Establishing multiple languages in early childhood. Heritage languages and language hierarchies in German-English daycare centers in Switzerland.

Abstract

The number of conceptually bilingual daycare centers has been steadily increasing in Switzerland, a traditionally multilingual country. Yet, the focus on the languages introduced in these institutions has largely remained on one national language–and English. We look at how English and–in our case–German are employed in daycare centers and how their prioritization leads to a reproduction and legitimization of language hierarchies. Drawing on the theoretical perspectives of translanguaging, code-switching, and language hierarchies as well as data from an ethnographic study in three daycare centers, we investigate how teachers and children employ different languages in the light of restrictions imposed by the daycare centers’ language policy. Although these are implemented differently in each institution, the overall commonality is the juxtaposition of the prestigious and official languages used, German and English, and the virtual exclusion of children’s heritage languages.