‘And all of a sudden, it became my rescue’: language and agency in transnational families in Norway

ABSTRACT

This article examines, how agency is constructed by members of two transnational families living in Norway in biographically oriented interviews. We understand agency as realised on the intertwined levels of grammar and meta-agentive discourse. Reports of speakers’ lived language experience and their experiences with family language policies are analysed to demonstrate how speakers use different approaches to realise agency in their narratives. Drawing on data collected through Language Portraits and semi-structured interviews, we focus on how family members perceive and construct their agency when it comes to language learning, maintenance and management.

KEYWORDS:

• Agency
• lived language experience
• family language policy
• Norway

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Research Council of Norway through its Centers of Excellence funding scheme (project number 223265), and MultiFam (project number 240725).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Research Council of Norway through its Centers of Excellence funding scheme (project number 223265), and MultiFam (project number 240725).