This text locates plurilingual and intercultural education within a rationale concerning the right to education. This involves a change of perspective insofar as schooling is here conceived as having in particular to allow all those engaged in it to exercise the rights to education they possess. Language education, defined here as plurilingual and intercultural, thus becomes that element of the process of education which puts languages in the service of a quality education and in relationship with the general aims of the school and the rights of learners.
The text first emphasises the transversal nature of language education, taking into account the linguistic repertoire of learners and the languages present in the school (language of schooling, and other languages whether taught or not) and their relationship to social uses outside school. It then addresses the relationship between the rights of learners and the different forms of language activity in the school.