Raising children bilingually in Australia: a case study

Abstract

This is a case study about the experiences of parents in seven families in Melbourne, Australia, who are raising their children bilingually. To become bilingual, a child must grow up in a bilingual environment (Chin & Wigglesworth, 2007) and in this study the lowest common denominator among participating families is the families’ two language contexts of English language outside home and the heritage language in the home. I personally share the same experience of raising children bilingually and being bilingual. Therefore, as the researcher, I have placed the story of my life within a story of the social context in which it occurs. Starting with the aim to explore why parents want to raise their children bilingually and how they do this, this study explores the parents’ understandings of culture and children’s bilingual identity, as the parents also raise the issue of the connection between language, culture, and identity. These issues cannot be separated from discussion of child development and parenting, as data draws on the complexity of the parent-child relationship. Parents’ perspectives about cultural identity that their bilingual children have show the complexities that the practice entails. Data is gathered from in-depth interviews with the participating parents who come from six different language backgrounds. The data is obtained from three-round interviews, with three-month intervals between interviews. The following themes emerged from the data: reasons for bilingual communication, the strategies that parents use in bilingual communication, the parents’ understandings about bilingualism and their experience of raising their children bilingually, and links between language, culture, identity, and religion. Many parents believe that they are maintaining the heritage culture when they maintain their heritage language, and that their children should be able to maintain their heritage cultural identity, which become the most dominant reason for their bilingual communication. The most common strategy used - One Context – One Language – is where parents speak their heritage language at home and expect the children to speak the same language, while outside home, the language spoken by the children is English. This one context – one language strategy is more complex than it seems; its complexity marked by the children’s language of choice in the home, which is dominantly English. Constructing an understanding about the practice of raising children bilingually, this study has established awareness that there are various ways in which bilingualism is practised. The discussion suggests that there is idiosyncrasy in parents looking at the phenomenon of raising children bilingually. In addition, their view about children’s cultural identity to one point does not correspond to children’s perception about cultural behaviour; a fact that makes children are considered to have improper attitude about their heritage culture.