Pierre Escudé’s text begins with a reminder of the history of dialects across France, and particularly Occitan. He draws our attention back to the nineteenth century and France’s systemic repression of minority languages. Against this tide, he gradually became the ambassador of these so-called dialect languages and developed the field of intercomprehension, actively challenging the adage: “One country, one language”. On the contrary, he describes how linguistic diversity may reinforce national identity surprisingly, through its most recent immigrants: “If my little one speaks Occitan, he will really be French.”

Through her own trajectory, as well as her daughter’s, Emmanuelle Le Pichon describes their experiences of “languages belonging” and legitimacy from France to Canada via Italy, the Netherlands and the United States. Emmanuelle Le Pichon shows her concern with categorizing and reductive terms such as foreign language or L1, L2, L3 and proposes alternative ways for a proactive celebration of diversity in the classroom.

Mercè Bernaus grew up in Spain, in a language imposed by the oppressor, and reminds us that school is a political instrument manipulated by the official language. Emilee Moore, daughter of Italian migrants in Australia, explores the stigma surrounding the indigenous communities in Australia and their right to live and learn in their languages. Together, they explore how gesture, ways of dressing, and dance movements can contribute to learning, in the context of different socio-cultural dynamics and through collaborative and activist approaches that include the whole semiotic repertoire of students.

Daniel Coste, the father of what has been coined “ plurilingual competence,” demonstrates "the intricacy of the historical, territorial, patrimonial, migratory, even ethnic and religious, and always economic, social, and political aspects that, depending on various configurations, affect the representations and positionings of social actors with regard to linguistic plurality." He helps us to tease apart “chosen plurilingualisms from forced plurilingualisms" and to remember that there are "unfortunate, insecure, perhaps handicapping plurilingualisms.”