Early language and culture development in the social context of an Arab homes: multimodal practices

ABSTRACT

This study explores the literacy and social practices of a young Omani emergent bilingual child who is beginning to develop bilingualism and biliteracy in Arabic and English through social interactions. One case study of a four-year-old child and her family living temporarily for her father postgraduate studies in Canada is presented. Framed on socio-cultural understandings of literacy development, the study discusses the role of multimodal home practices in the emergent biliteracy development of the child and generates new understandings about children’s social practices that are embedded in their daily lives. The study also explores the role of these cultural practices in navigating between two systems of language and culture. The findings make visible how children’s engagement with the social context of home, whether physical or through digital media, can enhance their biliteracy development.

KEYWORDS:

• Young children
• home culture
• digital literacy/biliteracy
• Oman
• multimodal literacy

Acknowledgements

Special thanks go to the participating child, Aya and her mother for their collaboration throughout this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics statement

Ethical approval was sought and gained from participants and home settings. Child was involved as a participant in the consent process. All participants were given pseudonyms.

Conflict of interest

The author declare no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Data availability statement

The transcripts are detailed representations of audio recordings, video recordings and screen shots. The corpus of audio data is not open access for privacy and ethical reasons, as per the consent agreement and institutional requirements.