This is a qualitative study on bilingualism from Somali children’s perspectives. It aims to examine how Somali-Swedish bilinguals understand their bilingual experiences in a Swedish context. It looks at questions that relate to their views on language use in family and peer group interactions, their attitude towards heritage language maintenance, and challenges they may face in their everyday bilingual experiences. Three interviews were carried out with six children of Somali background between the age of 12-15 years, interviewed in pairs, and the empirical data were subsequently analyzed thematically. The findings of the case study show that children have a high-level of awareness about achieving monolingual-like bilingualism. This is linked to their language investment in Somali and Swedish languages in order to be better members of both the Somali community and the Swedish society. From the interviews, it became clear that Somali and Swedish are equally important for their everyday life for a variety of reasons, including: maintaining healthy family relationships and bonds, continuing contact and ties with extended-family, developing ethnic and societal identities, and understanding and fostering friendship. However, many experienced challenges such as bullying and embarrassment as a result of, for instance, insufficient knowledge of their language or avoidance of using multiple languages in public for fear of being mocked. Furthermore, children are active agents in their learning and in acquiring proficiency in Somali and Swedish as they explain their choice of preserving their heritage while they negotiate with teachers to find a balance between language demands in the parental interactions and those with others in their ethnic group, and achieving native-like mastery of spoken Swedish.

The present qualitative study investigated Spanish language maintenance among a familial/friend group of ten Ecuadorians that live in Northern California. The participants completed a survey and participated in an interview from which I retrieved information about the importance of Spanish and English, their self-reported confidence in Spanish and English, language attitudes, language use in private/familial contexts, and language use in public/social contexts. Previous studies regarding language maintenance and language shift in California were primarily focused on the Mexican-American population. California has the fourth largest population of Ecuadorians in the United States, yet there are no maintenance and shift studies for Ecuadorians in California. The collectivism and communal style of living that permeate Ecuadorian culture make the current study particularly unique and adds to past research on factors that affect maintenance and shift. Findings indicate that many of the members of this community are part of a dense network. This appears to encourage positive language attitudes. As a result, Spanish is used in many public and private contexts, which may help Spanish to be maintained by future generations. However, the current study also sheds light on the level of impact that spousal language may have regarding maintenance or shift for the future generation. The findings show that households with an English monolingual parent show a shift of importance and emotional attachment from Spanish to English. Thus, future generations are likely to see a shift to English if they are in a household with an English monolingual mother but may have an identity associated with their heritage because of the dense network to which they belong. However, future generations in households with two parents who speak Spanish are likely to maintain Spanish due to the network density and overall language attitudes.

This case study explores the Spanish speaking and writing practices of middle-school Latina/o youth in Miami, Florida. Its ethnographic approach aims to re-present students learning English as a second language as emerging bilinguals (Escamilla, 2006; García, 2009) who access, maintain, and develop their first language to varying degrees while learning English. Through my position as an attached member (Wax, 1971) of a Spanish-English dual language school, I examined students' Spanish production within larger socio-historical and institutional frames of reference. Shadowing students in their Spanish-instruction classes (e.g., Mathematics, Humanities, and Spanish), I drew from observations, student work, interviews with students, educators and parents, and student focus groups. Analysis of data sources reveal that students, together with influential adults, created and received messages about language--ideologies of language as standard, evolving, and dynamic. Youth engaged in normative translanguaging and transliteracy practices in mathematics class; confronted institutionally-created labels and articulated their bilingual identities as members of two language programs; and developed their Spanish writing as part of varying, yet often prescriptive, literacy instruction. This study adds to the limited research on Latina/o middle-school experiences and K-12 heritage language education. This research has pedagogical and language policy implications for those who educate and oversee the education of bilingual youth.

Recent scholarship has highlighted the importance of supporting home languages for linguistic-minority families in multilingual settings, as the family language is the means through which they can more successfully socialize their children into the beliefs, values, ideologies and practices surrounding their languages and cultures. Although there has been some research examining issues of Spanish acquisition, maintenance and loss in Canada, the language socialization ideologies and practices of Hispanic families have not yet been examined in this context. This ethnographic study investigated language socialization in immigrant families from ten Spanish-speaking countries residing in Greater Vancouver. Thirty-four families participated, three of which were selected for intensive case study in their homes and in three grassroots community groups. More specifically, the study examined the families’ desires and goals with respect to Spanish maintenance, the meanings they assigned to Spanish, and the processes through which they attempted to valorize Spanish with their children. The study found that many families formed support groups in order to transmit language and culture to their children. A cross-case analysis revealed that the families further exerted their agency by strategically turning these spaces into “safe houses” to resist assimilation and into venues for the Spanish socialization of their children, which enabled them to also transmit cultural values, such as familism. The families conceptualized Spanish maintenance as an emotional connection to the parents’ selves and as a bridge between the parents’ past and the children’s future. It was also constructed as a key that opened doors, as a bridge for learning other languages, and as a passport to a cosmopolitan worldview. Detailed discourse analyses revealed how the families utilized explicit and implicit directives, recasts, and lectures to socialize children into Spanish language ideologies. These analyses also showed how children at times resisted the parents’ socialization practices, but other times displayed their nascent understanding of their parents’ language ideologies in their own use of cross-code self-repair. The study offers unique insights into the complexity of L1 maintenance and the dynamics of language socialization in the lives of linguistic minorities and concludes with implications for policy, pedagogy and research.

Recent scholarship has highlighted the importance of supporting home languages for linguistic-minority families in multilingual settings, as the family language is the means through which they can more successfully socialize their children into the beliefs, values, ideologies and practices surrounding their languages and cultures. Although there has been some research examining issues of Spanish acquisition, maintenance and loss in Canada, the language socialization ideologies and practices of Hispanic families have not yet been examined in this context. This ethnographic study investigated language socialization in immigrant families from ten Spanish-speaking countries residing in Greater Vancouver. Thirty-four families participated, three of which were selected for intensive case study in their homes and in three grassroots community groups. More specifically, the study examined the families’ desires and goals with respect to Spanish maintenance, the meanings they assigned to Spanish, and the processes through which they attempted to valorize Spanish with their children. The study found that many families formed support groups in order to transmit language and culture to their children. A cross-case analysis revealed that the families further exerted their agency by strategically turning these spaces into “safe houses” to resist assimilation and into venues for the Spanish socialization of their children, which enabled them to also transmit cultural values, such as familism. The families conceptualized Spanish maintenance as an emotional connection to the parents’ selves and as a bridge between the parents’ past and the children’s future. It was also constructed as a key that opened doors, as a bridge for learning other languages, and as a passport to a cosmopolitan worldview. Detailed discourse analyses revealed how the families utilized explicit and implicit directives, recasts, and lectures to socialize children into Spanish language ideologies. These analyses also showed how children at times resisted the parents’ socialization practices, but other times displayed their nascent understanding of their parents’ language ideologies in their own use of cross-code self-repair. The study offers unique insights into the complexity of L1 maintenance and the dynamics of language socialization in the lives of linguistic minorities and concludes with implications for policy, pedagogy and research.

Recent scholarship has highlighted the importance of supporting home languages for linguistic-minority families in multilingual settings, as the family language is the means through which they can more successfully socialize their children into the beliefs, values, ideologies and practices surrounding their languages and cultures. Although there has been some research examining issues of Spanish acquisition, maintenance and loss in Canada, the language socialization ideologies and practices of Hispanic families have not yet been examined in this context. This ethnographic study investigated language socialization in immigrant families from ten Spanish-speaking countries residing in Greater Vancouver. Thirty-four families participated, three of which were selected for intensive case study in their homes and in three grassroots community groups. More specifically, the study examined the families’ desires and goals with respect to Spanish maintenance, the meanings they assigned to Spanish, and the processes through which they attempted to valorize Spanish with their children. The study found that many families formed support groups in order to transmit language and culture to their children. A cross-case analysis revealed that the families further exerted their agency by strategically turning these spaces into “safe houses” to resist assimilation and into venues for the Spanish socialization of their children, which enabled them to also transmit cultural values, such as familism. The families conceptualized Spanish maintenance as an emotional connection to the parents’ selves and as a bridge between the parents’ past and the children’s future. It was also constructed as a key that opened doors, as a bridge for learning other languages, and as a passport to a cosmopolitan worldview. Detailed discourse analyses revealed how the families utilized explicit and implicit directives, recasts, and lectures to socialize children into Spanish language ideologies. These analyses also showed how children at times resisted the parents’ socialization practices, but other times displayed their nascent understanding of their parents’ language ideologies in their own use of cross-code self-repair. The study offers unique insights into the complexity of L1 maintenance and the dynamics of language socialization in the lives of linguistic minorities and concludes with implications for policy, pedagogy and research. / Education, Faculty of / Language and Literacy Education (LLED), Department of / Graduate

Migration flows have created various educational needs worldwide. One such is HeritageLanguage Education as people claim their right to connect with their cultural, traditional,religious and linguistic background while they reside abroad. Ethnic communities haveestablished settings in which they aim to sustain their ethnolinguistic capital. The presentthesis explores how heritage language teachers perceive their role in two HeritageLanguage Community Schools, in Athens and in Stockholm. Based on a qualitativedesign, the research focuses on sociolinguistic phenomena such as language use andmaintenance, and ethnic identity creation. Data were collected in Athens and Stockholmthrough semi-structured interviews with nine teachers. The analysis of findings revealsself-perceptions of teacher role that include cultural and linguistic connotations. Teacherscontribute to language use and maintenance and to some extend to ethnic identityformation. Teacher practices and experiences strive not only for linguistic developmentbut for group’s ethnolinguistic vitality as well. The study concludes that there is a needfor further research on teachers of Heritage Language Education since the topic has notgotten the attention it deserves.

This thesis is a case-study on bilingualism and biculturalism from Somalian perspectives. The aim of the present study is to explore raising bilingual and bicultural children in Sweden from parents’ views. It focuses on three questions: 1. What are the parental policies and strategies used to maintain one’s heritage language and culture, as well as to integrate into the society of a host country by learning its language and culture?; 2. How do parents think that their choices of upbringing might shape the everyday life of children?; and 3. What challenges do parents encounter when raising bilingual and bicultural children?. Qualitative data was collected based on individual in-depth interviews with six Somali parents living in Sweden, each parent having at least one child between the age of three and thirteen years old. A thematic analysis has been applied to the collected material. The findings of the present study show that, based on the parents’ viewpoints, maintaining the language entails preserving the cultural identity. This perspective-based study also found that heritage language maintenance is a collective task between all family members when looking at parent-child interactions, and children are active agents who can negotiate language choice and use at familial settings. Parents believe that successful bilingualism is crucial for their children’s everyday lives in terms of family and community ties, understanding different people and cultures, career prospects, to name a few while, children with insufficient knowledge of heritage language are bullied and isolated within the same ethnic group. However, the study findings suggest further investigation on how gender ideologies correlate with heritage language maintenance.

This 16-week long, observational study examined the effects of Spanish peer-tutoring on first language attitudes, maintenance, and motivation among native and heritage Spanish-speaking adolescents. In this study, 31 high school students from two ‘Spanish for Native and Heritage Speakers" classes peer-tutored second-year Spanish learners for an average of fifty minutes per week. The native/heritage Spanish-speaking students took a pre and post language attitudes, maintenance, and motivation survey and they completed two reflections during the course of the study. The native/heritage Spanish-speaking participants demonstrated a significant positive increase in language attitudes towards their native language, they also reported increased motivation to speak Spanish with friends and family after participating as peer tutors for their native language. There was no significant change in time spent in first language maintenance activities, namely: listening, reading, writing, and viewing in Spanish.

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