Exploring English and multilingualism in Wikipedia

This short article describes how a Wikipedia project was integrated into a course on English as a global language, part of a Master’s degree in European and Global Studies. Wikipedia was explored as a ‘global context’ where English is a dominant language, but co-exists with other language Wikipedias. At the same time, Wikipedia allows educators and students to adopt a ‘transformative activist stance’ (Stetsenko 2014) and challenge the ‘status quo’ by learning the rules of engagement in Wikipedia and potentially contributing to a more multilingual and critical Wikipedia. Yet this is not necessarily an easy task, and raising awareness of these opportunities does not mean that they are necessarily taken up.