MULTILINGUAL INTERACTION IN THE COMMENT SECTIONS OF EDUCATIONAL YOUTUBE CHANNELS: A QUALITATIVE ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDY
Keywords:
Code-Switching, Communities Of Practice, Digital Discourse, Educational Technology & Informal Learning, Multilingualism, Translanguaging, YouTube CommentsAbstract
Within a surprisingly short space of time, YouTube has become a world-wide hub for informal education, whereby learners from far and wide can have access to tutorials, lectures and training on skills. While most research concentrates on the pedagogical value of video content, there is a considerable gap in studying interactional discourse existing in the comment sections – a less studied, yet rather dynamic space where global users communicate with one another in various languages. This study considers the multilingual practice that occurs in YouTube comment sections in educational videos and how the users communicate, collaborate, and create meaning in informal learning spaces. Based on Translanguaging Theory (2014), Sociocultural Theory (1978), and Communities of Practice (1991), this work takes a qualitative ethnographic approach. Comments were obtained from English-medium educational YouTube channels in such domains as language learning, coding, and science. From the thematic and discourse analysis carried out by the study, patterns of code-switching, code-mixing, transliteration, and translation have been identified. Findings show that multilingualism is not a stylistics option but a practical and strategic device employed by the learner to access knowledge, be culturally connected, and promote community. Many times, the comment threads are acting as transient learning communities in which the users, as a collective body, decipher complex messages and help each other with their full linguistic arsenals at their disposal. That shows how the comment space in YouTube becomes an organic phase of translingual learning, connecting the formal and informal learning processes. The impact of this research on the discipline of Applied Linguistics and Digital Literacies lies in the fact that it highlights the pedagogical meaning of user-generated multilingual discourse on the web attached to education.
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Copyright (c) 2025 Bakhtawar Shahzad, Dr. Zahida Hussain, Maham Noor (Author)
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