Examining conviviality and cultural mediation in arts-based workshops with child language brokers: Narrations of identity and (un)belonging

The concept of conviviality has usually been applied to contexts such as urban neighbourhoods of diversity (Gidley 2013; Lapiņa 2016; Valluvan 2016), and refers to what Gidley (2013) would term the ‘convivial turn’, or the notion of living together or coexisting in our daily social interactions (Wise and Velayutham 2013). The application of conviviality explored in this chapter concerns everyday encounters (Fincher et al. 2014), or what Amin (2002, 959) calls ‘the micropublics of everyday social contact’. ‘Micropublics’ are sites of (sometimes compulsory) conviviality, such as workplaces, schools (Neal et al. 2016), youth centres and community groups (Neal et al. 2015). In this vein, our lens of focus in this paper is on what Neal et al. (2016, 465) would describe as ‘extended encounters’, namely a series of arts-based workshops with students in a culturally and linguistically diverse school in London. The substantive focus of the research study on which this paper is based explored feelings of identity, belonging and cultural mediation among child language brokers. Child language brokers are children and young people who linguistically and culturally mediate between family members and officialdom (Antonini 2010). The arts-based workshops with our child language brokers, and their subsequent outputs, are the centre point for what Illich (1973) might term ‘tools for conviviality’. Our analytic endeavours explore the ‘autonomous and creative intercourse among persons’ (Illich 1973, 11), namely the young people taking part in the workshops, wherein there were possibilities to share, connect and interact. In exploring one of the arts-based workshops for this paper we ask, what role did the artist delivering the workshop have on the output, and how did that unfolding process reflect our research objectives

The contact zone and dialogical positionalities in ‘non-normative’ childhoods: How children who language broker manage conflict

This paper examines the processes by which different dialogical positionalities are taken in the contact zone (Hermans, 2001a, 2003; Pratt, 1991). The contact zone provides a framework for the consideration of potential confrontations and uncertainties during intercultural contacts between migrant children, their family and another adult. The other adult is usually someone in a position of authority. For young people who language broker, managing the uncertainties and confrontations of conflictual situations highlighted three positionalities: (i) ‘conflict avoider’, (ii), ‘the neutral or passive broker’, (iii) the ‘active broker’. The contact zone was a sphere of experience that opened up possibilities for agentic action as well as constraints. The contact zone had the potential to foreground different aspects of their status such as ‘the child,’ ‘the immigrant’ or the second-language speaker. Equally, the young people took opportunities to utilise these statuses as part of their dialogical positionalities to get the best outcome for them and/or their families. We argue that further exploration of the contact zone within the framing of dialogical positionalities can enable better understanding of critical-cultural-development childhoods

Agency, aspirations and citizenship: Non‐formal education from the perspective of children in street situations in Pakistan

This paper explores an NGO‐based non‐formal education (NFE) intervention in Pakistan from the perspective of its recipients, children in street situations. Recognizing children as agential beings, we draw on participant observation and in‐depth semi‐structured interviews with 20 children, aged 10–19 years. Young people discussed the impact of the intervention on their self‐worth and future aspirations. They also reflected on their growing awareness of civic issues and citizenship rights. The study emphasizes the importance of NFE in providing opportunities to the most marginalized and those without adequate documentation, particularly in a context when state support can be lacking

Parenting and child development in multi-ethnic Britain: a study of British Indian, British Pakistani and non-immigrant White families living in the UK

Past research has neglected second generation onward immigrant families in Britain as they further acculturate into host society culture, as well as the experiences of majority ethnic-group families in relation to second generation immigrant families. The central focus of this study was an in-depth assessment of the similarities and differences in parenting practices, parent-child relationships, child psychological adjustment and parental social experiences in British-born Indian, Pakistani and non-immigrant White mothers with 5-7 year old children living in culturally diverse areas of the UK. This is the first in-depth comparative study focusing on normative second generation families rather than disadvantaged samples. In total, 90 mothers participated, and the study employed a multi-method approach. A range of measurement techniques including standardised interviews, questionnaires, observations of parent-child interaction and a child test were used. The study was organised according to two aspects of family life. A quantitative approach was used to investigate parenting and child adjustment. A mixed-methods approach, using both quantitative and qualitative analyses was used to examine the broader social environment of the mother and child, exploring family life in relation to surrounding cultural and contextual factors in the three ethnic groups. The children showed positive levels of adjustment, with no differences between groups. In terms of parenting, similarities were found between family types for some aspects of parenting as assessed by interview, including maternal warmth, mother-child interaction and maternal control. The differences that were identified generally reflected differences between the Pakistani and White mothers, with the Indian mothers lying between the two. For example, the British Pakistani group showed higher levels of child supervision, child-centredness, and overt discipline compared to White mothers. They were also more likely to be in an arranged marriage and less likely to confide in their partner. Regarding the observational measure of mother-child interaction, there was no difference between family types for the overall construct of mutuality. In relation to cultural and contextual factors, Pakistani mothers were more religious, compared with Indian and White mothers. Overall, both second generation Indian and Pakistani mothers showed a more bicultural identity. Qualitative analysis revealed that a range of ethnic-racial socialisation techniques for discussing race and ethnicity with children were used by mothers from all groups. Pakistani mothers remained more traditional and were most likely to use religio-cultural socialisation whereas Indian and White mothers used egalitarianism more, i.e. teaching children the importance of individual qualities as opposed to membership in their ethnic group. Indian mothers were the most positive about multiculturalism and seemed to face fewer challenges associated with diversity. Both Pakistani and White mothers experienced discrimination. White mothers felt they were still trying to adapt to increased diversity, some believing that their culture was being sidelined and under threat. It was concluded that there were many similarities in parenting practices and family life between British Indian, British Pakistani and non-immigrant White groups, with children from each group showing positive adjustment. However, although all mothers were born and raised in Britain, differences still existed indicating that ethnicity was an influential factor in parenting. The study increases understanding of the extent to which the parenting processes that have been found to be most significant for positive child development can be generalised to other ethnic groups. It also provides information on acculturation patterns in the host society and what it means to be born to second generation parents and live in a multicultural environment in the UK today. The findings have implications for theory and policy development regarding family life in different ethnic groups.Laura Ashley Foundatio

Child language brokering as a family care practice: Reframing the ‘parentified child’ debate

This paper explores the perspectives of 29 child language brokers living in the UK who interpret for their family following migration. They were presented with vignette stories depicting a potentially conflictual situation between a language broker, a parent and an adult ‘other’ in a position of power or authority. Drawing on debates about language brokering as a family care practice, the ‘parentified child’ and discussions about non‐normative childhoods, the analysis highlights how the role played by the adult ‘other’, coupled with a sometimes‐hostile sociocultural context, can exaggerate tensions or facilitate interactions in the parent–child relationship. The young people's views and experiences illuminate how they navigate these complexities

Collecting Stories of Identity and Culture with Young people: The Synallactic Collective Image Technique

The leader of an arts-based workshop, Evangelia, has asked the young people involved to consider a time they translated or interpreted and to think about how they were feeling. One young man named Tariq looks unsure and mumbles, ‘I don’t got feelings’ and then asks the question more loudly: ‘do you have feelings when you translate, do you have feelings?’. A couple of his friends smile but no one replies. Throughout the workshop he casts sideways looks at the others’ drawings. In the end, with a black pen he draws an oval face, with two round circles for eyes that are blank in the middle. The face has a little bit of hair, a line for a nose and a round circle for the mouth. The only bit of colour is a red tongue in the mouth. It is a stark face, for its lack of detail. For his story Tariq writes: ‘don’t have any story about translating, mean I do but don’t really remember them’, and ‘don’t have any feelings while I am translating’, and on the back of his drawing he writes ‘#Nofeelings’ and, a little further down the page, ‘Concern’. This excerpt is drawn from an arts-based workshop which was part of an Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded project, based at the Thomas Coram Research Unit (TCRU) between 2014–17. The project focused on child language brokers; children and young people who translate and interpret for family members, peers and the local community. In this chapter, we focus on one of our arts-based workshops that employed the Synallactic Collective Image Technique (SCIT), a technique used for sharing personal and collective stories, memories and experiences. In this instance, we brought together a group of young language brokers (aged 13–16) who took part in a SCIT workshop. Through sharing individual drawings and narratives of personal experiences of language brokering, interpersonal transactions within the group unfold

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) findings in white matter disease of brain

Demyelinating and dysmyelinating white matter diseases are important components of neurological problems. Recently, Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) has played a key role in diagnoses of white matter diseases. Therefore, the purpose of the current study is to evaluate the usefulness of MRI in determining the type and frequency of white matter disease. We studied 35 patients who visited the Radiology Department of the Aga Khan University Hospital (AKUH) for MRI with suspected demyelinating/dysmyelinating disorder from January 2003 to December 2005. Multiple Sclerosis (MS) (17; 48%) and leukodystrophies (10; 29%) were the most common diseases. The MRI helped identify the sites and types of the lesion precisely and thereby helped made clearer. distinction between various types of white matter diseases. The current study demonstrated the effective use of the imaging and clinical presentation for arriving at the correct diagnosis