The south in the north

Abstract

Recently, it has been suggested that the study of family multilingualism could benefit from serious engagement with current discussions about southern and decolonial theories. Against this backdrop, this article draws upon raciolinguistics to investigate whether, and if so how, racialized ideologies of language have been internalized by family members of Ethiopian descent in Sweden in relation to their perceptions of their multilingual repertoire and practices. Specifically, this study examines how speaking accented Swedish and multilingual suburban slang is perceived, valued, and experienced by family members in the home. To this end, the study draws on multimodal research data obtained from three multilingual Ethiopian families living in Sweden. The findings show that racialized ideologies of language have been internalized, inhabited and enacted by family members, as revealed through raciolinguistic policing of what are perceived as immigrant Swedish accents and multilingual suburban slang. Consequently, this study illustrates the complexities and double binds that participating families experience, being caught between raciolinguistic ideologies that devalue speaking other than the idealized standard Swedish on the one hand, and attempts to maintain Amharic on the other. The ambivalences experienced by these families have implications for family multilingualism research on pockets of the south in the north.

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