An ethnographic portrait of translingual/transcultural navigation among immigrant children and youth: voices during Sunday school at a Latino Church

ABSTRACT

This ethnographic study aims to foreground the voices of 34 first through twelfth graders who belong to first-generation immigrant families from Mexico and Central America and attend Nueva Vida Church (fictitious name) in a Midwestern US city. They insightfully reflect upon their language, culture and citizenship during Sunday school class focus groups, and as we listen to their honest conversations, we note themes that emerge as they live their translingual, transcultural and transnational lives: their perceptions of their own language use and fluency, the use of ‘Spanglish’, language and family relationships, thoughts about language, culture and identity, linguistic agency, their decision-making processes, and so on. The study illuminates the unique set of skills and understandings possessed by these young people as they make meaning across and through cultures, languages and national ties. This study aims to turn up the volume on these immigrant voices and illuminate the process through which children with feet in more than one language, culture and country navigate and make decisions about their lives.

KEYWORDS:

• Translingual and transcultural navigation
• immigrant children
• Latino children
• ethnographic research
• Spanglish