What does ‘international university’ mean at a European bilingual university?: The role of languages and culture

Aintzane Doiz ^[1] ; David Lasagabaster ^[1] ; Juan Manuel Sierra ^[1]
1. [1] Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea
  
  Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea
  
  Leioa, España
Localización: Language awareness, ISSN 0965-8416, Vol. 23, Nº. 1-2, 2014 (Ejemplar dedicado a: Language Awareness for our Multicultural World: Selected papers from the 11th International Conference of the Association for Language Awareness, Concordia University, Montreal, July 2012), págs. 172-186
Idioma: inglés
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Resumen
- Internationalisation has brought about remarkable changes at universities all over the world. In the case of the University of the Basque Country (Spain) this is reflected in the increasing presence of English-medium instruction. This paper examines two issues: the university community's perception of (1) the term international university and its interaction with languages and culture; and (2) the effect of English on attitudes towards the minority language, Basque. The participants were 589 subjects (students, teachers, and administration personnel) whose views were sought by analysing their responses to two open questions. Results show that there is a strong association between the presence of different languages and cultures in the conceptualisation of an international university. As for the impact of English on Basque, international students and teachers were mainly positive, whereas local students and administration personnel harboured a more reluctant attitude. Finally, we conclude that it is essential to raise language and cultural awareness in the implementation of multilingualism in higher education.