1 International universities and implications for minority languages: views from university students in Catalonia and Wales 1 Peter Garrett Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University, Cardiff, CF10 3EU, Wales, UK GarrettP@cardiff.ac.uk Lídia Gallego Balsà Department of English and Linguistics, Universitat de Lleida, Lleida, Catalonia, Spain Abstract European higher education institutions are in general highly committed to internationalization, seeing it as providing ways into the global education market, as an indicator of academic excellence, and for generating income. In multilingual settings, minority languages are not always given adequate consideration in this process and may be a source of tension and ambiguities in the local communities and universities. We report part of a study of international and home students at universities in two bilingual contexts: the University of Lleida (Catalonia) and Cardiff University (Wales). They were asked about their understanding of what an ‘international university’ is, and also how they saw the implications of internationalisation in the universities for the respective minority languages. Results show some differentiation amongst the student groups. For example, in the case of the first item, the Lleida home students associated international universities with opportunities for travel, exchange, and employment advantages far more than the other groups. And in the case of the second, international students at Lleida showed greater negativity and opposition towards the minority language than other groups. Findings highlight the difficulties in reconciling the vitality of minority languages with the forces and priorities of internationalisation. Keywords: Catalan, Welsh, minority language, internationalisation, international university Introduction Higher education institutions in Europe are strongly committed to internationalisation (Woodfield, 2010: 170), viewing it as an opportunity to enter the global educational market as well as (i) to raise the status of the university, and (ii) in the case of non-EU full-fee paying students, for financial benefits. However, institutions do not always regard internationalisation as an opportunity to the same degree, since they need to accommodate a new population arriving with specific expectations. One expectation has