New Amsterdammers learn from ‘City and Language’ (Stad en Taal) project
cultuur + educatie 25 (2009)

Art and objects are good conversation pieces: they invite discussions of impressions and associations. This was the idea behind a number of special museum programmes organised for participants in civic integration programmes. This publication discusses the results of and experiences with the Amsterdam project ‘City and Language’ (Stad en Taal).

Stad en Taal
In 2006, the Municipality of Amsterdam launched the Stad en Taal project for those learning Dutch as a second language. The project serves the dual purpose of teaching Dutch and familiarising the participants with the city's culture and history. The Amsterdam Historical Museum (Amsterdams Historisch Museum) and the Stedelijk Museum are both partners in the project, developing special programmes for the ‘new Amsterdammers’. The project later included the participation of the Foam photography museum, the Dutch Resistance Museum and the Tropenmuseum Amsterdam.

Programmes and experiences
Melissa de Vreede (Cultuurnetwerk Nederland) outlines the programmes in her article and features museum employees who talked about their experiences. Stad en Taal is an example of how museums are tapping into the new target group of those learning Dutch as a second language.

New horizons
In an essay, Halleh Ghorashi (VU University Amsterdam) explores the significance of language in the civic integration/integration process. Language is the gateway to a new horizon, as learning the new language enables migrants to interact with their surroundings. Rather than thinking in terms of language deficits and minorities, Ghorashi prefers to stress the tremendous potential and richness that new residents have to offer this culture, as voyagers between two worlds.

Feeling at home
The idea behind Stad en Taal is that having a knowledge of the city’s culture and history helps immigrants feel more at home, thus promoting integration. Sandra Trienekens (Erasmus University Rotterdam and Hogeschool van Amsterdam university of applied sciences) and Niels Vlasman (Hogeschool van Amsterdam university of applied sciences) studied the effectiveness of the museum programmes in terms of this goal. Their conclusion is cautiously affirming: the programmes do in fact help participants in civic integration programmes feel more at home, although this seems to apply mainly to those who are better educated and more proficient in the language.

Language acquisition
In this contribution, Folkert Kuiken (University of Amsterdam) summarises the results of two studies into Stad en Taal as a foundation for language acquisition, concluding that museums provide a rich environment of visual stimulus that promotes interaction. Moreover, museum staff have been highly successful in encouraging those learning Dutch as a second language to talk, and those learning Dutch seem to retain many of the new words they have learned.

A brief look at Dutch as a second language
In the introduction to this publication, ‘A brief look at Dutch as a second language’ (NT2 in vogelvlucht), Bea Ros (Zunneberg & Ros Tekstproducties) provides an overview of the history of Dutch as a second language and museum programmes for participants in civic integration programmes.

Dutch overview