A Tale of Two Countries: Family Language Policies in England and Singapore

Thursday, March 23, 2017, 11:30-12:30 pm Place: Poetry Center, Humanities 2001

Lecture Abstract

This study presents a comparative inquiry of FLPs of bi/multilingual Chinese families in England and Singapore. Using Family language Policy (FLP) as a theoretical lens, the study explores: What types of FLP currently exist in private domains in UK and Singapore and how the educational and political systems in these two different sociocultural contexts influence the linguistic configurations and language practice patterns in these bi/multilingual families. Seventy-three families are involved in this study, 33 from the UK and 40 from Singapore. A questionnaire is used to gain information about three components of FLP: language practice, language management, and language ideology (Spolsky 2004). While there are different cultural, linguistic and political forces that influence FLPs in Singapore and England, there is an overall English-dominant ideology prevailing in the parental language management efforts. The study also shows the impact of English as a dominant/official language on the language practice patterns of the families.

About the Speaker: Xiao Lan Curdt-Christiansen

Xiao Lan Curdt-Christiansen is Associate professor at the Institute of Education, University of Reading, UK. Her research interests encompass ideological, sociocultural and policy perspectives on language learning with particular focus on children’s multilingual education and biliteracy development. She is the guest editor for a special issue on Family Language Policy for Language Policy (2013, Vol. 12). Her most recent books are entitled: Learning Chinese in Diasporic Communities (with Andy Hancock, published by John Benjamins); Language, ideologies and education: The politics of textbooks in language education (with Csilla Weninger, published by Routledge). Her publications have appeared in many academic journals.