Physical Work, Customer Service, or Teamwork? : Language Requirements for Seasonal Cleaning Work in the Booming Arctic Tourism Industry
In many parts of the world, cleaning services are mostly subcontracted, which means intense competition and increased demand for efficiency. Consequently, the terms and conditions of employment have declined and the turnover of workers is high. Remote areas such as the Arctic face particular difficulties recruiting and retaining cleaning workers. Nonetheless, possibilities to earn and aspirations for a better life bring center – periphery, cross-border, and lifestyle mobilities to the peripheral north, especially in winter. This chapter examines cleaning as seasonal blue-collar work in a booming tourist destination in Arctic Finland. Applying an ethnographic and discourse analytical approac…
Work-related language learning trajectories of migrant cleaners in Finland
Cleaning is often the survival employment that migrants can get in their new home country. Ideally, the workplace can be a site for integration and language learning. This article explores how two migrants working as cleaners in Finland narrate their work-related Finnish language learning trajectories. The research is designed by applying nexus analysis (Scollon & Scollon, 2004), which focuses on social action in the intersection of interaction order, participants’ life experiences, and discourses in place. The social action in focus here is investment (Darvin & Norton, 2015), which means a commitment to developing language skills to achieve one’s aspirations. The article also analy…
Conditions of commodification : Russian as a transient commodity in an Arctic tourism resort
Abstract Based on an ethnography incorporating interview, linguistic landscape and observational data, this research illustrates how temporary linguistic value is negotiated and how an Arctic tourism destination is made fit for consumption for a specific audience. Set within a tourism resort in the Finnish Arctic during two weeks in Winter when the region habitually receives a large influx of Russian-speaking visitors, we illustrate how Russian is conceptualized as a means of economic practice by stakeholders in the local tourism industry. While some offer services specifically for a Russian-speaking audience as part of a short-term high-risk/high-reward investment, others regard Russian as…
Affordances and constraints: Second language learning in cleaning work
This paper examines opportunities for language learning in a cleaning job, which is a typical entry-level job for immigrants. An ethnographic case study approach is taken to investigate examples of the conditions that allow or prevent language learning for the focal participant, a sub-Saharan man who works as a cleaner in Finland. This case illustrates on a micro-scale the impact of the new economy on a worker in a company that has outsourced its cleaning services. Theoretically and methodologically, the study applies van Lier’s (2004) ecological approach to language learning and Scollon and Scollon’s (2004) nexus analysis. The analysis of interaction order shows that within outsourced clea…
In the name of security : Governmentality apparatus in a multilingual mine in Arctic Finland
This critical sociolinguistic study explores how mining work is governed in the name of security in a mine in Arctic Finland. Although the mining industry is dominated by multinational corporations, mines themselves tend to be concentrated in peripheries where a mobile and multilingual workforce is recruited. Mining is a high-risk business: industrial accidents and environmental damage can be severe. Discursive practices play a crucial role in risk management. In this study, the nexus of language, security, and production in mining work is analyzed by applying the Foucauldian concept of 'governmentality'. The data comprise ethnographic observations, work-related documents, and interviews co…
Mahdollisuuksien rajoissa : neksusanalyysi suomen kielen oppimisesta siivoustyössä
Maiju Strömmerin suomen kielen alaan kuuluva väitöskirja tarkastettiin Jyväskylän yliopistossa 15. joulukuuta 2017. Vastaväittäjänä toimi dosentti Leena Kuure Oulun yliopistosta ja kustoksena professori Minna Suni. Maiju Strömmer: Mahdollisuuksien rajoissa. Neksusanalyysi suomen kielen oppimisesta siivoustyössä. Jyväskylä Studies in Humanities 336. Jyväskylä: Jyväskylän yliopisto 2017. Kirja on luettavissa osoitteessa http://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-951-39-7265-3 nonPeerReviewed
Neksusanalyysi suomen kielen oppimisesta siivoustyössä
This dissertation focuses on Finnish language learning opportunities in cleaning work, which is the most common job for immigrants in Finland. The study investigates what opportunities and constraints there are for Finnish language learning in cleaning work, how a work community supports language learning, and what factors facilitate or constrain investment in language learning at work. Language learning opportunities are explored from an ecological approach as affordances – the reciprocal relations between an individual and his/her social and physical environment. The study also explores the scaffolding provided by the work community and investment in second language learning. Nexus analys…
Material scaffolding : Supporting the comprehension of migrant cleaners at work
Linguistic diversity is growing in labour markets throughout Europe, including Finland, where cleaning is the most common job for immigrants. This paper explores material scaffolding provided for second language users in tasks involved in cleaning work. The notion of ‘scaffolding’ refers to temporary and adaptive support, and here the emphasis is especially on ‘material scaffolding’, that is, material artefacts and body movements employed in mentoring. The theoretical framework of the study is van Lier’s (2004) ecological perspective on language learning, and a discourse-ethnographic perspective of nexus analysis (Scollon and Scollon 2004) is adopted to analyse the ethnographic data collect…
Becoming a multilingual health professional in vocational education - two adult migrants’ translanguaging trajectories
The number of migrant students in vocational education in Finland is rising. Their educational backgrounds and language resources are diverse, and research is needed to gain better understanding on how their existing knowledge can be acknowledged, supported, and deployed when they become multilingual professionals in their own fields. In this ethnographic study, we drew on the theoretical approaches of translanguaging and language architecture (García, O., and T.Kleyn. 2016. “Translanguaging Theory in Education.” In Translanguaging with Multilingual Students: Learning from Classroom Moments, edited by O. García, and T. Kleyn, 9–33. New York, London: Routledge; Li, Wei. 2018. “Translanguagin…