As suggested in previous chapters (in particular chapters 3 to 6), in multilingual ecologies we may find communities that, in certain socio-historical environments, undergo a change in their linguistic repertoire through contact. I have described these environments as often involving closely knit minority/diasporic groups of mixed ethnic origins, often in the position of intercultural brokers. I have already argued (see in particular chapters 4 and 5) that language contact and contact languages are in fact quite common in human history, exotic as they may appear to the Western monolingual speaker. We should therefore find ways in which to view such ecologies as not ‘special’ or abnormal, because multilingualism is at least just as common as monolingualism in current societies.

Too often do linguists identify a speech community with a single language, even when it is clear that the community is characterized by multilingualism, and too often do we find that one particular language is exclusively linked to the cultural identity of a group.