Language use in the context of double minority: the case of Japanese–Catalan/Spanish families in Catalonia

This study presents a part of the findings of my doctoral thesis 'Els japonesos a Catalunya i la llengua catalana: comunitat, llengües i ideologies' (Japanese in Catalonia and Catalan language: community, languages and ideologies). I would like to thank Dr. Francesc Xavier Vila for his many valuable suggestions, and all my colleagues for their great support. I especially thank all the participants who collaborated in this study. Without them, this study would not have been possible.This study explores language use in Japanese-Catalan/Spanish families in Catalonia with a special attention to Japanese. In a community such as Catalonia wherein two languages of different status are in conflict within its own territory, the ability of families to maintain a socially 'weaker' language and transmit yet another language that does not have an official status within the community raises an important question: how do these cross-linguistic families cope with a 'double minority context' in terms of organising their language use within the family? Analysing the data collected through a questionnaire survey conducted with 29 Japanese-Catalan/Spanish-speaking families living in Catalonia revealed that the parents in said families adopted a mostly monolingual use of Spanish; however, this practice does not affect the families' Catalan and Japanese use. Not establishing a single common language for the family may be one of the strategies to combat the threat to minority languages. In general, especially for the survey participants, Catalan and Japanese remain significantly utilised. Our study also found that sibling existence can influence language-use patterns between parent and child(ren), with monolingual practices tending to be used in single-child families

Active trilingualism in early childhood: The motivating role of caregivers in interaction

The present paper is concerned with the language development of two young children from two different families growing up exposed to three languages. The children live in Switzerland and have been exposed to English, French and Swiss German from infancy. The focus is on the children's production of these languages, and the contextual and affective factors which have influenced their levels of active trilingualism. The method consists of two longitudinal case studies. Monthly recordings were made by each caregiver (mother, father and third caregiver) in dyadic interactions with the children from ages 2;1 to 3;1. It was found that one child had a high level of active trilingualism, speaking the language of the caregiver with that caregiver over 90% of the time (measured in utterances). By contrast, the other child had a low level of active trilingualism. An analysis of the children's language exposure, such as the position of the community language in the home, the variety of exposure, the interactional style of the caregivers, and the prestige of the languages involved indicates the importance of motivation, largely influenced by the caregivers in interaction, in explaining the children's different levels of active trilingualism