Yakutsk, capital of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) in Russia's Far Eastern Federal District, was often described in 19th and early 20th century accounts as being unique in the Russian Empire in that it was not a solely "Russian" city; rather, it was a Sakha (Yakut) place. Its population, Russian and Sakha alike, were conversant in the…

This paper explores language beliefs and writing practices of an international scholar in Biochemistry working at a large U.S. research university. Although the participant articulated monolingual ideologies and a desire to become like a 'native speaker,' he did not consider advanced writing skills in English a prerequisite for publishing in…

This study adopted a social network perspective to explore the academic discourse socialization experiences of eight degree-seeking multilingual international students at a university in eastern China. Based on a triangulation of ethnographic interviews, social network questionnaires, and supplementary sources (e.g., voluntarily submitted…

This paper seeks to address the question how people go about intercultural differences in an institutional setting which aims to mediate between the socio-legal system and the 'outsiders' of the system, i.e. ordinary citizens, through an investigation of professional interactions between a legal advisor and her clients of Eastern European…

The relevance of the investigated problem is stipulated by the necessity to solve a problem of multicultural humanitarian education and formation of tolerance of students to unfamiliar culture. The purpose of the article is to research educational potential of metaphorical vocabulary in different languages, such as zoomorphic naming units of a man…

This study responds to scholarship that has examined "folk concepts" of (non)nativeness through the lens of imagined ideals of the native speaker, by proposing a framework that integrates both ideals and habits. We operationalize these concepts by drawing from the theoretical notions of chronotope, scale, and habitus. Using data from…

The present paper is a case study of how the commodification of the Russian language has transformed a market in New Delhi, India, inaugurated in 1969 and known as Yashwant Place. Over the years, the market slowly assumed a new identity, referred to as Yashka not only by Russian visitors but also tourists from countries of the former Soviet Union,…

This paper aims to demonstrate the implications of health mobility on language practices in the medical tourism industry in India and on the ways, language workers become entrepreneurs. Drawing from ethnographic fieldwork that traces the trajectories of three former students of Russian, we highlight their future aspirations as language learners…

The focus of this paper is on Lithuania, where government policies continue to limit the use of Russian in education, the public space and the media, while the local economy has recognized proficiency in Russian as a commodity. This is particularly salient in the healthcare industry that grew significantly in the past years with patients from…

English as a medium of instruction (EMI) programs are an increasing phenomenon in European universities. This paper takes an ethnographic approach to understanding the impact of EMI on pedagogy in a private university in eastern Ukraine. Fieldwork was conducted over the 2010-2011 academic year in nine English-medium and three Russian-medium…

Using an ecology of language framework, the purpose of this study was to examine the degree to which English as a medium of instruction (EMI) at a private university in eastern Ukraine allows for the use of Ukrainian, the state language, or Russian, the predominantly spoken language, in large cities in eastern Ukraine. Uses of English and Russian…

This study uses a language socialization approach to explore the role of Ukrainian language instruction in the revitalization of Ukrainian as the national language. Based on 10 months ethnographic observation and videotaping of classroom interaction in two fifth-grade Ukrainian language and literature classrooms, it focuses on corrective feedback…

A study undertaken by the American Council of Teachers of Russian (ACTR) and National Foreign Language Center (NFLC) is described. The project was designed to examine the process and results of language study abroad. The first phase of the project was a statistical analysis of the relationship between student characteristics (demographic and…