Il plurilinguismo nella classe italiana: dalla ricerca sull’immigrazione alle prospettive di sperimentazione e analisi nel contesto subalpino

In the research field of sociolinguistics of migration, the subfield of migration at school age carries a specific interest, both as part of a more comprehensive picture of the sociolinguistic dynamics of immigrant repertoires and as a specific object, connected with research on bilingualism and bilingual education. Sociolinguistic research over immigrant communities has recently increased in Italy, but it has mostly focussed on urban areas; this is especially true with regard to young immigrants in their school age. The paper discusses results and perspectives offered by recent sociolinguistic and applied linguistic research in multilingual classes, as well as by recent experimental programs for language teaching and linguistic education aiming either at promoting plurilingual education or at fostering linguistic proficiency in the school language, a non-native language for many pupils. Starting from these experiences, adaptations and applications – for both sociolinguistic research and language teaching research – are proposed, which could be suitable for multilingual classes in non-urban contexts that also involve recent and long-lasting dynamics of multilingual repertoires, such as the alpine and sub-alpine areas of Piedmont.