Multilingualism Research Centre

Advancing interdisciplinary research to inform language, education and social policies

About us

Multilingualism is key to Australia’s multicultural future. Located in Australia’s most multilingual city, with one of Australia’s largest concentrations of language and education researchers, Macquarie University is ideally placed to take the lead in multilingualism research. The Multilingualism Research Centre aims to:

• foster interdisciplinary research on multilingualism across Macquarie University,
• build research collaborations with multilingualism researchers in Australia and overseas,
• build partnerships with community organizations in New South Wales to provide research-based support on multilingual policies and practices.

Interdisciplinary collaboration and community engagement lie at the heart of our approach to research that aims to enhance the quality of life in a multilingual world.

The Centre is hosted by the Faculty of Medicine, Health and Human Sciences (FMHHS), and sponsored by the Linguistics Department in FMHHS and the School of Education in the Faculty of Arts.

Research streams

Language learning and use in the community
What do languages contribute to economic prosperity and social wellbeing? How can we facilitate wider learning, use and maintenance of languages other that English in Australia?

Australian indigenous languages
Indigenous languages are the crown jewels of multilingual Australia. What roles do community members, researchers and educators play in safeguarding our uniquely Australian linguistic heritage? Do twenty-first century multilingual practices contribute to the vitality of indigenous languages, or threaten their very existence?

Multilingualism, technologies and literacies in education
How can new technologies and pedagogies enhance multilingual and multimodal literacies in a culturally diverse education system?

Learning and using English in a multilingual society
What are the roles of English in a multilingual Australia? How can we facilitate the learning and teaching of English in and for a multilingual society?

Multilingualism in social and professional life
How does multilingualism enhance communication in social and professional life?

Geographies of multilingualism
How are Australia’s languages distributed geographically? How are the use and maintenance of community and indigenous languages influenced by geography and space.

Centre Director: Phil Benson (Linguistics)

Associate Director: Alice Chik (School of Education)

Advisory Board

• Professor Terry Lamb - Professor of Languages and Interdisciplinary Pedagogy, University of Westminster
• Professor John Hajek - Director of the Research Unit for Multilingualism and Cross-cultural Communication, University of Melbourne
• Professor Gillian Wigglesworth - Director of the Research Unit for Indigenous Language, University of Melbourne
• Ms. Lucia Johns - President, New South Wales Federation of Community Language Schools
• Ms. Oriana Acevedo Multicultural Consultant, State Library of New South Wales
• Mr. Patrick Pheasant - CEO, NEAS (National English Language Teaching Accreditation Scheme) Australia
• Ms. Janet Freeman - President, ATESOL (Association for Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) NSW

Social Media

Web site. In addition to this web site, the Centre maintains the Multilingual Sydney web site, which hosts Centre reports and publications for download.

Twitter (@MultilingualSy1). The Centre tweets daily news and information on multilingualism to more than 2,000 followers.

YouTube. Video recordings of Centre seminars and events can be viewed on the Multilingual Sydney YouTube channel. The channel currently hosts more than 40 presentations on topics of multilingualism.