Volume 3, Issue 1 May 2022, pp. 23–41 
Regular Articles
Metalanguage for enabling immigrants and refugees: Relevance of Natural Semantic Metalanguage and Minimal English
Boudjemaa Dendenne 
1
1 Ècole Normale Supérieure - Messaoud Zeghar, Sétif, ALGERIA 
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29140/mle.v3n1.487
Abstract
We should seek every possible method for educating immigrants and refugees and facilitating communication for them – especially during the current difficult times due to the spread of a killer-pandemic (i.e., Covid-19). To this end, I discuss the role which “metalanguage” could play in this regard, with reference to Natural Semantic Metalanguage/NSM and Minimal English/ME (e.g., Goddard & Wierzbicka, 2007; Goddard & Wierzbicka, 2018). This mainly theoretical contribution will demonstrate how NSM and ME can be powerful pedagogical tools for ethnopragmatic instruction and a mitigator to cross-cultural misunderstanding in intercultural/ international communication. The main merit which I claim is raising awareness about the significance of this well-established project in applied linguistics and demonstrates how it can tie in with the immigrant-and-refugee situation.
Copyright
© Boudjemaa Dendenne
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Suggested citation
Dendenne, B. (2022). Metalanguage for enabling immigrants and refugees: Relevance of Natural Semantic Metalanguage and Minimal English. Migration and Language Education , 3(1), 23–41. https://doi.org/10.29140/mle.v3n1.487
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