Anna Dillon
Kay Gallagher
Sumaya Saqr
Claudine Habak
Yahia AlRamamneh
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- Emirates College for Advanced Education, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
This brief research report explores the language choices of Emirati fathers when sharing reading with their young children, and discusses how implicit plurilingual family language policies may be expressed through these choices. Participants’ responses were shared via WhatsApp messages following on from workshops provided by the team which offered tips for sharing reading. Fathers’ reported language choices for communicating via shared reading prompted the authors to reflect on these practices and situate them within a larger discussion on plurilingualism and the ways in books may be shared within plurilingual homes. The language choices of Emirati fathers demonstrate a range of implicit family language policies. They allude to translanguaging and plurilingual practices, which become enacted policies within the home. With some children wishing to read in English, others wishing to read in Arabic, some fathers reading in Emirati Arabic and combinations of all of those languages and language varieties, and only a few of them reading the book in the language within which it was originally printed, it seems like a translanguaging stance is being taken for communication within homes, as plurilingual repertoires are being actively harnessed through this shared reading.
Introduction
Hamad sits with his young daughter Shamma on the majlis in the late afternoon. They read a story together – ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’. Today is the first time that Hamad learned the word ‘caterpillar’ in English, and it’s the first time that Shamma learned the same word in Arabic. Even though the text of the book is printed in English, Hamad tells some of the story in Emirati Arabic. They reach the end of the story and find that the caterpillar has turned into a beautiful butterfly. Both of them enjoy reading the story together, spending time together, and learning new vocabulary. They plan to read another story, ‘Uncle Khalfan’s Sheep’ (printed in Arabic) next weekend.
The above vignette acts as an illustration of a father engaging with his child in shared reading within his plurilingual home, using some of the languages within their shared linguistic repertoire. This paper explores the reported choices of languages used by similar plurilingual Emirati families while sharing reading. Firstly, some relevant literature related to plurilingualism and shared reading in a variety of languages within families will be presented. This is followed by an explanation of the methodology used and then a presentation of the findings. The findings act as explanatory power for the discussion about how fathers and children appear to enact family language policies within plurilingual homes within this context. The research question in this paper is as follows: What languages do plurilingual families in Abu Dhabi choose to use while sharing reading together as father/child dyads?
It should be noted from the outset that this paper reports on a small aspect of a larger research study. The recent publication by Dillon et al. (2024) focused particularly on Emirati fathers’ reported enjoyment of sharing reading with their young children, and provides a clearer picture of the study design as a whole. The focus on fathers, rather than mothers or parents in general, stems from the origin of the research in the call for proposals from the Abu Dhabi Early Childhood Authority in the first place (Early Childhood Authority, 2023), which sought to emphasize the father’s role in parenting, rather than the mother’s role which has traditionally been emphasized.
Literature review
The plurilingual home’s family language policy is affected by factors including beliefs and values regarding language use, and the family’s ability to access and share reading materials in a variety of languages (Kirsch and Bergeron-Morin, 2023), which will be explored below. Firstly though, the choice of using the term ‘plurilingualism’ is explored, followed by a contextualization of the plurilingual nature of Emirati families.
Plurilingualism
While the term ‘multilingual’ is more commonly used than ‘plurilingual’, the prefix ‘pluri’ is chosen to describe languaging in this paper. The terms are often used interchangeably (Preece and Marshall, 2020, p. 121). However, the Council of Europe (2001, p. 4) has defined multilingualism as “the knowledge of a number of languages, or the co-existence of different languages in a given society,” whereas plurilingualism has been defined as a speaker’s competence in being able to use more than one language (Beacco and Byram, 2007). The authors note the conceptual distinction between ‘multi’ as a “multiplication of singularities” of individual languages (Piccardo, 2019, p. 189) and ‘pluri’ as an inherent valuing of languages in an embedded sense, emphasizing the “permeability and porosity of languages and cultures” (Piccardo, 2019, p. 190). Multilingualism values languages, indeed multiple languages, as part of the linguistic repertoire of the individual and within society. A multilingual perspective could, however, still lead to monolingual language use policies, as various languages might be used separately within different contexts. Piccardo (2019) provides a thorough exploration of the difference between multilingualism and plurilingualism. A plurilingual perspective “describes a process of dynamic, creative ‘languaging’ across the boundaries of language varieties” (Piccardo, 2019, p. 185), rather than a ‘stacking together’ of languages, as implied by multilingualism.
Piccardo (2019) explains that language users, within a plurilingual approach, “are encouraged to think in terms of their holistic language repertoire, made up of their different languages and varieties, (inter)cultural and linguistic encounters” (2019, p. 188). A plurilingual approach enacts translanguaging. Translanguaging is an action related to ‘being’ plurilingual – drawing from all linguistic resources within one’s repertoire, regardless of level of competence. ‘Doing’ translanguaging, the act of flowing with the ‘corriente’ (translates to current from Spanish, i.e., the flowing current of a river) of all languages and language varieties available (Parra and Proctor, 2023) involves taking a translanguaging stance (Johnson et al., 2019), or essentially a plurilingual perspective, which is why the language choice among fathers and their young children during shared reading may reveal the implicit language policies of families (Kirsch and Bergeron-Morin, 2023).
According to Piller and Gerber (2021), a fear has continued to exist among parents that the use of home languages for reading, for example, could negatively affect how young children learn to read in additional languages such as English. These views of multilingualism as a threat rather than an asset, which tend to come from remnants of monolingual language policies within education and society, may lead to the implementation of monolingual versus plurilingual family language policies (Kirsch and Bergeron-Morin, 2023), where in many cases the dominant language of society has been favored as more valuable for literacy and therefore academic achievement. However, in a society such as the UAE, which is intensely multilingual (if not plurilingual), one could argue that monolingual language policies no longer exist. As mentioned by Yang et al. (2021), for families in similar linguistic contexts, albeit different cultural-historical contexts, ‘bilingualism is their dominant language” (p. 2). The authors acknowledge the use of the term ‘bilingual’ as part of the overarching scholarly narrative across the continuum of languaging ‘isms’ (Galante and dela Cruz, 2024; Marshall, 2021; Piccardo, 2019).
Plurilingualism in the UAE
It should be noted that the plurilingual context of the Emirati family is complex, usually moving along a continuum involving a combination of Modern Standard Arabic (which is written, and not spoken), Emirati Arabic (which is spoken, and not written), Khaleeji Arabic, and local Emirati dialects, which highlights the multiglossic nature of Arabic (Said, 2024). Gulf and other world Englishes (Gallagher and Bataineh, 2020) are also used, as well as languages spoken by domestic workers and other personnel working within the domestic sphere (Taha-Thomure, 2022). Multiple languages are widely heard outside of the home, and due to the huge numbers of transnational workers from diverse language backgrounds, English has become the lingua franca used across the UAE (Gallagher, 2024). Bilingualism in Arabic and English is heavily promoted through the educational system. All of this has led to a widespread concern among the Arabic-speaking population about the loss of status for Arabic, with the government making significant efforts to promote it (Alhosani, 2022). This plurilingual context presents both opportunities and challenges for Emirati families in sharing reading with their young children.
Reading in a variety of languages
The availability of books within homes has a significant impact on what types of reading practices may take place, as alluded to by Kirsch and Bergeron-Morin (2023). Plurilingual families tend to share reading less often, and also tend to have fewer books available in their less dominant language (Baralt et al., 2022; Gonzalez-Barrero et al., 2021; Quirk et al., 2024). Gallagher and Bataineh (2020) and Al-Bataineh and Gallagher (2021) highlight the potential of sharing translingual books and bilingual parallel storybooks with young children in the context of the UAE, while also acknowledging in a related study that Emirati teacher candidates appeared to feel ambivalent about the meshing of Arabic, Emirati Arabic, and English within one printed book (Al-Bataineh and Gallagher, 2021). Within the UAE, shared reading between parents and their children is not common (Kumar, 2022), and there are very few studies reporting on this (Dillon et al., 2024; Barza and Von Suchodoletz, 2017).
Even when reading a book in one of the languages spoken in the home, books tend to be shared in a myriad of different ways. Yang et al.’s discourse analysis (2021) of book-reading practices between a mother and her two young children in Mandarin Chinese and American English illuminates how they all “utilize their linguistic resources for constructing understanding through shared book reading at home” (Yang et al., 2021, p. 40). They highlight how drawing on both languages in this situation gives opportunities for languages to be bridged, i.e., each language acting as a resource for the development of another, in this case while reading books printed in English (and not Mandarin). Ultimately, Yang et al. (2021) concluded that “translingual reading practices allowed for metalinguistic mediation” (p. 50). Meanwhile, Lanza’s work (2021) highlights the complexities of families harnessing their own multilingual repertoires in various ways. Families, as communities of practice living and learning together, have their own individual ways of “speaking, acting and believing” (Lanza, 2007, p. 47) which can be represented in ways including the language choice of shared reading together.
Methodology
Data collection tool
This paper emerged from a qualitative study where Emirati fathers reported their experiences of sharing reading with their young children, having attended a workshop about shared reading at their children’s kindergarten. During the workshop, the research team modeled ways of sharing reading with their young children, and emphasized the benefits of sharing reading. Participants were provided with a selection of books in Arabic and English to take home and read with their young children. The books had been selected by the project team members and by inviting suggestions from an expert panel. Most of the ten picture books provided were printed in Arabic, with some printed in English, and two of them available bilingually (one a bilingual book, and one book offered in two versions, Arabic and English). Participants were then asked to provide feedback to the team in the form of an oral diary. They were encouraged to send WhatsApp messages (voice note or text message) in response to their choice of prompt questions, as soon as possible after reading the story. The prompt questions included a range of questions including the location where they chose to share reading, whether or not they enjoyed the experience, which books were chosen, and which language(s) were used. This paper reports only on the language(s) used while reading in the context of the books chosen (when mentioned). WhatsApp was chosen as an accessible mode of data collection which would suit the digitally ready and responsive context (Cairns et al., 2021; Mavhandu-Mudzusi et al., 2022), attuned to the oral storytelling culture of the location (Rainey, 2015).
Data analysis
Due to the open-ended prompts, participants were afforded the opportunity to respond in any way they wished in order to describe their experiences of shared reading. Therefore, the authors were aware that not all participants would mention the language they had used while sharing reading, and the WhatsApp messages had to be carefully combed through to find these references, taking a ‘digging in the dirt’ approach to the thematic analysis (Braun et al., 2022). Firstly, all of the messages were transcribed and/ or translated by the research assistant into a spreadsheet. Then, the first and second author highlighted relevant themes as they occurred. The theme of enjoyment has already been reported in Dillon et al. (2024). The theme of language use appeared during this analysis, as reported below. Firstly, it will be helpful to explore who the participants were.
Participants
80 participants (Emirati fathers of young children) attended one of the seven workshops facilitated in public kindergartens. Of the participants who attended, 35 of them responded with WhatsApp messages. Of these, 12 responded with messages directly related to their language choices when sharing reading with their young children. All participants were Emirati by default, because only Emirati families may attend public kindergartens in Abu Dhabi (Alhosani, 2022).
Authors’ perspectives
For the team members, involvement in the project sparked considerable reflective thought around the language use of parents while sharing reading with young children within plurilingual families. Each author has a plurilingual background, and has read with their own children in a variety of languages ranging from Irish to Canadian French to various varieties of Arabic including Jordanian Arabic, Gulf Arabic and Emirati Arabic, to various varieties of world Englishes, and indeed combinations thereof. The reported experiences of language use within the context of Emirati plurilingual homes therefore became a critical area for exploration in relation to the authors’ lived experiences in their personal and professional lives.
Ethics
This study was carried out in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki for research with human participants and was approved by the Institutional Review Board (RP-209-2023). The research team was also approved by the local education authority to approach kindergarten principals to host workshops in their schools and invite fathers. Prior to the start of the workshops, the study was explained, and participants provided written informed consent. In the presentation of the findings below, pseudonyms are allocated to participants. These pseudonyms are deeply reflective of the culture within which the study took place. In this way, pseudonymization is completed in accordance with normative practices in qualitative research, but the sociological information included in the pseudonyms contribute to the thick description (Deakin-Smith et al., 2024).
Findings
The below quotations and paraphrased statements indicate which languages were used while sharing reading, in relation to the language of the book being shared at the time. These findings are divided into the use of both Arabic (including Emirati Arabic) and English for reading, the use of mostly English, and the use of mostly Arabic.
Use of Arabic and English
Ahmed responded with multiple comments and considerable detail about his use of both Arabic and English, unlike most participants who responded with one comment. His comments appear to stem from the fact that he felt like his children’s English was stronger than their Arabic, and wanted to support their Arabic development and therefore he used a combination of both languages, either translating from one language to the other, or reading in both languages. Ahmed mentioned several books in Arabic that he had selected himself to read with his children, as well as books provided by the team. For example, he said, having read ‘The Gruffalo’ (printed in English) that “My kids mostly speak in English,” and that “next time I will try to read Arabic stories and act out with puppets to enhance his imagination and enjoyment.” Another comment which reiterates his family’s preference for English is as follows: “My son asked lots of questions because his level in Arabic is not very strong” (having read ‘The Forest of Wonders’ – printed in Arabic – not provided by team). He also stated that “they think in English, so I do my best to choose good Arabic books. Next time I will focus more on the letters” (about the book ‘Adventures of the Body’ - printed in Arabic - not provided by the team). A further book that he read in Arabic was not provided by the team, as he mentioned that “Hello, I read a Quran story.”
His wish to improve his son’s Arabic levels is indicated by the following comment: “Hello, we are now reading Arabic book ‘Uncle Khalfan’ […] My son was paying attention to the words in Arabic and how to pronounce them. My son enjoyed the book, we need easier book to read with him.” He also mentioned an improvement for his daughter, when he said “she has an issue pronouncing the letter ‘khaa’ in Arabic, she liked joining discussions, and prefers that kind of books, she was mildly excited. I liked it, and to me shorter stories are better,” thereby reiterating that he needed simpler language in the books he was sharing with his children. Over time, these improvements for his children became clearer as he stated that “we read ‘I Spy a Desert’. She was following through with the words in Arabic, even though it was an English story.” In addition, he highlighted that “in general, I find it hard to continue reading in Arabic, so I have to stop midway and translate into English” (based on ‘Venteer the Flamingo’, printed in Arabic).
Another father indicated his children’s wish to have the stories read in both languages, regardless of the language in which the book was printed. For example, Majed stated that his daughter had selected the book ‘Goodnight Moon’ (printed in English), and that she requested him to read it in English first, then Arabic. Ibrahim indicated his wish to read an Arabic book the next time, to balance with the English book he had just shared. For example, he said that having read ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ (printed in English), that “Next time I will pick an Arabic book, and we will act out what happens in the book.” Also, while Amar mentioned that he had spent 2 hours reading ‘The Little Ghaf Tree (printed in two versions, both Arabic and English), he reported that:
In Arabic I was able to read fully, but in English, the older kids took over and read to us … I did not follow a certain strategy, other than laughing, discussing, and translating, discussing the photos, I focused on Arabic and my target was to improve their linguistic acquisition.
Similarly to Ahmed and Tamer, Omar wanted to improve his children’s Arabic language skills via shared reading. Khalifa also indicated his wish to improve his son’s Arabic while reading ‘Uncle Khalfan’ (printed in Arabic) when he said that “he asked me to repeat the story again, although my son uses English more, but he liked the story and I think it is an opportunity for me to improve his Arabic.”
Use of mainly Arabic
Mohammed mentioned that he read ‘My Eyes’ (printed in Arabic) with his son “after the prayer. I used Classic Arabic.” Another father, Issa, indicated that his children wanted books read to them in Arabic, even if the book was printed in English, for example: “I showed my kids all the books, and they chose them, based on colors maybe. The colors attracted them. I asked them do you want in English, they said no, in Arabic.” Saeed commented, having read a selection of the books provided in Arabic, that “We read all the stories except the English one, maybe he did not want to.” Hassan also indicated how he enjoyed reading an Arabic-language book using a combination of MSA and Emirati Arabic, for example when he mentioned that he “used Classic Arabic to read the books with some Emirati dialect” (‘The Curious Crocodile’, printed in Arabic). Similarly, Anas noted that when a book (‘Hungry Rosie’ - printed in Arabic) was presented in MSA, he read it in Emirati Arabic, stating that “I read the story in Emirati dialect to make it easier for him to comprehend the words according to his intellectual level.”
Use of mainly English
Sultan mentioned that his children wanted him to read in English, even when the story was printed in Arabic (‘Uncle Khalfan’ – printed in Arabic). He stated that “I changed the story from Arabic to English.” Likewise, Zayed also reported that when reading The Gruffalo (printed in English) “I read in English, I stopped at each paragraph to clarify the story plot and to go into details of the story.” He also mentioned that he read ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ (printed in English) in English, as well as ‘Hungry Rosie’ (printed in Arabic).
Discussion
The language choices reported above drew on their families’ linguistic repertoires in ways which did not always match the language or language variety in which the book was printed. For example, some books printed in English were shared in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA); some were shared in Emirati Arabic, even if printed in MSA; some English books were not shared at all; and some Arabic books were not shared at all. This finding responds to the original research question posed for this study: What languages do plurilingual families in Abu Dhabi choose to use while sharing reading together as father/ child dyads?
We can see that from the 12 fathers who responded, a combination of MSA, Emirati Arabic, and English were used in a variety of different ways, which is individual to each family. This indicates a sense of plurilingualism in shared reading within Emirati families and homes where a variety of languages and language varieties are simultaneously drawn upon for communicative purposes, similarly to the usage of language during shared reading noted by Yang et al. (2021). The ways in which these families make these linguistic choices can be seen as demonstrating a range of implicit family language policies. The language(s) in which they choose to read is one aspect of how they communicate, using their linguistic repertoires in different ways (Lanza, 2007, 2021).
The responses offered by participants in this project allude to translanguaging and plurilingual practices, which become enacted policies within the home. With some children wishing to read in English, others wishing to read in Arabic, some fathers reading in Emirati Arabic and combinations of all of those languages and language varieties, and only a few of them reading the book in the language within which it was originally printed, it seems like a translanguaging stance is being taken for communication within homes, as plurilingual repertoires are being actively harnessed through this shared reading (Song, 2016). With the increased availability of translingual and bilingual picture books both globally and in the UAE (Gallagher and Bataineh, 2020; Dillon et al., 2020), perhaps it will be easier for families to enact these plurilingual policies within their homes, whether to help to improve Arabic language skills, English language skills, or use local dialects including Emirati Arabic as a way to enhance understanding and embed Emirati lingua-culture. With families representing a microcosm of the society in which they are situated, Said and Lexander (2024) point to the importance of families as spaces (Lanza, 2021) that both affect, and are affected by, their presence in the world, including the wider and local community.
While a limitation of this qualitative study is the relatively low number of responses related to the choice of language during shared reading, the quality of those responses offers a unique window into an aspect of family communication to which Emirati fathers decided to respond. Emirati families are not homogenous, and the way in which these fathers share reading with their children varies from family to family, indicating once again that plurilingual family language policies are dynamic and personal, and interact with communicative practices within the wider society. It would be interesting to offer Emirati fathers a selection of translingual books and a wider selection of culturally relevant bilingual books to see how their language choices might be affected when sharing reading, thereby perhaps offering more of an opportunity to fathers to share reading in Emirati Arabic and other local dialects as a way to preserve and drive the cultural transmission of language within this plurilingual society.
Data availability statement
The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.
Ethics statement
The studies involving humans were approved by Emirates College for Advanced Education. The studies were conducted in accordance with the local legislation and institutional requirements. The participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.
Author contributions
AD: Conceptualization, Data curation, Funding acquisition, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. KG: Conceptualization, Funding acquisition, Writing – review & editing. SS: Writing – review & editing. CH: Writing – review & editing. YA: Writing – review & editing.
Funding
The author(s) declare that financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This work was supported by Abu Dhabi Early Childhood Authority [grant number ECA2022/094].
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Generative AI statement
The authors declare that no Gen AI was used in the creation of this manuscript.
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Keywords: language choice, family language policy (FLP), plurilingual, multilingual, shared reading, translanguaging
Citation: Dillon A, Gallagher K, Saqr S, Habak C and AlRamamneh Y (2025) Language usage during shared reading—family communication as implicit plurilingual family language policy. Front. Commun. 9:1514899. doi: 10.3389/fcomm.2024.1514899
Edited by:
Anastassia Zabrodskaja, Tallinn University, EstoniaReviewed by:
Ahlam Alharbi, Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Saudi ArabiaZohreh Eslami, Texas A & M University, United States
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*Correspondence: Anna Dillon, YW5uYW1hcmllLmRpbGxvbkBnbWFpbC5jb20=