This year makes it the sixth time The Unconference Space is held at the Social Innovation Summit. The Unconference Space is organized and facilitated by the Impact Hub Stockholm team. There is nothing traditional about this Unconference set up. There are no keynote speakers or pre-set program to adhere to. The people who participate in the Unconference are the ones who will host and drive the conversations. This encourages collaboration, empowers new thinking, and connects people.
This specific Unconference Space session will focus on “Språkvård! Imagining inclusivity, language and cultural awareness for adults in plurilingual Sweden. Why and how should migrant languages be valued?”.
Background: Language is key in any type of crisis, be it war, the refugee crisis, disease spread, intercultural misunderstandings, and other man-made or natural disasters. An important issue for humanitarian organizations is finding the right support in the right language pairs at the time of a pandemic or a crisis. Even before the medical help, the information in the right language is crucial. While the Swedish health agency and many other organizations are increasingly creating websites & leaflets with important information in several languages, we still haven’t fully exploited the wealth of language richness available to us at our doorsteps. Whether it is during the Covid-19 or the post-Covid world, a bilingual mind has access to information and ways of doing things in different ways. Language contact enriches our world with diverse types of experiences. In Sweden, according to the Institute of Language and folklore (ISOF), 150 migrant languages are spoken besides the five minority languages and Swedish. An adult who can speak several languages can understand and bridge cultural divides within our cities. We need more contact between different language communities within our cities and Nordic to bring communities closer and to enrich our experiences.
Imagining and creating opportunities for multilingual education in Sweden for everyone is highly important, not just in times of crisis but to make the world a better place.
You do not have to be an expert to participate – come as you are! For the full experience, make sure to have your camera and microphone on.