Language hierarchies at the international university

This article presents a framework for the analysis of language hierarchies at the international university. Taking into consideration that more than 50 different languages may be present among the language resources of students and staff, the article approaches the problem of how one can analyze practices of hierarchization, inclusion and exclusion of languages in a de facto multilingual setting such as a university. The major analytical categories are those of language hierarchization in practice and in representations, as well as distinctions of language hierarchies at different levels: the global, the regional, the state and the institutional levels. The article positions universities in this complex linguistic landscape and presents a case in which a multilingual policy has been implemented: Cultural Encounters at Roskilde University, an educational program that deals with issues of multicultural and multilingual society in a global and postcolonial perspective.