Language and Education in Multilingual Settings

It is not the purpose of this volume to propose solutions but rather to explore some of the methods of recognizing and analysing the problem; only if this difficult first step of agreeing on the dimensions of the problem is carried out successfully can there be any chance of finding acceptable and workable solutions. The writers of this volume do not have a single view of the issues, for they are international in background and experience, and interdisciplinary in training and approach; moreover, as will be clear, they differ in political and philosophical beliefs, in scholarly rhetoric, in research paradigms and in personal circumstances. By inviting some of them to participate in its first Symposium, the AILA Scientific Commission on Language and Education in Multilingual Settings hoped to encourage a free exchange of ideas among scholars from different countries; by publishing in this volume some of the papers from the Symposium together with others selected to complement their coverage, we hope to widen the debate and work towards the development of a common effort at understanding. Researchers in the 1980s do not need to be reminded of the example of the blind scholars describing an elephant; only by making a real effort to understand our colleague's point of view can we hope to work together to a common understanding of a phenomenon.