Multilingual Family Language Policy and Wellbeing : Language Ideologies, Strategies and Experiences

Makes an important contribution to how we understand wellbeing in multilingual family settings.

This book investigates transnational families’ ideological language motivations, strategies and experiences. The rich interview and observation data from fourteen multilingual families living in Wales and Finland provide insight into the challenges of managing national minority and majority languages alongside a foreign language at home.

It considers the perspectives of parents and children, identifying the strategies used to manage these languages and the effects of these strategies on family wellbeing, particularly children’s self-esteem, identity and sense of capability. Including a variety of Family Language Policy prototypes and language communities, it suggests adjustments to parental strategies and promotes awareness of positive psychology and peer support for language communities.

This book will be of interest to researchers and policymakers in language education and multilingualism as well as parents engaged with Family Language Policy.