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10 - Multilingualism and Language Play

from Part Two - Cognition and Faculties in Multilinguals

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 August 2022

By
Xiao-lei Wang
Edited by
Anat Stavans  and
Ulrike Jessner
Anat Stavans
Affiliation:
Beit Berl College, Israel
Ulrike Jessner
Affiliation:
Leopold-Franzens-Universität Innsbruck, Austria
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Summary

Children have an intuitive predilection to play with language and respond to language play. Multilingual children may demonstrate additional talents and characteristics in using language playfully as a result of being able to access multiple cultural and linguistic resources. This chapter provides an overview of the effects of multilingualism on children’s language play by first addressing how language play is used by children who are learning a new language in the classroom environment. It then presents a case study of how two simultaneous trilingual siblings displayed their dexterity in the use of ludic language in the everyday context. The evidence suggests that multilingual children tend to use language play to transcend the linguistic norms of their ambient languages to negotiate meaning, leverage their communicative intents, and develop their unique multilingual identity. The chapter suggests that multilingual children tend to use language play to synthesize hybrid elements from their languages and cultures and create a wide variety of new meanings that no single linguistic system can offer. This syncretic nature of multilingual children’s language play enables them to develop a nuanced and creative manner of communication.

Keywords

multilingual language playmultilingual creativitymultilingual competencemultilingual discourse strategy
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Childhood Multilingualism , pp. 235 - 254
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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