One Week, One Language: Family Language Policy in an Intercultural Family Based in Japan

Bilingual first language acquisition has been extensively researched and many of the findings in this field are considered to be applicable to multilingual first language acquisition as well. However, the linguistic environment and the language interaction patterns involved in multilingual first language acquisition are much more complex, and therefore more research into this particular field is necessary. This presentation will introduce a case study of a multilingual international family living in Japan, which is using four languages: English, Spanish, Japanese and Romanian. Following a brief description of the linguistic profiles of the nuclear family and those of the extended family, the history of the parents' language interaction and patterns of code-switching, as well as the language environment they are creating for their 5-year-old son inside and outside the home will be discussed in detail. In particular, the Family Language Policy (FLP) adopted by this family, namely "one week, one language", is something that has not been reported on in the literature. Elucidating the linguistic environment in this family is extremely important because research suggests that no valid conclusions can be drawn regarding multilingual first language acquisition unless the detailed language environment of the child is known (Grüter and Paradis, 2014). Next, findings on the child's language development outcomes up to 5 years of age will be presented. The presentation will also introduce some findings on the child's language choice with individual addressees, his patterns of code-switching, as well as his adjusting to the "one week, one language" FLP. Finally, some future challenges to the child's balanced acquisition of each of the languages in his linguistic repertoire will be discussed.