ABOUT
THE
PROJECT
In a world where monolingualism often takes center stage, multilingual families in the US face a unique set of challenges. The Trilingual Families Project is here to shed light on these challenges and offer practical solutions for raising trilingual children in monolingual societies.
BACKGROUND
Multilingual families find themselves at a crossroads, trying to nurture and sustain multiple languages within societies dominated by a single tongue. This challenge is even more daunting when compared to bilingual families. Imagine a child growing up with two heritage languages, both of which are minority languages, alongside the dominant community language. It’s a delicate juggling act, with inherent competition between the heritage languages and the community language and between the two heritage languages themselves. Over time, parents may feel tempted to give up on one or both of the heritage languages in favor of promoting the community language. However, this doesn’t have to be the case. There are strategies to prevent and overcome language maintenance challenges and successfully raise trilingual children.
Immigrant and transnational families in the United States face additional complexity. They grapple with linguistic colonialism and monolingual policies that put their heritage languages at risk. The potential loss of these heritage languages can adversely affect all family members’ well-being. But just like other multilingual families, they, too, can overcome these challenges.
THE PROJECT
The Trilingual Families Project is supported by HabilNet and dives deep into the world of harmonious multilingualism within immigrant and transnational families with children aged two to 12. Spanning various geographical, sociopolitical, cultural, and linguistic contexts across the United States, this project began in January 2023 and is slated for completion in December 2024.
The driving force behind this project is a team of three researchers based in the United States. We bring extensive expertise in the field of multilingualism, bolstered by our personal experiences of raising trilingual children and maintaining harmonious multilingualism within our own families.
PROJECT GOALS
Our primary goals are clear:
Supporting Multilingual Families: We’re committed to helping families sustain HM and enhance language and literacy skills in their children, particularly those facing linguistic colonialism and related challenges in the United States.
Promoting Social Change: We want to empower multilingual families to become agents of social change by normalizing multilingualism within their families and contributing to a more multilingual society.
Our website is a treasure trove of information for multilingual families and practitioners. Here’s what you can expect to find:
Family Portraits: Dive into the lives of 10 trilingual, immigrant, transnational families in the U.S. with children aged two to 12. These profiles go beyond the dominant language, exploring the families’ linguistic repertoires.
Strategies and Challenges: Gain insights into the strategies employed by these families and the hurdles they face in achieving HM within their unique contexts.
Research-Based Guidelines: Explore a repository of research-based recommendations designed to assist multilingual families and practitioners on their journey towards HM.
Featured Families Page: Discover a synthesis of the families’ suggestions on promoting HM.
Scenarios Pages: Read brief excerpts of common scenarios faced by multilingual families, along with our research-based solutions.
JOIN THE CONVERSATION
Our website is not just a static resource; it’s a dynamic platform for families to interact, share resources, and find support. We believe that the insights gleaned from this website are invaluable for other multilingual families facing similar experiences. We hope that by sharing these stories, we can inspire and encourage others to continue nurturing multilingualism in their children, regardless of the environment they find themselves in.
In a world that celebrates diversity, let us embrace the beauty of multilingualism and pave the way for a more inclusive and linguistically rich society. Join us on this journey towards harmonious multilingualism.
FEATURED STORIES
