Raising Kyrgyz kids: family language policy, childrearing, and language shift in a Bishkek family

This study aims to investigate parents� language ideology and family language policy (FLP) among Acehnese families that impact on language shift and language maintenance of Acehnese as a heritage language. The participants of the study were 10 female parents from one of the suburbs in Lhokseumawe City, who have young children from 2 years to 15 years old. The study employed a descriptive qualitative method. The data was collected through semi-structured interviews. The result of the study shows that the majority of parents� belief that Indonesian is significant for their children's education, has resulted in parents prioritizing Indonesian for their children as the dominant language to speak at home. Furthermore, the family language policy adopted by parents has an impact on language shift among Acehnese children to the Indonesian language. �Parents are reluctant to speak Acehnese to their children as a mother tongue and tend to abandon their heritage language. There are two significant points that are lost due to the consequence of parents� belief and there the family language policy to choose only Indonesian as a mother tongue to their children; first, it has led their children to grow as monolingual people that somehow is a big loss for the Acehnese children in order to gain various benefits culturally, cognitively, and communicatively from being bilinguals; second, Acehnese is under serious threat as Acehnese children ability in speaking their heritage language keep decreasing. Thus, strong efforts need to be done by all parties for Acehnese language preservation as a part of the unique identity of the Acehnese people.

Family language policy comprises three components, namely, ideology, practice, and management. Using the conceptual framework of family language policy, this study draws on data from semi-structured interviews and participant observation to explore the role of mothers in the process of language maintenance and language shift in Malaysia. First, it investigates the language choices and ideologies of four Chinese single mothers from Penang that lead to speaking heritage languages and/or dominant languages with their children. Second, it examines the strategies for heritage culture maintenance adopted by these mothers. The study found that two of the mothers speak Chinese heritage languages with their children to reinforce emotional attachment and family cohesion. Conversely, two other mothers face socioeconomic and educational pressures in relation to maintaining Chinese heritage languages, which trigger a shift to using dominant languages such as Mandarin Chinese and English with their children. Nevertheless, all four mothers made efforts in exposing their children to ethnic Chinese cultures. The findings indicate that maintaining heritage languages in the current era has become a challenge for many families in Malaysia while speaking dominant languages is becoming a necessity.

Though bilingual populations in the U.S. have increased in recent years, the number of non-Spanish foreign language programs at the elementary and middle levels has dropped significantly. Because it is a less common second language in the U.S., Korean language education is severely limited even in major urban areas. This disparity is especially critical for Korean-speaking families who wish to maintain their native language (L1), particularly since language shift and loss generally occur when non-native English-speaking children are exposed to a different dominant language like English at school. With this background in mind, the current dissertation study is centered upon two main purposes. Grounded in a sociocultural perspective, I examined how sociocultural and educational backgrounds affect how Korean-English bilingual transnational parents construct language ideologies, shape their family language policy (FLP), and develop their language maintenance strategies. Also, in accordance with a sociolinguistic approach, I examined family dynamics in relation to language ideologies through verbal interaction. Each parent and child who participated in this study took an agentive role by making corrections through code-switching and negotiated cultural values by making indexical meanings through code-switching. The study was conducted among seven transnational Korean-English bilingual families in a Midwestern city in the U.S. Each family had at least one child who was enrolled in grades K-6, with the understanding that most Korean communities lack access to Korean as a second language in the public-school curriculum. I collected interview data from the parents and children as well as family conversation data from each family unit. For data analysis, I divided the families into three FLP groups: a Korean-dominant group, a bilingual group, and an English-dominant group. I applied theme-based data analysis and conversation data analysis for each data type. This study deepens our understanding of how parents’ diverse educational and cultural backgrounds contribute critically to their language ideologies and, by extension, their family language policy. Each family also employed various FLPs based on their social circumstances while negotiating, contesting, or sharing their prioritized languages and their associated cultural values in the process of developing their language ideology.

<p>This thesis examines how Azeri, a minority language with the largest number of speakers in Iran, is marginalized by de facto monolingual language policies of the state favoring Farsi, the only official language, over Azeri in the three selected domains. The research provides insights into how family language policies, i.e. attitudes, ideologies and practices in the home, are influenced by macro policies of multilingual nation-states, leading to language maintenance/shift among minority groups. The investigation adopted and integrated a number of complementary theoretical frameworks and paradigms. An ecology of language paradigm (Haugen, 1972; Hornberger & Hult, 2008; Mühlhäusler, 1996) was used to situate the research within a broader sociopolitical, historical and economic context. The ethnolinguistic vitality model (Giles, Bourhis, & Taylor, 1977), and language policy and planning (LPP) frameworks proposed by Shohamy (2006) and Lo Bianco (2005, 2008c, 2012a; 2013) were utilized to explore the complex interaction between macro level LPP activities and micro level attitudes and practices. The integrated model demonstrates how language policies implemented within state-run domains and institutions produce particular Discourses. The proposed framework further illustrates how such Discourses may influence people at the grass roots level which in turn could lead to language maintenance/shift in different communities and groups. The data base for the study comprised two phases: the first phase involved ethnographic observations of the public sphere (linguistic landscape data), language use in the home (three case studies), and the local channel for Azeris (media data), interviews with fifty children, and authorities of ten kindergartens and preschools. A focus-group interview was also conducted in this phase to assist with designing an attitude questionnaire which was administered in the second phase to 150 parents of young children. The empirical data suggests that family language policies among Azeris in Tabriz are constantly and increasingly influenced by monolingual policies of the state. The institutionalization and legitimization of Farsi through de facto LPP activities has resulted in formation of uncommitted, if not negative, attitudes among Azeri parents regarding their ethnic language. The analysis shows how a Farsi-only education system cajoles kindergarten principals into favoring Farsi over Azeri, leading them to suggest that parents and children speak Farsi in the home to ease their integration into the education system. The linguistic landscape data demonstrates the absence of Azeri both in top-down governmental and private individual signage indicating its low status compared to Farsi and English, the two prevalent languages in public signage in Tabriz. Exploring the broadcasting media suggests Azeris' inclination towards Farsi, and then in a second place, Turkish channels. As a result, having attracted only one percent of Azeri audience, the only available channel provided by the government for Azeris, Sahand TV, provides arguably no institutional support for Azeri. The findings suggest that although family members may be viewed as free agents to choose a particular language to speak in the home, in reality such choices are highly constrained by the ecology surrounding the home which is shaped by LPP decisions and activities. Overall, this thesis sheds light on the complex nature of language policy and planning in multilingual nation-states, and how they impact on language maintenance/shift processes among minority groups, whilst also illuminating how language ecologies are manipulated by nation-states to achieve particular non-linguistic goals.</p>

1. Beginnings John Macalister & Seyed Hadi Mirvahedi Part I: Challenges in Family Language Policy 2. Family Language Policy: New Directions Cassie Smith-Christmas 3. Family Language Policy for Deaf Children and the Vitality of New Zealand Sign Language Rachel McKee & Kirsten Smiler 4. Family Language Practices as Emergent Policies in Child-Headed Households in Rural Uganda Maureen Kendrick & Elizabeth Namazzi 5. Exploring Family Language policies Among Azerbaijani-Speaking Families in the City of Tabriz, Iran Seyed Hadi Mirvahedi 6. The Role of the Zapotec Language from Lozoga' in the Californian Migrant Community Daisy Bernal Lorenzo 7. Adrift in an Anglophone World: Refugee Families' Language Policy Challenges Diego Navarro & John Macalister PART II: Opportunities in Family Language Policy 8. How Religious Ideologies and Practices Impact on Family Language Policy - Ethiopians in Wellington Melanie Revis 9. I speak all of the language!: Engaging in Family Language Policy Research with Multilingual Children in Montreal Alison Crump 10. Dynamic Family Language Policy: Heritage Language Socialization and Strategic Accommodation in the Home Corinne Seals 11. Language Ideologies, Social Capital, and Interaction Strategies: AN ethnogrpah8ic Case Study of Family Language Policy in Singapore Guangwei Hu & Li Ren PART III: Consequences for Family Language Policy 12. Home: A Confluence of Discourses in Multilingual Linguistic Ecologies Seyed Hadi Mirvahedi & John Macalister

This study explores language shifts in multilingual families during the COVID-19 pandemic across Cyprus, Germany, Israel, and Sweden, employing the Family Language Policy (FLP) framework. It addresses critical gaps in FLP literature by examining how external disruptions affect the maintenance and sustainability of minority home language (HL) and country language (CL). The study provides new perspectives on the flexibility of FLP in rapidly changing environments. Data were collected via an online survey for 807 multilingual children across four countries: Cyprus (n = 74), Germany (n = 291), Israel (n = 370), and Sweden (n = 92). Participants reported speaking 39 different mother tongues; their partners reported 41. Russian emerged as the most common HL, spoken by 50% of respondents and 36% of spouses. We evaluated language shifts in caregivers and children, noting no significant change in Cyprus, while respondents in Germany, Israel, and Sweden reported increased HL use. Using network analysis, we revealed complex interdependencies among factors influencing HL and CL shifts. In HL-Russian families, child community language proficiency and home activity engagement were most influential. In other HL groups, respondent–child interaction was central. These findings advance FLP theory and demonstrate the broader impact of crises on language practices, underscoring the need for adaptive, supportive language policies.

The current paper describes a study that sought to determine the beliefs, practices, and needs of parents living in Montreal, Quebec, who were raising their children bi/multilingually. The parents (N = 27) participated in a total of nine focus group and individual interviews in which they discussed their family language policies (language ideologies, practices, and actions taken to maintain a language). Through rounds of deductive and inductive coding and analysis, family language policies regarding English and/or French were compared with policies regarding heritage languages. The participants’ family language policies were further examined in light of Quebec’s official language policy of interculturalism. Findings indicate a complex co-existence of family and official language policy in which parents both support Quebec’s official language policy by converging towards French as a common public language and questioning the policy’s stance on official institutional support for heritage languages.

This paper focuses on the language shift phenomenon in Singapore as a consequence of the top-town policies. By looking at bilingual family language policies it examines the characteristics of Singapore’s multilingual nature and cultural diversity. Specifically, it looks at what languages are practiced and how family language policies are enacted in Singaporean English-Chinese bilingual families, and to what extend macro language policies – i.e. national and educational language policies influence and interact with family language policies. Involving 545 families and including parents and grandparents as participants, the study traces the trajectory of the policy history. Data sources include 2 parts: 1) a prescribed linguistic practices survey; and 2) participant observation of actual negotiation of FLP in face-to-face social interaction in bilingual English-Chinese families. The data provides valuable information on how family language policy is enacted and language practices are negotiated, and what linguistic practices have been changed and abandoned against the background of the Speaking Mandarin Campaign and the current bilingual policy implemented in the 1970s. Importantly, the detailed face-to-face interactions and linguistics practices are able to enhance our understanding of the subtleties and processes of language (dis)continuity in relation to policy interventions. The study also discusses the reality of language management measures in contrast to the government’s ‘separate bilingualism’ (Creese & Blackledge, 2011) expectations with regard to ‘striking a balance’ between Asian and Western culture (Curdt-Christiansen & Silver 2013; Shepherd, 2005) and between English and mother tongue languages (Curdt-Christiansen, 2014). Demonstrating how parents and children negotiate their family language policy through translanguaging or heteroglossia practices (Canagarajah, 2013; Garcia & Li Wei, 2014), this paper argues that ‘striking a balance’ as a political ideology places emphasis on discrete and separate notions of cultural and linguistic categorization and thus downplays the significant influences from historical, political and sociolinguistic contexts in which people find themselves. This simplistic view of culture and linguistic code will inevitably constrain individuals’ language expression as it regards code switching and translanguaging as delimited and incompetent language behaviour.

Family language policy (FLP) has received increased attention over the last decade as researchers seek to understand questions such as: why (and how) do members of some transnational families maintain their language while members of other families lose their language? How is it that some children, growing up in a largely monolingual society, become bilinguals while other children, growing up in a bilingual environment, become monolinguals? What policies and practices do parents implement to promote or discourage the use and practice of particular languages? And how are these language policies and practices negotiated in private domains, and concomitantly, related to broader ideologies of language and language education policies? While emphasizing close analysis of family domains and relationships, FLP also recognizes the relevance and influence of economic, political and social structures and processes in a given society. In a complex nested relationship, FLP interacts with a wide range of socio-historical, political, cultural and linguistic variables and factors (Spolsky 2012; King and Fogle 2013). As such, the study of FLP not only contributes to our understanding of the processes of language shift and change, it also sheds lights on broader language policy issues at societal levels. Most importantly, the study of FLP can make visible the relationships between private domains and public spheres and reveal the conflicts that family members must negotiate between the realities of social pressure, political impositions, and public education demands on the one hand, and the desire for cultural loyalty and linguistic continuity on the other. FLP draws on theoretical frameworks of language policy, language socialization, literacy studies and child language acquisition (Caldas 2010; Curdt-Christiansen 2009, 2012a, 2012b; De Houwer 2009; Gafaranga 2010; King and Fogle 2006,

This article discusses the reflexive relationship between language shift and identity in the case of Scottish Gaelic on the Isle of Skye, Scotland, demonstrating how (Fishman, Joshua A. 1991.Reversing language shift. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.) concept of X versus Y as related tolanguageis problematic in this particular context. The article posits that in many ways, the processes by which Gaelic has been alienated from a sense of Scottish identity at the macrolevel are reproduced at the microlevel and discusses the implications of this in terms of Family Language Policy (FLP). Using a nexus analysis approach, this article focuses on a second-generation member – referred to as “Seumas” (the children’s uncle) – of three generations of a Gaelic-speaking family and discusses how, although Seumas appears to see Gaelic as part of his identity in terms of “family” and “heritage”, other identity orientations often take precedence, ostensibly contributing to his high use of English. The article discusses the possible impact that Seumas’ linguistic practices have on the third generation, as well as the double-edged sword nature of using “identity” as a tool in language revitalisation.

This paper critically examines the ‘ideology, practice, and management’ of family language policy (FLP), adopting the theoretical lens of Spolsky's (2004. Language Policy. Cambridge University Press) “tripartite model” of language policy in the multilingual context of Vyas Municipality, Nepal. Following the critical ethnography design of a qualitative approach, I selected the research site purposively, engaged in fieldwork as a critical ethnographer for ten months, and collected information through in-depth interviews, participant observations, communication exchanges, and focused group discussions with six linguistic communities and families (Darai, Kumal, Bote, Dura, Bhujel and Newar) who exposed language ideologies, practices, and management at home and in the vicinities. The “thematic analysis”, “critical discourse analysis” and NVivo-12 software were applied to interpret the critical ethnographic information. The findings revealed that the local languages have reached the verge of extinction because of the influence of standard language ideology. Moreover, it disclosed that the family members have been facing “duo challenges”: passive bilingualism and intergenerational break that caused the disappearance of their first languages. The study concludes that the FLPs have been “created, interpreted, and appropriated” haphazardly; the focus should be on systematic management and promotion of local languages from individual and institutional levels.

The study of family language policy has emerged as a significant domain for multilingual development, language maintenance and cultural continuity. Family Language Policy seeks to connect the studies of child language acquisition with the field of language policy research in its approach to understand language maintenance and shift among different migrant families and communities. However, few studies have been conducted in this area. Through the in-depth analysis of 19 interviews, this article explores family language policy employed by Bangladeshi migrants in South East Queensland. The results show that participants evidence a strong will to maintain their mother tongue for which they resort to strategies from family to social domains. The implementation of their policies is facilitated by what they perceive as helpful macro-level processes. That is, they approve of the Australian policies that promote multiculturalism.

This paper examines a family language policy (FLP) in the context of an extended bilingual Gaelic-English family on the Isle of Skye, Scotland. It demonstrates how certain family members (namely, the children's mother and paternal grandmother) negotiate and reify a strongly Gaelic-centred FLP. It then discusses how other extended family members (the children's father, his sister and brother) occasionally participate in this Gaelic-centred FLP; however, at the same time, these speakers also participate in language shift by maintaining English as their peer group language and replying in English when addressed in Gaelic. The paper argues that these linguistic practices socialise the children into the norms of language shift, resulting in the children's low use of Gaelic. The paper also discusses the possible negative impact of the father's use of Gaelic in disciplining his children.

This article examines the reported language ideologies and family language policies of the parents of Cantonese-English bilinguals in the U.S. in relation to their children's achievement scores in Cantonese and English. We explore the relationships first by language of instruction. Results show children in bilingual classrooms scored higher than those in mainstream (English-only) classrooms on the Cantonese tasks, but significantly more children in bilingual programs had Cantonese as a home language than children in mainstream classrooms. Parents from mainstream classrooms were significantly more satisfied with their children's English-language attainment than parents from bilingual classrooms. Using cluster analysis, we then identify four new groups of children based on their language proficiency: (a) English-dominant, (b) Cantonese-dominant, (c) “balanced bilingual,” and (d) “ideal bilingual.” Results show all children scored at or above the monolingual English mean on English decoding, but the ideal bilingual cluster had the largest Cantonese vocabulary. The English-dominant group heard significantly less Cantonese in the home, while all children in the ideal bilingual and Cantonese-dominant clusters heard only Cantonese. Findings point to the integral component of the family unit in children's bilingual development and bring up timely issues relating to family language planning and policy.

Hakka has been the lingua franca used among various Chinese groups in Sabah, Malaysia, since the 1950s. Economic development and de-emphasis on ethnic identity within Chinese communities throughout Malaysia is now forcing Sabah Hakkas to confront external pressures on their language and culture. Language shift from Hakka is in progress as young Hakkas prefer speaking Mandarin, while their parents feel responsible for maintaining Hakka. This article presents a case study of family language policies in four Hakka families in Sabah. Whether a particular language is used in the family and passed down to the next generation is one of the significant points of enquiry in studying language shift. In this study, parents’ ethnic identity, children’s language choices, and the factors affecting family language policy are examined. The findings show that the quintessence of Hakka culture in Sabah is the Hakka language, and this helps to keep the language alive at home. However, concern for children’s education and wider social factors such as globalisation, economic changes and the media are influencing language practices in Hakka families.