This research group gathers scholars with an interest in grasping ways in which our fields of research have been formed and how different knowledge objects have developed over time. Our research questions tend to be meta-scientific in nature. We interrogate, for example, the role and ramifications of the language sciences vis-à-vis objects such as mother tongue instruction – in policy and in practice, in historical and contemporaneous times. 

Bilingualism and historical epistemology constitutes a central thematic strand. We often adopt an intellectual history approach to questions that in various ways concern bi- and multilingualism, Swedish as a second language and other related areas. Other knowledge interests pertain to recruitment within the fields, or to reproduction of knowledge through their journals. Another salient concern is societal impact and the study of the ways in which knowledge from these areas influence societies in long term and short-term perspectives.