The inclusion of Slovak Roma pupils in secondary school: contexts of language policy and planning

The arrival of large numbers of Slovak Roma to Sheffield over a relatively short period has inserted two new languages (Slovak and Romani) into an already diverse, multilingual school environment. Schools face challenges in welcoming the new migrant children, inducting and integrating them and facilitating access to the English school curriculum. This paper draws on longitudinal ethnolinguistic research in one secondary school in Sheffield that has experienced this migration and language situation and responded in a variety of ways. Utilizing an analytical framework based upon “language-in-education planning” (LEP, [Kaplan & Baldauf, 1997, Language planning. From practice to theory. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters]) and “micro language planning” (MLP, [Liddicoat & Taylor-Leech, 2014, Micro language planning for multilingual education: Agency in local contexts. Current Issues in Language Planning, 15(3), 237–244]), the various emergent practices are examined. Findings show that the school is engaging in various “unplanned” practices to surmount the language and pedagogical issues, thus highlighting the role of MLP as a necessary part of more macro LEP processes

A review of name-based ethnicity classification methods and their potential in population studies

Several approaches have been proposed to classify populations into ethnic groups using people's names, as an alternative to ethnicity self-identification information when this is not available. These methodologies have been developed, primarily in the public health and population genetics literature in different countries, in isolation from and with little participation from demographers or social scientists. The objective of this paper is to bring together these isolated efforts and provide a coherent comparison, a common methodology and terminology in order to foster new research and applications in this promising and multidisciplinary field. A systematic review has been conducted of the most representative studies that develop new name-based ethnicity classifications, extracting methodological commonalities, achievements and shortcomings; 13 studies met the inclusion criteria and all followed a very similar methodology to create a name reference list with which to classify populations into a few most common ethnic groups. The different classifications' sensitivity varies between 0.67 and 0.95, their specificity between 0.80 and 1, their positive predicted value between 0.70 and 0.96, and their negative predicted value between 0.96 and 1. Name-based ethnicity classification systems have a great potential to overcome data scarcity issues in a wide variety of key topics in population studies, as is proved by the 13 papers analysed. Their current limitations are mainly due to a restricted number of names and a partial spatio-temporal coverage of the reference population data-sets used to produce name reference lists. Improved classifications with extensive population coverage and higher classification accuracy levels will be achieved by using population registers with wider spatio-temporal coverage. Furthermore, there is a requirement for such new classifications to include all of the potential ethnic groups present in a society, and not just one or a few of them. Copyright (c) 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

Changing Perspectives on Language Maintenance and Shift in Transnational Settings: From Settlement to Mobility

This chapter focuses on the study of language maintenance and shift in transnational (migrant) contexts. It comprises a brief history of the field, covering its emergence, development, and expansion during the twentieth century. It includes a discussion of the main approaches investigating the processes of language maintenance and shift as well as the theories put forward to understand these processes and account for differences in the language practices of various ethnolinguistic groups. The final section moves beyond the twentieth century and focuses on how globalisation has significantly altered what constitutes ‘migration’. Rather than seeing it primarily as a process resulting in ‘permanent’ (re)settlement elsewhere, migration increasingly results in ongoing mobility. Such changes in turn affect language practices in diaspora contexts and impact our understanding of what constitutes language maintenance