**3.2 What is multilingualism?**

In this section, I examine at some of the different meanings of multilingualism offered by the different authors. I also go through the definitions of the some of the concepts that have been related to multilingualism, albeit with some preconceptions.

#### **3.3 Delineating multilingualism**

#### *3.3.1 Dissociating multilingualism from monolingualism*

Multilingualism is a fundamental phenomenon that involves language competences and communicative practices in most communities around the globe, according to Heller and Edwards [2, 26]. Multilingualism is an important linguistic dispensation in respect of people's communication patterns, according to Aronin and Singleton [27, 28]. They claim that multilingualism is the worldwide norm, notably in Africa and Asia, and that it manifests itself at the individual and societal levels. Although language uniformity has long been valued in Europe, there is a growing tendency toward embracing linguistic diversity [8].

The term multilingualism refers to the knowledge and use of a wide range of languages and language varieties with various statuses on the one hand, such as official, national, majority, minority, non-standard varieties, mixed languages, and domains of use on the other, such as home, school, and work places [8, 29]. It also entails all levels of language knowledge and skills. Research on multilingualism has greatly influenced studies in the fields of Linguistics, Applied

#### *Multilingualism and Language Choice in Domains DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.101660*

Linguistics, Psycholinguistics and Sociolinguistics. Jessner [29] states that one of the reasons for the challenge in creating widely recognized definitions of multilingualism is that monolingualism's principles do not match the unique arrangements that occur when individuals or groups know and use many languages. This is also evident of different conceptions for different terms and concepts crucial to multilingual studies, such as the meaning of "language," which is the primary object of study in various domains.

Since "multilingualism" emerged as a theme in linguistic research, different attempts have been made toward defining it. According to Kemp [30], the different definitions stem from the complexity of language practices in different communities on the one hand, and differing ideologies and goals of researchers in studying multilingualism and multilingual societies on the other hand. The understanding of multilingualism starts from the understanding of its basic ingredient, "language," which in the classical sense is defined as an abstract tool of communication with territorial and cultural boundaries [5, 31, 32]. Its bounded nature inspired the creation of language names like English attached to specific geographical territories [6]. In this sense, language is a quantifiable entity. The fact that the people or communities could have many such institutions inspired the counting convention. The practice of counting languages led to the coining of terminology such as "bilingualism," "trilingualism," "plurilingualism," and, of course, "multilingualism" [4, 5, 30]. In light of the aforesaid, Edwards [2] defines "multilingualism" in terms of individual knowledge and use of language (individual multilingualism). He recognizes that the ability of an individual to speak different languages is varied does not exist at the same level for all languages. This discussion forms the base for a binary approach in research, which distinguishes the complexity of multilingualism as opposed to monolingualism, and which subsumes "multilingualism" under "bilingualism" by authors of [33–35].
