The purpose of this study was to explore translanguaging space as a transformative third space, where alternative and competing discourses are celebrated and where science learning and the development of science's discourse and epistemic practices expand across overlapping boundaries (e.g., home, school, and community). The study focused on Syrian…

Chinese speakers are the second largest language minority group in the U.S., and transnational migration redefines their lives in many ways, including families' educational practices. This case study examined the English home literacy and language learning (EHLLL) practices of two transnational Chinese families during their year abroad while…

Translanguaging research among multilingual students has received considerable attention across different contexts of practice. The most robust contexts in translanguaging research have been the classroom contexts between teacher and students. This study examined the affordances of translanguaging spaces "between class sessions" in…

This study examined the extended discourse used by two Deaf parents with their two Deaf children (ages two and four). The study was conducted using an in-depth examination of parental expressive use of American Sign Language, looking at the use of discourse and the features and contexts that offered the most opportunity for rich language…

This paper addresses the interactional dynamics of one bilingual, two-way immersion classroom where children came from diverse linguistic, cultural, racial, and socioeconomic backgrounds. Based on an ethnographic discourse analytic study of one kindergarten TWI classroom, I analyze interactional data using participant frameworks as the unit of…

The number of multilingual families in Norway has increased during the last decades, but there are no official statistics concerning the linguistic situation in Norway today. Immigrants account for 15% of the population. In addition, there are mixed-language families where one of the parents does not have Norwegian as his/her mother tongue. Most…

Several studies have revealed the cognitive and linguistic benefits of balanced bilingualism, but the research on balanced biliteracy is still in its initial stages (Marinis et al. submitted. "Biliteracy Education Impacts on Cognition Selectively"). This study investigates the positive effects of balanced biliteracy on the development of…

Despite the substantive body of research on African American Language (AAL), designating it a meaningful, rule-governed language system and the first language of many African Americans, schools in the US have systematically failed to integrate a language policy related to African American English learners (AAELs). In this article, we employ a…

This study explored the interaction of school and students' cultures at a Latino academic/social enrichment after-school programme in Georgia, USA. I researched if and how students used language, a defining aspect of cultures, as cultural capital while negotiating school and student discourses. This study is particularly important due to the…

Children today are growing up in a digital world that is changing and advancing at an unprecedented rate. While some adults may struggle to keep up with new technological gadgets, we find our very young may be quite at ease with the use of digital technologies, even before learning to speak. This study builds on a foundation of family literacy…

Claiming to rely on "science," many well-intentioned "experts" offer advice on how to "close the gap"--word gap, language gap, achievement gap--between disadvantaged and advantaged children. Based on both research and personal experience, this advice promises magic solutions to apparently complex and intractable…

This paper considers the construction of social difference in the interactions of a couple as they communicate at home and work, with one another, their colleagues, and strangers in a superdiverse English city. In our linguistic ethnographic approach we observed, wrote field notes, audio-recorded key participants, took photographs, made…

The aim of this article is to illustrate the fluid nature of family language policy (FLP) and how the realities of any one FLP are re-negotiated by caregivers and children in tandem. In particular, the paper will focus on the affective dimensions of FLP and will demonstrate how the same reality--in this case, a grandmother's use of a child-centred…

Hart and Risley's (1995) concept of a "word gap" (aka "language gap") is widely used to describe inferior cognitive development and lower academic achievement as by-products of the language patterns of families from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. In recent decades, this line of deficit research has proliferated and…

This paper presents findings of an initial study on a trilingual code-switching (CS) phenomenon called "Hokaglish" in Binondo, Manila, The Philippines. Beginning with descriptions of multiculturalism and multilingualism in the Philippines, the discussion eventually leads to the description and survey of the code-switching phenomenon…