Truncated multilingual repertoire in Indian migrant families in three cities of Europe

Abstract

This paper outlines a case study of language choices between three Indian immigrant families residing in three different countries of Europe – France, Norway, and Finland. The issue is to focus on the language practices of the immigrant members when the verbal repertoire is composed of several languages owing to truncated competencies. What are the languages at their disposal and how do they exploit their truncated multilingual repertoire within different social settings? The sociolinguistic and ethnographic empirical observations have yielded useful information on the multiple usages of languages by our participants. This paper reveals how several languages are handled in the daily life with limited or high competence in each of them displaying the intricacies of truncated multilingual repertoire. The latter has been found playing a pivotal role in situating language practices with different segments of the society