Abstract
This paper uses a transnational lens to discuss findings from a longitudinal study of the home literacy practices of linguistically diverse immigrant families. The paper draws on the experiences of three families to show how literacy events and practices index and mediate immigrants’ identities as they settle into the host community. Observations, interviews, and family members’ own documentation of their home literacies revealed the richness and complexity of the families’ linguistic repertoires. Using Levitt and Schiller’s distinction between ways of being and ways of belonging, the paper focuses on the role of everyday literacies in the families’ lives and on how critical events at home and abroad shaped family members’ identities as they navigated their new lives. The paper offers insights into the role of multilingual literacies in the settlement process and draws attention to the significance of literacy practices in shaping immigrants’ transnationalism.
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Multilingual family language policy in monolingual Australia: multilingual desires and monolingual realities
- Articles
- “It’s like the root of a tree that I grew up from….”: parents’ linguistic identity shaping family language policy in isolated circumstances
- “I want her to be able to think in English”: challenges to heritage language maintenance in a monolingual society
- Family language policy and dialect-Italian dynamics: across the waves of Italo-Australian migrant families
- Transnational identities, being and belonging: the diverse home literacies of multilingual immigrant families
- ‘Maybe if you talk to her about it’: intensive mothering expectations and heritage language maintenance
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Multilingual family language policy in monolingual Australia: multilingual desires and monolingual realities
- Articles
- “It’s like the root of a tree that I grew up from….”: parents’ linguistic identity shaping family language policy in isolated circumstances
- “I want her to be able to think in English”: challenges to heritage language maintenance in a monolingual society
- Family language policy and dialect-Italian dynamics: across the waves of Italo-Australian migrant families
- Transnational identities, being and belonging: the diverse home literacies of multilingual immigrant families
- ‘Maybe if you talk to her about it’: intensive mothering expectations and heritage language maintenance