Exploring Health Literacy With Child Language Brokers

• In Event: 47.095 - MTCC Roundtable Session 19
  In Roundtable Session: 47.095-3 - The Intersection of Family, Community, and Language

Abstract

This paper examines three middle school aged language brokers’ unique experiences mediating health information. Child language brokers are children who act as cultural and linguistic mediators for others (Tse, 1995). A smaller subset of child language brokering research considers the phenomenon in conjunction with specific domains, such as the health domain. For health and health literacy research, language brokers’ experiences can provide insight unto the existing barriers and resources to accessing health information for communities with limited English. This paper explores the nuances of health literacy and illuminates how language brokers' experiences and perspectives on health can provide valuable insights for research and practice at the intersection of health literacy and education.

Author

• Krissia Martinez, University of California - Los Angeles