Unspoken Dialogues Between Educational and Family Language Policies

Abstract

Linguistic assimilation has been historically regarded as a cornerstone for nationalistic sentiments in the United States. Schools have been utilized as influential filtering sites where non-English languages are marginalized, and then assimilated into the dominant American English ways of languaging (Crawford, 1992; Flores, 2014; Heath, 1976; Nieto, 1999; Wiley & García, 2016). Drawing on theories of language policy (Spolsky, 2004) and governmentality (Foucault, 1991), this dissertation examined the links between family language policies and educational language policies at two public elementary schools in the state of Massachusetts during its final year of enforcing an English-only educational policy (Chapter 71A of Massachusetts General Laws). The participants were four fourth grade children, four parents, and eight school staff at two public elementary schools in two different districts (one urban and one suburban). The families spoke Cape Verdean Creole, Mandarin, Portuguese, and Spanish as their heritage languages. The study was designed as a qualitative multiple case study to conduct a multi-sited analysis of language policy. The data for the case studies were collected through surveys of parents, language logs filled by the children, interviews with the children, the parents, and the school staff, as well as weeklong school observations of each child. The units of analysis were family and school as two main language policy contexts the children regularly navigated. Qualitative thematic analysis was used to analyze the data (Braun & Clarke, 2006). The findings indicated that although the families and the schools seemed to appreciate bilingualism, they were still strongly influenced by the historical monoglossic ideologies of the society that convinced them to eventually conform to English in the name of ensuring success for the children. These ideologies were communicated between schools and families as “unspoken dialogues” through children who navigated language policies in both contexts. The findings highlight implications for teacher preparation, curriculum development, language policy research on schools and families, and educational language policies that impact children of immigrants.