012). Lingua receptiva, a related concept, encompasses receptive multilingual communication between interlocutors who might not use their L1 (Rehbein et al., 2012). In this study, receptive multilingualism is used to describe the general phenomenon of communication through receptive language, whereas lingua receptiva is used to describe a particular inclusive multilingual mode used by meeting participants.
Speaker/hearer plan
The speaker/hearer plan (Ehlich & Rehbein, 1979, 1986; Kameyama, 2004) is instrumental in functional-pragmatic analyses. It illustrates the mental and interactive activities of both speakers and hearers as reconstructed from the discourse. By using linguistic elements, the speaker tries to accomplish something on the side of the hearer (Beerkens, 2010). The plan consists of three phases: Pre-history (before the utterance), History (preparation and realization of the utterance), and Post-history (follow-up action) (Beerkens, 2010). In receptive multilingual communication, the speaker and hearer each realize their mental and interactive processes in their preferred but distinct languages within the same speech action pattern. Figure 1 is based on Beerkens’ (2010) adaptation of the speaker/hearer plan to analyze receptive multilingual discourse, based on schemas from Kameyama (2004) and Rehbein (2009). The bolded text indicates the added components when receptive multilingualism is used.
Speaker/hearer plan with receptive multilingualism (based on Beerkens, 2010, pp. 93, 167; Kameyama, 2004; Rehbein, 2009).
Beerkens (2010) argues that Step VI of the hearer’s History phase is imperative in achieving understanding in receptive multilingualism. She explains that the hearer must reconstruct their proficiency in the speaker’s language, as well as the speaker’s proficiency in the hearer’s language. Step VI is comparable to Bahtina-Jantsikene’s (2013) description of a multipurpose meta-communicative device that is “aimed at securing reality, knowledge and linguistic realisations at the same time” (p. 68). Using concepts related to functional pragmatics and (receptive) multilingual communication, this study investigates the action potentials of the chairperson.
Method
Data collection and characteristics
Recordings of meetings in a council at a Dutch university were collected and used with ethical approval from the university. Eighteen plenary meetings held between 2020 and 2023 were analyzed for the research. Meetings were held in online or hybrid settings.
The analysis focuses on the main meeting participants: chairperson, council members, and board members. In each year of the data, there were 26 Dutch-speaking participants and 2 international participants. The chairperson and board members were all Dutch-speaking and were the same for all three years. In Year 1, there were two international student council members, one with Portuguese as L1 and one with Hindi and English as L1. In Years 2 and 3, there were two international employee council members, who served both years. Their L1s were Chinese and German, respectively. All four international members had some receptive proficiency and limited speaking proficiency in Dutch.
Before 2020 (Year 1 of the data), the council held meetings in Dutch only. In Year 1, the election of non-Dutch-speaking members brought about the addition of inclusive multilingual modes. These modes included lingua receptiva, but with the assistance of Dutch-to-English interpretation. In Years 2 and 3, English as a lingua franca was also used in the sense that Dutch-speaking participants responded to international participants in English rather than in Dutch. Throughout all three years, internationals relied on Dutch-to-English interpretation, meaning that lingua receptiva was rarely used without additional aid.
There were other attendees present in these meetings who are outside the current scope of analysis. One example is the writing interpreter, who interpreted Dutch utterances into English. Others include policy advisors who assisted the board members in answering technical questions and a gallery of audience members.
The meeting constellations resulted in meetings in which primarily Dutch was spoken. Therefore, all interactions in which English was also spoken—interactions in which internationals spoke and/or were addressed directly—were incorporated into the research corpus. Tables 1 and 2 outline the data collection and selected research corpus.
Data collection: plenary meetings of the council.
Research corpus: interactions in which English is spoken.
Method of analysis
Recordings in which English was spoken were marked and incorporated into the research corpus. Transcripts of the recordings were generated using Whisper (OpenAI, 2022), which was used offline, and manual editing. The transcripts were edited using HIAT conventions (Schmidt, 2011) in the program EXMARaLDA (Rehbein, 2009).
In analyzing this intercultural data, the researchers strived toward decentering, or “moving away from the researcher’s perspective so that more equal weight is given to various cultural perspectives” (Spencer-Oatey, 2008, p. 328). The first author of this study is an international who speaks English as L1 and has high receptive proficiency in Dutch. The other authors speak Dutch as L1 and are highly proficient in English.
Results
Question/answer pattern
Reconstruction of the meeting discourse shows that the chairperson is highly involved in the question/answer pattern. The interpreter is also included in the pattern, though an in-depth analysis of the interpreter’s role is outside the scope of this study. Redder’s (2008) question/answer pattern has been adapted in Figure 2 to reflect the meeting discourse.
Question/answer pattern for council meetings (adaptation of Redder, 2008, p. 137).
This question/answer pattern has been reconstructed from the data. The activities can be read sequentially as follows. First, the chairperson checks the agenda and meeting script to determine which council member/primary speaker (PS) will speak (pattern position 1). The council member asks their question. Either the chairperson asks which board member/primary hearer (PH) they can appoint to respond, or a board member simply responds (pattern position 2). Then, either the chairperson will ask the council member if they accept the board member’s answer, or the council member will self-initiate a response (pattern position 3). The council member may respond through confirmation, rejection and follow-up question, nodding, or silence. The chairperson assesses the confirmation (or lack thereof) from the council member in light of the question being answered as well as extra-linguistic elements, such as time remaining in the meeting. Then, the chairperson closes the pattern (pattern position 4), resulting in the appointment of the next speaker or movement to the next agenda point. Although the interpreter’s role is not explored in depth in this study, it is important to note that the interpreter listens to the language used. When the chairperson or board member realizes their utterances in Dutch, the interpreter usually writes English translations of the utterances for the international council members.
There are two important things to acknowledge regarding the question/answer pattern. First, although the interactions with international council members are the focus of this study, this same question/answer pattern also applies to interactions with Dutch-speaking council members. In addition, preparation is an essential component of council meetings. Most questions asked by council members are shared with board members in advance of the meetings. This means that, except for spontaneous follow-up questions or responses to announcements, questions are known to the main meeting attendees in advance. What remains unknown until the meetings are the answers to council members’ questions.
Overview of chairperson interventions
The chairperson may intervene at four question/answer pattern positions: appointing speaker, appointing hearer, checkpoint, and closing the pattern. In the seven meetings in the multilingual corpus, there are 12 distinct interactions with internationals that fall within the question/answer speech action pattern. Table 3 illustrates the four pattern positions in which the chairperson (typically) intervenes, the direct addressee of the utterance, and the language(s) used.
Question/answer pattern interventions in the multilingual interactions.
In most cases, the chairperson initiates the four mentioned pattern positions, though there are exceptions. In addition, pattern positions two and three each have 13 occurrences in the multilingual interactions instead of 12. These additional occurrences illustrate derived cases, or exceptions, that diverge from the basic cases (ten Thije, 2002). The findings in Table 3 are detailed in the following sections through transcript examples that serve as “rich points” (Agar, 1994) or intercultural interactions that a researcher identifies as causing wonder. In the examples, speaker names are represented by codes: function and number. The functions are:
C = chairperson
B = board member
IS = international student council member
IE = international employee council member
DS = Dutch-speaking student council member
DE = Dutch-speaking employee council member
Pattern position one: appointing speaker
In most cases, the chairperson uses Dutch to appoint the speaker in the form of an announcement. The chairperson uses constructions such as “Dan is de volgende” (The next is) and “Ik ga allereerst naar” (I first go to) to announce the next council member to speak, without using a second-person pronoun.
English is used only in a minority of cases. In the one English-only example, the chairperson simply says “Yeah uh next” and the council member’s name. The lack of a verb phrase in this example suggests that the utterance is directly addressed to the individual council member, in contrast to the Dutch-language example. This is similar to an example that uses both English and Dutch, in which the chairperson codeswitches from Dutch to English and says “Dan uh next question” (Then uh next question) and the council member’s name. The division between Dutch as the language of announcement and English as the language of direct address can be seen in (1) below.
(1) 20211004-B, Excerpt 1 [1]
[2]
[3]
[4]
The chairperson announces, in Dutch, that IE1 will be the next to speak (s. 0). IE1 speaks (s. 1) but is inaudible. After 2 seconds, the chairperson directs her to turn on the microphone so that “we can all hear you” (s. 2). The second-person pronoun “you” shows that this English utterance is addressed directly to IE1, whereas the previous Dutch utterance was an announcement addressed to the group.
Pattern position two: appointing hearer
Most of the time, the chairperson does not appoint the hearer; rather, a board member self-initiates their turn as the primary hearer. In the data, the chairperson only initiates the pattern position in two cases. One of these two cases is in English. After an international employee asks a question, a board member begins his response in Dutch. The chairperson intervenes and requests, in English, that the board member answer the question in English. This request aligns with the ELF component of the language policy for this council year, Year 2. The second case in which the chairperson appoints the hearer is realized in Dutch, as illustrated in (2) below.
(2) 20211004-A, Excerpt 1 [47]
[48]
[. . .] [67]
[68]
[69]
[70]
[71]
[72]
This example is an exception in the data, as it is a case in which a Dutch-speaking council member asks a question in English. The chairperson appoints DE1 to speak by saying his name (s. 43). The utterance of DE1’s name, rather than making an announcement, suggests that DE1’s question is spontaneous rather than prepared. This inference is supported by DE1 saying “her lab” (s. 44), referring to IE1, the previous speaker. After DE1 asks his question in English, the chairperson then intervenes to appoint the hearer. He speaks Dutch and states that “we” can switch back to Dutch when answering (s. 57). The chairperson’s insistence on switching back to Dutch indicates that ELF interactions are reserved for communication with internationals.
Pattern position three: checkpoint
In the corpus, the international council members initiate a checkpoint more often than the chairperson does. These self-initiated checkpoints are uttered in English and realized through giving confirmations (e.g., “yes,” “okay,” “thank you”), asking a follow-up question, or providing an elaboration on their initial question.
There are also two cases in which the checkpoint is bypassed, and the chairperson closes the pattern by appointing the next speaker. A possible explanation for the chairperson closing the pattern could be to stay on track with time or because non-verbal confirmation from the council member is not captured on camera.
The chairperson only initiates the checkpoint in four cases: three in Dutch and one in English. The English-language case is an outlier because it is a checkpoint realized by the chairperson after a series of follow-up questions and responses. This exception explains why there are 13 cases of pattern position three rather than 12. Most commonly, when the chairperson initiates a checkpoint, it comes after the first answer from a board member in the question/answer pattern. If a council member asks (a) follow-up question(s) and the board member responds, the chairperson does not often initiate a checkpoint after these supplementary responses are given.
Chairperson initiates checkpoint: Dutch
Two of the Dutch-language checkpoints occur in the same meeting in Year 1. The differences in the response from the same council member in (3) and (4) show that slight differences in how the checkpoint is realized may affect the international’s understanding.
(3) 20201026-A, Excerpt 1 [59]
[60]
[61]
In (3), the chairperson asks IS1 not only whether the answers were clear but also whether she still has any questions (s. 35). IS1 responds (s. 36) not with a follow-up question but rather with a further elaboration of her original question. Even for Dutch-speaking council members, this is a common response. IS1’s appropriate response to the checkpoint in (3) can be contrasted with a potential misunderstanding in (4), which occurs later in the same meeting.
(4) 20201026-B, Excerpt 1 [15]
[16]
[17]
[18]
[19]
In (4), IS1 responds to the chairperson’s checkpoint (s. 19) with “No no thank you” (s. 20). The chairperson’s response of “Oké” (Okay) (s. 21) and appointment of the next speaker (s. 22) suggests that he receives IS1’s utterance as acceptance of the board member’s answer. The chairperson’s reaction is noteworthy because “No no” could alternatively indicate that the board member’s answer had not been sufficient. In such a case, a follow-up question would be expected. When comparing (4) with (3), a possible explanation for the difference could be that IS1 may understand the chairperson’s utterance (s. 19) as a question of whether she would like to ask a follow-up question. In that case, her response would be logical. This example (4) shows how the chairperson simultaneously balances managing the meeting succession and checking internationals’ understanding.
Chairperson initiates checkpoint: English
The one English-language checkpoint initiated by the chairperson stands out not only for language use but also because it is initiated after a series of follow-up questions and responses. In this case, which occurs in Year 3, a policy advisor answers IE1’s question. After the response is given in Dutch, the chairperson asks “Did you follow the answer uh IE1?.” The international confirms with a “Yes” and then the chairperson appoints the next speaker in Dutch. The question of whether IE1 could “follow” concerns comprehension rather than satisfaction. This English-language checkpoint shows how the chairperson may check in with an international during an unfamiliar situation, such as a non-regular meeting attendee answering a question in Dutch when the expectation is ELF.
Comparison: checkpoints for Dutch-speaking council members
The following section compares the checkpoints involving internationals with those involving Dutch-speaking members. Similar to the interactions with internationals, there are more cases in which Dutch-speaking council members self-initiate checkpoints through confirmation or follow-up questions than there are cases in which the chairperson initiates the checkpoint. When the chairperson does initiate a checkpoint with a Dutch-speaking council member, it is always uttered in Dutch. While the chairperson occasionally asks whether board members’ answers are sufficient (“voldoende”), he more frequently inquires whether or not the council members have another question (“nog een reactie?”) or simply calls on them with “ja [name]?” (yes [name]?). Based on this analysis, it is concluded that checkpoints for Dutch-speaking council members are focused on confirming satisfaction with answers, whereas checkpoints for internationals dually check satisfaction and comprehension when answers are provided in Dutch. This comprehension check is illustrative of Beerkens’ (2010) hearer plan in receptive multilingual communication.
Pattern position four: closing the pattern
Closing the pattern means that the current primary speaker’s question turn is over. Only the chairperson closes the pattern, and this is typically done by thanking the last person to speak and/or announcing the next item on the agenda. There are two cases in which the chairperson does not use exclusively Dutch to close the pattern. One is found in (2) (s. 43) when the chairperson utters DE1’s name to appoint him as the next speaker. This use of name only is thus categorized as neither Dutch nor English. The other exception is a case in which both English and Dutch are used. After an international receives an answer to her question, the chairperson summarizes the topic of discussion in English and proposes a plan of action. Once the plan has been addressed, the chairperson switches to Dutch to appoint the next speaker.
Discussion
The formal meeting structure, constellations of meeting attendees, and use of several inclusive multilingual modes resulted in limited examples of lingua receptiva being used without additional language aid. While this is a limitation of the research, it also underscores the reality of multilingual meeting practice. The chairperson’s interventions in the question/answer speech action pattern exemplify his role in leading bilingual meetings that aim to use receptive multilingualism.
Pattern position one (appointing speaker) fulfills institutional purposes (Ehlich & Rehbein, 1979) beyond the practical, indicating the formality of the meetings. Most questions are prepared in advance, so there is typically no surprise among council members when the chairperson appoints a particular speaker. This pre-knowledge enables internationals to understand when the chairperson uses Dutch to appoint speakers. In nearly all cases, the chairperson uses Dutch to appoint the speaker in the form of an announcement. This phenomenon illustrates multiple address (Koole & ten Thije, 1994); the same utterance can simultaneously be an announcement to the entire group and an invitation for one individual to speak. English is used only to make requests directed at internationals. These findings show how Dutch is used to maintain the formal group structure of meetings, whereas English is used to communicate effectively with particular individuals.
Pattern position two (appointing hearer) also illustrates the institutionality of the meetings. In most cases, the chairperson does not need to appoint the hearer, as board members often answer questions unprompted. This can be explained by the shared pre-knowledge of the prepared questions and the board members’ awareness of their respective portfolios. The chairperson does appoint a hearer, however, when the language policy has been broken. He uses pattern position two to simultaneously assign a question answerer and steer the discourse toward a particular language.
Pattern position three (checkpoint) may occur after a board member has answered the council member’s question, and it can be initiated by the chairperson or the council members themselves. Regardless of who initiates the checkpoint, the purpose is to confirm with the council member if the board member’s answer can be accepted or if follow-up action is needed. While checkpoints also occur in monolingual interactions, in multilingual interactions they have the added effect of checking understanding when receptive language is used. When the chairperson initiates checkpoints for internationals, there is a dual checking of not only satisfaction but also comprehension. This activity can be seen as the chairperson taking over the council member’s hearer plan in stage VI of the History phase (Beerkens, 2010), bringing mental planning out into the discourse. The checkpoint is similar to Bahtina-Jantsikene’s (2013) meta-communicative device for checking general understanding (MCD4). Although the chairperson does not realize a checkpoint in all cases, the checkpoint could be a valuable tool for creating alignment between interlocutors in receptive multilingual meetings. Just as a chairperson may assess council members’ satisfaction with answers received, they can also check potential misunderstandings resulting from asymmetry in language proficiencies.
Finally, pattern position four (closing the pattern) is always initiated by the chairperson and marks the end of a primary speaker’s time for questions. Dutch is used to delineate the boundaries of interactions with internationals—interactions in which English may be used. Since the action of closing the pattern is usually the appointment of the next speaker, it follows that closing the pattern in Dutch functions as a general announcement. Like pattern position one, pattern position four illustrates how Dutch is used to address the group, while English is reserved for individual internationals.
Conclusion
This study reconstructs the multilingual activities of a council chairperson within the question/answer speech action pattern through functional-pragmatic discourse analysis. Through using Dutch or English, codeswitching at the end of an utterance to enact a different activity, or requesting that interlocutors speak a particular language, the chairperson regulates the bilingual language policy. These strategies are used, on the one hand, to make it easier for international council members to understand utterances (through using English) and, on the other hand, to maintain the status quo of Dutch speakers using Dutch. The chairperson’s action potentials serve not only to create immediate understanding between council members and board members but also to enable the council to fulfill its institutional purposes through communication.
The chairperson’s interventions can be detected at four pattern positions: appointing speaker, appointing hearer, checkpoint, and closing the pattern. Dutch, English, or both languages are used throughout the question/answer pattern, depending on the goal of the position and the addressee(s). The realizations (or lack thereof) of the pattern positions, as well as the languages in which they are realized, construct how multilingualism operates in this council with a bilingual language policy that uses inclusive multilingual modes. The chairperson maintains the language policy primarily through his own choice of language, though he may also instruct others on which language to use when they appear to go against the policy.
Results also illustrate contradictory tendencies (Bührig & ten Thije, 2023) within the multilingual council meetings. For example, the use of English allows internationals to participate, but English and Dutch do not hold equal statuses. Meetings consist primarily of speakers who can and do speak Dutch, and therefore Dutch is used significantly more than English. Another contradiction is that both Dutch and English can be considered inclusive or exclusive, depending on the scenario. Dutch is used for announcements to the entire group, whereas English is typically directed at individual international council members. The use of English simultaneously includes internationals within a Dutch-dominant group and signals a deviation from said group. These effects illustrate how democratic organizations must confront multiple rationalities (Cheney et al., 1998), particularly where language is concerned. Introducing multilingualism may have inclusive intentions, but actual practice could reinforce a monolingual habitus (Gogolin, 2013; Piller et al., 2024). Despite contradictions, this study shows that university participatory bodies can make use of existing structures, such as the mediating role of the chairperson, to facilitate mutual understanding in meetings with a bilingual language policy. Even in the face of a monolingual counter-run (Rehbein, 2013), it is possible to work with multilingualism in institutionalized contexts. Further research should investigate different meeting groups with varying degrees of formality and preparation, as well as more diverse constellations of speakers.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
We sincerely thank two participants for their insightful comments on this paper. We are also grateful to Linda Fong, Kimberly Naber, and Natalia Rivera-Vera for their feedback.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by The Dutch Research Council (NWO) [406.21.CTW.024].
