Logo: to the web site of Uppsala University

Situated within research on language socialization and family language policy, this thesis explores how young children (2–4 years old) learn their heritage language in multilingual, transnational families, and how multilingualism becomes an integral part of family life. It draws on video-ethnographic fieldwork in three bi/multilingual families in Sweden with preschool-aged children where the mothers speak Russian and the parents aspire to raise children multilingually.

Using a multimodal interactional analysis, the three studies identify and examine recurrent language practices that promote the children’s use of the heritage language, Russian, in mother-child interactions. They approach heritage language maintenance as embedded in mundane activities such as home language lessons during collaboratively accomplished chores (Study I), conversational storytelling during mealtime (Study II), and co-narration during literacy events (Study III).

The analyses focus on the interactional organization of language learning agendas and heritage language socialization environments that are initiated by the mothers to scaffold their children’s learning and use of Russian. In particular, this study illuminates various ways to engage the children in collaborative Russian speech production, including mutually enjoyable embodied performances. Moreover, it is shown in detail how high expectations of children as heritage language speakers and learners and educational efforts are interactionally balanced through relational work.

The findings suggest that the realization of family language policy to support heritage language development relies not only on consistent language choice, frequency of language use, and parental strategies and ideologies, but also on how language choice and language use are embedded in the ongoing activity, how activity formats are organized and appropriated by the children, the position of the child as a speaker vis-à-vis the parent, and affective alignments. The study uncovers an interplay of educational, relational, ideological, and pragmatic dimensions of heritage language socialization in the home. In this way, the thesis contributes to a more nuanced understanding of family language policy and children’s emergent multilingualism as integrated in everyday family life.