Linguistic reasoning across repertoires: multilingual students’ metalinguistic practices in a South African writing centre

Writing centres in multilingual South African universities offer critical spaces for examining students’ language use in academic writing development, where consultations often feature explicit metalinguistic talk across African languages, English, and Afrikaans. This qualitative case study explored how multilingual undergraduate students engaged in linguistic reasoning (defined as the analytic processes through which learners interrogate language knowledge) during writing centre consultations. Data comprised observations of 15 consultations, interviews with 12 students, and follow-up tutor interview with three tutors, analysed through an integrated framework of linguistic reasoning and translanguaging theory. Across 87 reasoning episodes in grammatical, discursive, and pragmatic domains, three patterns emerged: cross-linguistic comparisons clarified concepts such as nominalisation and tense; translanguaging served as a cognitive tool for testing interpretations; and reasoning extended to stance, politeness, and authorial positioning beyond mere correctness. The findings of this study position multilingual repertoires as epistemic resources for academic literacies, challenging deficit views. Writing centres should thus foreground multilingual linguistic reasoning to foster inclusive, responsive pedagogies.