Development Of Foreign Language Learners’ Value System In Multilingual Urban Environment

The article discusses the impact of growth of territory’s international activity on the transformation of the value system of students studying foreign languages. A city is considered as an example of such territory. The article states that the growth of the territory’s foreign economic activity leads to the emergence of a multilingual space. Conditions influencing development of a multilingual urban environment are analyzed. In turn, the multilingual landscape of the city becomes the environment in which development of the students value system occurs, as they seek to acquire foreign language competencies to use them in their professional activities. The article argues that the multilingual urban landscape affects the value system of foreign language learners. The article considers the case of the city of Ekaterinburg. During the past decades it has transformed from a city that was closed for foreigners until 1992 into one of the largest regional centers of international business activity in Russia. The article presents analysis of results of the empirical sociological study of the value system that was carried out in 2017-2018 among the first-year students of the Linguistics direction of Ural Federal University: stable and changeable value paradigms are identified, as well as the main reasons are established in focus groups and lead to the value opposition. This analysis allows concluding that there is a correlation between changes in the value system of foreign language learners and the multilingual urban environment at the initial stage of the professional development of students.