Language Shift, Maintenance, and Attitudes of Domestic Educational Migrants in the Philippines

Globalization has stirred human mobility for various reasons, one of which is education. In the Philippines, many high school graduates move to other places within the country to study in bigger universities, making them educational migrants. Since language is an integral component of migration (Borlongan, 2023), we explore how the language choices and attitudes of the domestic educational migrants reflect their language shift and maintenance. Employing a descriptive survey method supplemented by qualitative inquiry, results show that the domestic educational migrants demonstrate domain-based multilingualism, as indicated by their language choices, involving maintenance in intimate, familial, and cultural domains and shift in academic, expanded social, and digital domains. Their native language remains a foundation of their identity and belonging, while English and Tagalog-based Filipino serve as tools for academic achievement and social integration. The sustained growth of educational migration in the Philippines merits more investigations, especially on language beliefs and practices.