English for Migration: Interaction between African Refugees and Professionals in the Humanitarian Sector

The massive migratory flow of refugees and asylum seekers from Africa represents one of the key issues in the current European agenda. Although economic and socio-political factors related to this phenomenon have been widely investigated and exposed through international institutions and the media, little attention has been paid to the linguistic implications. Hotspots, refugee camps, reception and accommodation centres in Europe are currently defining new linguistic contact zones, where the overlapping of diverse cultural and linguistic elements shape new ways of communication and produce new linguistic practices. This article presents the data from a project that aims to record, describe, and analyse these practices with a particular focus on Italy. The data include different textual typologies and audio and video recordings gathered in selected settings: hotspots and reception centres in the south and the north of Italy. The populations migrating from Africa to Europe present heterogeneous characteristics in terms of nationality, cultural and linguistic backgrounds. Furthermore, the journey to Europe forces migrants to develop or strengthen their sociolinguistic competencies and skills, as they experience, adapt to and accommodate different contexts and conditions. The study investigates the varieties of English spoken in the interactions between Anglophone African migrants and Italian professionals in the humanitarian sector, exploring the implications of a translanguaging approach, which could offer an innovative perspective on the dynamics of language contact, acquisition and teaching, providing pragmatic solutions to communication failure in institutionalized settings, and emphasizing the fluidity of the linguistic scenario in the domain of migration.