Studies on monolingual language acquisition reveal that although the structural basis of language acquisition is very much in place by the time children start school, language acquisition and consolidation continue during the school-age period. Literacy involves exposure to formal and decontextualized uses of languages and a variety of registers. It fosters vocabulary, semantic, syntactic and pragmatic growth. Furthermore, it enhances children’s reflections on formal aspects of language. The question of how literacy and text exposure contribute to linguistic development is fundamental to understand heritage language growth because this can be hampered under conditions of reduced input in childhood and beyond. This is because heritage language exposure and use diminish substantially when bilingual children start school in the majority language. Under these conditions, literacy in the heritage language is very likely to play a fundamental role in the development and maintenance of the heritage language.

The purpose of this Research Topic is to bring studies of heritage language development during the school-age period to understand which factors contribute to heritage language acquisition, maintenance or loss during this time – with special reference to literacy-related practices at home and school – and how these factors vary across individuals, school contexts and societies. An open question is how literacy exposure and language-exposure variables build on or interact with each other in determining heritage language acquisition outcomes. Furthermore, the acquisition of different linguistic phenomena may be sensitive to language and literacy exposure to a different extent. Another area that demands attention concerns the attitudes of families and societies towards literacy exposure in the heritage language. While schooling in the heritage language fosters its development, whether exposure to literacy in the majority language has negative effects on oral abilities in the heritage language has not been explored in detail in existing research.

This Research Topic invites studies considering how literacy exposure to the majority or the heritage/minority language shapes – directly or in interaction with other variables – the heritage language acquisition process and outcomes. We welcome both experimental studies that examine this topic from a psycholinguistic, linguistic, and language acquisition perspective as well as sociolinguistic contributions on attitudes towards literacy exposure in the heritage/minority language across families and societies. Studies that examine the effects of different types of heritage language education programs on the acquisition of the heritage language are also encouraged. Both quantitative and qualitative contributions will be considered as well as general literature reviews on particular aspects of the relationship between heritage/minority language acquisition, schooling and literacy exposure at home or at school. Therefore, the themes welcomed include (but are not limited to):

1. Psycholinguistics
2. Heritage language acquisition
3. Sociolinguistics, with special reference to family attitudes/identities
4. Heritage language education
5. Educational psychology

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Frontiers in Language Sciences

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