In this episode Dr Marie-Josee-Bisson talks to Dr Xiao Lan Curdt-Christiansen about language choices in the family. How do parents decide which language they will speak to their children at home and are there rules to follow? Xiao Lan talks about Pride, Prejudice and Pragmatism and how these impact on family language decisions. Parents have a big role to play in providing a rich linguistic context for their children. But, parents are not alone and the community, school and government can do more to support the learning and maintenance of heritage languages. Let's start with small initiatives and scale it up!  

To find out more behind-the-scenes information about this topic or about our podcast, please visit our webpage, languagescientists.dmu.ac.uk. This is where you can go to ask questions, leave comments, or even participate in our current research! We'd love to hear from YOU.  

Follow Dr Zavaleta and Dr Bisson on twitter: @dr_klzavaleta  and  @mjbisson  

Or get in touch via email: language.scientists@dmu.ac.uk  

Follow our Instagram page @the_language_scientists   

Links to Dr Curdt-Christiansen's research:   

https://researchportal.bath.ac.uk/en/persons/xiao-lan-curdt-christiansen  

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8973-5251  

https://familylanguagepoli.wixsite.com/familylanguagepolicy  

https://www.languageathome.info