Beyond Textbook Knowledge of the Host Country’s Language: Migrants’ Language-Related Tactics When not Attending Classes

This chapter explores migrants’ language-related tactics when they do not attend classes. Focusing on a multilingual migrant who arrived in Italy as an unaccompanied minor, the study utilises rapport conceived as processual in the interaction between researcher and participant and the notion of memory as mobile. The data shows that it is not necessarily textbook knowledge of the host country’s national language that is a helpful resource in this migratory setting; it is a combination of pre-departure languages, phrases learnt online, and other ways of communicating. The results, therefore, shed light on ways of getting things done linguistically that are often overlooked when focusing solely on classroom teaching and learning. This chimes with Cox’s (2024) effort to take learning outside of the classroom but concentrates on experiences as remembered and recounted in interaction of what happened when formal instruction was not a given. This may well warrant further discussion about appropriate language standards as well as learning methods for migrants.