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Within discourses on education and transnationalism, much importance has been given to language, both for the educational success of migrants and their transition into the labor market. Among the many perspectives on multilingualism, there is a growing body of research on language brokering. In contrast to professional interpreting, this is often associated with interpreting without formal qualifications or payment in mostly informal settings. However, language brokering is embedded in complex social structures, and students who interpret often act within complex power relations. In our article, we address experiences with education-related language brokering. While focusing on the perspectives of the students, we will address the roles they take during language brokering activities between different actors and the power relations they experience. Our data were collected as part of an ethnographic research project which aimed to explore the experiences of refugee students following their arrival in Austria and during the adjustment period in their new sociolinguistic and educational context. Empirically, the article is based on a data set of small stories and reflections about language brokering. The analysis was carried out through contrastive comparisons between different cases. The paper will conclude with suggestions on the introduction of critical language brokering practices and policies in educational institutions.

In „super-diversen" Migrationsgesellschaften ist die Frage nach dem Umgang mit Pluralität entscheidend und folgenreich für soziale Gerechtigkeit. Insbesondere sprachliche Diversität stellt für öffentliche Organisationen, die in einem Spannungsfeld zwischen gesellschaftlicher Mehrsprachigkeit und monolingualer Orientierung agieren, eine Herausforderung dar. Ausgehend von der Annahme, dass Sprache neben der mittelnden stets auch eine soziale Funktion hat, analysiert der vorliegende Beitrag, wie sprachliche Pluralität auf der Beziehungsebene die professionelle Interaktion zwischen Street-level Bureaucrats und Klient*innen prägt. Die Daten stammen aus dem qualitativen Forschungsprojekt AMIGS, das den Umgang mit sprachlicher Diversität am österreichischen Arbeitsmarktservice untersucht. Die Analysen zeigen, dass die Beziehungsarbeit mit Herausforderungen und Paradoxien verbunden ist, welche im Kontext migrationsgesellschaftlicher Mehrsprachigkeit verschärft auftreten können und zusätzliche Dimensionen aufweisen. In "super-diverse" migration societies, the question of how to deal with plurality is crucial and consequential for social justice. Linguistic diversity, in particular, is a challenge for public organizations that are monolingually oriented by tradition while operating within multilingual societies. Based on the assumption that language always has both a social and a mediating function, this article analyzes how linguistic plurality shapes the professional interaction between street-level bureaucrats and clients at the relational level. The analysis refers to data from the qualitative AMIGS research project that investigates how the Austrian Public Employment Service deals with linguistic diversity. Our findings show that relational work in client interactions is associated with challenges and paradoxes, which can emerge more intensely in the context of multilingualism and have additional dimensions in a migration society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The setup of an islet isolation facility designed along the rules of good manufacturing practice (GMP) is a technically challenging, cost and time intensive process. ( 1) Consequently, several institutions have decided to perform transplantation of islets isolated at another center with an already standing expertise. Such a solution includes the necessity to transport the isolated islets from the isolation to the transplantation facility. In spite of its importance, an ideal solution for the transport of the isolated human islets has still not been established.   Here, we present an islet transport device suited to transport human islet cells under reproducible conditions and minimized cell stress. The transport simulation of the human islets was performed in a transfused "rotary transport system for islets" termed "ROTi." Besides measuring standard metabolic (LDH, lactate, glucose) and physical parameters (pH, dissolved oxygen and temperature), we used five different live stains in combination with real time live confocal microscopy to document islet quality parameters. As live stains we added tetramethylrhodamine methyl ester, cell permeant acetoxymethylester, propidium iodide, annexin-fitc and fluorescent wheat germ agglutinin, and assessed mitochondrial membrane potentials, calcium levels, cell death, apoptosis or cell morphology, respectively. We compared the viability of human islets after 24 h incubation in the ROTi device to an incubation simulating "standard" shipment of islets in 50 ml tubes. All cell viability parameters studied (mitochondrial membrane potentials, calcium content, apoptosis, cell death as well as cell morphology) documented a significantly better cell viability in the ROTi fraction compared with the simulated "standard" shipment fraction. Besides maintaining islet cell viability, the ROTi bears the advantage of a better reproducibility of islet transport conditions.