Plurilinguismo e intercomprensione nella classe di italiano L2 a migranti adulti. Dalla lingua veicolare alla lingua-ponte

The paper reflects on how to activate and capitalise on adult migrant learners’ plurilingual repertoires through intercomprehension in the Italian L2 classroom. Firstly, two survey results with adult migrant learners and teachers of Italian as L2 are discussed so as to show how plurilingual practices are perceived and activated by both parties. Secondly it discusses how studies on the intercomprehension between related languages and on the role of English as a bridge language towards Romance languages can be usefully applied in the given learning context in order to enhance the metalinguistic awareness of learners and develop teachers’ ability to capitalise their language repertoires in the teaching of the target language.