Migrants in the Midst of the COVID-19 Pandemic

A Migration Linguistic Perspective

Abstract

In this article, I discuss the various issues confronting migrants in the midst of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, in particular, the language issues which they encounter. And then, I point out lessons to be learned from these issues and draw implications and suggest recommendations relating to language in the context of migration, ultimately outlining a ‘crisis and emergency language competence and plan for migrants’. I argue that there is a great need to reflect on and rethink how language and language resources are used in times during the COVID-19 pandemic in view of the migrants around the world. In this article, I therefore conjecture on the pandemic from a migration linguistic perspective, an interdisciplinary and multidimensional approach to the study of language in the context of migration.