Psychologial impact of bilingual education on parents part 2

read risvolti psicologici di un'educazione bilingue 

Acquarello, 3 anni

Bilingual education: more disappointment than satisfaction?

One day, here in Luxembourg, I witnessed this conversation between an Italian father and his Italian-Swedish son, in the presence of an Italian friend.

"Låt oss gå och leka!" (= andiamo a giocare!)

" Honey, do not speak Swedish with your friend, he doesn't understand ... speak Italian with him "

????? But does he at least speak French, daddy? "

He could have easily added "... this ignorant?". Eh ... yes, we're pretty spoiled here in Luxembourg in terms of multilingualism. But if you look at a more common situation of bilingualism, we are usually faced with a bi-national family living in the country of either parent. The child will thus have a dominant language, the one called "environmental" language and a minority one, the language of the other parent.

A study on a sample of Greek mothers in Germany and German mothers in Greece has shown some factors that may have a strong psychological impact on parents, but also on children. The external environment, for example, can represent an element of pressure on both the parent and the child. The parent, in his/her social life with the child, is often forced to make a choice between his native language that no one else understands outside of his/her own child, and the language of the environment, giving up to their linguistic origins. I would add that,  even a parent -why not?-, although already adult, can suffer from the fact of being different, and not just the child, who for this reason may be led to reject the minority language.

Comparing it with the Luxembourgish reality, to date, I've not yet heard the case of a child who refuses to speak a language, correct me if I'm wrong, and I would attribute it to the fact that all the children living in Luxembourg share, albeit in a different way and to different extent, the same situation of multilingualism and multiculturalism. This leads children to not feel different, on the contrary, it paradoxically forces them to keep up with others to not feel excluded. While this may seem a pressure factor for the child, on the other hand it is a huge stimulus. However, do not forget that to us parents, who perhaps grew up in different realities, all this seems a very heavy workload, but not for a child born in a certain environment and does not know differently. Learning languages, learning many languages, not to recognize diversity as such, everything suddenly becomes natural.

Let's go back to the parents speaking the minority language. How hard is it to resist external pressures and how easy it is to fall into the temptation to abandon the project? At first, sometimes the latter may seem the easiest solution for everyone, but in the long term the same study cited showed a strong sense of guilt that grips the parent in question. I do not know if there are studies indicating different responses between mothers and fathers in these cases, but I think the guilt is rather related to the type of relationship between the parent and his/her home country.

Feelings of guilt may have deep roots, but it is understandable since the first impact that parents can experience this feeling for both the disrespect showed towards their own culture (implying their family and, ultimately, themselve), through their choice of not speaking their mother tongue to their children, and for what they are depriving their children of, a wide-ranging cultural background that could accompany them later in life. Another element to consider is how well the parent of the dominant language knows the minority one. That alone can send unintended negative messages to the child "if dad does not speak mom's language means that after all it is not so important to speak it."

Obviously, for a child, the concept of "speaking a language" is different than for an adult, so the key is mainly the attitude of the parents. The interest that one parent shows in the language and culture of their partner is crucial to convey a positive message to the child. Therefore, the message is at the end always the same: it is difficult, but do not give up!