Phd Proposal

1 CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION AND RESEARCH CONTEXT 1.1 The concept of family language policy The term ‘language policy/planning’ has been defined in various ways (Reagan 2002: 420). The notion of ‘language policy’ is, however, generally used at the level of government or province which decides on the languages to be used by the people it administers. This policy is enshrined in a nation’s constitution; it has institutional backing, and is imposed on particular structures, groups of people, with rules and regulations. In other words, a government can enforce or implement a language policy. Spolsky (2004) insists that the processes that operate in macrolevel planning also operate in microlevel planning. In his view, language policy involves practices, beliefs or ideology about language and language use, and efforts to influence practices (p. 14). Beliefs or ideologies encompass the values attributed to a language that govern language choice (Spolsky 2004: 14). The choices in turn affect practices. For Spolsky, the domain of language policy may be any defined or definable social or political or religious group or community, ranging from a family through a sports team, or a neighbourhood or a village, or a workplace or organisation, or city or nation state or regional alliance. (Spolsky 2004: 40). Spolsky (2004) maintains that ‘language policy operates within a speech community of whatever size’ (p. 40). This thesis investigates the concept of language policy in relation to the microlevel: the family, in particular immigrant DRC families in South Africa. Since schools, companies, and public institutions have language policies, the meanings of language policy mentioned above can well be extended to family language policy (FLP). The notion of FLP (from now on FLP) requires taking cognizance of four key notions. The first fundamental notion of ‘family language policy’ in this thesis is that families make choices about which languages to use at home. This policy may be explicit or implicit (Spolsky 2004: 8), monolingual or multilingual, the same or different for adults 2 and children, highly regulated or ‘laissez- faire’. In this thesis, ‘family language policy’ is used to refer to a unilateral decision taken by parents about language use in the home. While some theorists would call it ‘language choice’ or ‘language preference’, I have chosen language policy in order to understand the relation between choice, power, identity and external forces. Second, the choice of which language/s the family has to use may be made democratically or negotiated between parents, and/or imposed by more powerful members of the family. It is important to understand the extent to which power relations in the family affect these language choices. For example, in African families that are patriarchal, the father has more power than the mother in making rules. Where policies are imposed, members of the family have to decide whether or not to comply and in what circumstances. Third, language is fundamentally tied to identity. ‘We learn who we are and what we are through the language(s) and local discourses in which we are raised’ (Ricento 2002: 1). The choice of language, for Hall (1974), is profoundly related to the choice of and construction of particular identities. Peirce’s (1995) work on identity and investment is crucial to understanding how a FLP is tied to a family’s values in relation to articulating distinct identities in SA which are informed by their aspirations. Their identity investments affect how they position themselves in relation to both the diasporic community and local communities. The final point is the impact of external forces on the formation and implementation of the FLP at the microlevel. For example, xenophobia directed at immigrants might lead to limited opportunities to interact with the local community and result in the choice of homeland languages in the family. The language of schooling may also influence a family’s decisions. In this research project I use the term ‘language choice’ to include all the languages used in face-to-face interactions. I also use the term ‘immigrant’ to mean ‘refugees and 3 asylum seekers’ as well as ‘émigrés or voluntary exiles’, and the term ‘practices’ to mean what people regularly do with language and how they do it. Further, the terms ‘language’ and ‘code’, on the one hand and the concepts ‘immigrant learners’ and ‘immigrant children’ on the other hand, are used interchangeably in this thesis. I also use the term ‘indigenous languages’ to refer to ‘all African or Bantu languages’. Similarly, the notion of ‘home languages’ is used to mean ‘all languages, African and non-African’, spoken in the homes of immigrant families. 1.2 Situating the research project For Gramsci (1985), every time the question of language surfaces, it means that a series of other problems are coming to the fore. Language is not a mere medium of communication but also a carrier of a set of societal values, the norms and beliefs of a given community. As a function of culture, language and its practices then become social manifestations of people's daily struggles. To this end, language as social action (Norton 2000; van Djik 1996) embodies relations of power embedded in people's interactions and mobility. The use of languages in immigrant families in a host country is likely to affect their linguistic or cultural identities. This study is concerned with the situated use of spoken language as a means of communication. It explores the in-family language socialization practices in four immigrant families from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), using a multiple case study. The study is located in different areas of Johannesburg. It seeks to understand the assumptions that underpin family language policies, the children’s attitudes towards DRC indigenous languages, the nature of parent-child interaction, and the impact of the policy on relationships outside the home. It also investigates the research participants’ diasporic identities and their positioning in South Africa. Bosher (1997: 593) argues that the degree of ethnic identity maintenance is seen as a crucial factor for children's self- esteem, psychological well-being, successful adjustment to their new society. It also increases the chances of succeeding academically. 4 Through their language practices parents convey ‘language, behavior, values, and beliefs to give shape to their children’s experience or primary identity’ (Gee 1990: 151). The way we are perceived by ‘Others’ may also have an impact upon the way we actually perceive ourselves and in turn construct the ‘Other’. Local languages and discourses shape our ‘ways of being people-like-us, i.e. ways of behaving, interacting, valuing, thinking, believing, speaking’ (Gee 1996: viii). This establishes a link between language, culture and identity, as discussed further in Chapter 2. In a multicultural society like South Africa, multiple sets of discourses associated with varied ethnic and linguistic groups operate within complex multilingual settings. As a medium of cultural processes, language raises questions about the link between language and ‘authentic’ ethnic identity, particularly in the context of immigration. In this regard, Ricento (2002) asks how we can conceptualize the identities of people using multiple languages in multiple settings, specifically in the context of immigration. 1.3 Identifying the research problem In the context of immigration, homeland languages are often prohibited in family interactions because they are thought to impede the children’s spoken competence and literacy development in the dominant language of the host society. But this exclusion, Amati-Mehler et al (1994) argue, may engender in children a painful experience of exile from the affective world of their parents. On the other hand, homeland languages, particularly in the diaspora, may be perceived and encouraged as a core element of culture and ethnicity. Research has found that multilingualism (specifically, in the diaspora) allows mental flexibility and social mobility in multiple settings and circumstances, and that in a multilingual environment a child can learn to speak two or more languages (e.g. Cummins 1996, 1984, 1981a; Heugh 1995) simultaneously or sequentially. The question is: how do immigrant children maintain their linguistic and cultural heritage, along with the development of fluid identities that transcend the narrowly essentialist conceptions of ethnicity? 5 My interest in this research stems from my experiences and ethnic identity as a DRC immigrant teacher (and father) in South Africa. During my encounters with other DRC families (most of whom are both economic and political refugees), I noticed that some parents had restricted their children to the use of English at home, whereas they used two or more DRC indigenous languages in addition to French and sometimes interacted with children in these languages at home. Their children then responded in English. My immediate impulse as a father, a teacher, a researcher and a Congolese, with strong a sense of ethnic identity, was to understand the assumptions behind such language choices. The choice of any language in a family is often attributed to language valuation or assessment and linked to an array of cultural, moral and/or socio-economic strategies (Dhir & Savage 2002; Eiss & Pedersen 2002; Lankshear 2002; Grin 1996; Cooksey 1996; Coulmas 1992, 1991). In this study, I wanted to investigate how these language choices affect the research families, the status of DRC languages in the diaspora and the immigrants' sense of cultural belonging. Language is not only the medium by which ‘a community communicates its culture to its members within the society in which it operates; it also facilitates a creation of value through the exchange of ideas within the context of culture’ (Dhir & Savage 2002: 2). Dhir and Savage (2002) add that ‘like money, language is an asset’, what Bourdieu (1991) calls cultural capital. Gee (1996), drawing on Bourdieu, argues that each speech community has its own ways of thinking, behaving, saying, speaking, believing, acting, and valuing.

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