The real and virtual public space of Cyprus, Estonia and Sweden, its relevance to family language policy and language transmission

Family is seen as a site where languages are managed, learned and negotiated (King et al.,2008). Family is also understood to be an intermediate level between the individual and society (Schwartz and Verschik,2013). The aim of this comparative study is to investigate the linguistic landscape, on-line and off-line, used by particular Russian-speaking families in Cyprus, Estonia and Sweden and to examine whether this affects individual family language policy (FLP), as well as majority vs. minority language use, maintenance and transmission. It attempts to compare the position of the minority and dominant languages in these countries, and which languages are preferred, excluded and/or imposed as a reflection of power difference, linguistic diversity and language policy (Cenoz and Gorter,2006; Gorter and Cenoz,2015,2017). In each country, we studied six families.The empirical data were obtained by semi-structured ethnographic interviews, supplemented by quantitative surveys of the same participants about their attitudes and language practices. The interview data were analysed using the methods of linguistic ethnography (Rampton et al.,2015), looking beyond the propositional meaning in the texts of the interviewees to reveal how the subjects expressed their identities through linguistic means.Also we implemented a qualitative, geo-semiotics approach (Scollon and Scollon,2003) and the method of virtual linguistic ethnography (Kelly-Holmes,2015). It was found that virtual and real signage affects the language practices and FLP of minority and immigrant communities in these countries. The complexity of semiotic spaces, multilingualism, translanguaging, code-switching and code-mixing in real and cyberspace (Ivkovic-Lotherington,2009; Troyer,2012), as well as digital literacy, influence the language choices and agency of minority speakers in their home domains and social networking (Vandergriff,2016). The location, layout and index of signs in the real and virtual (on-line newspapers, magazines and websites) space of Cyprus, Estonia and Sweden provided information about social change, complexity and super-diversity on the individual family level.