Multiliteracies as Intergenerational and Transnational Funds of Knowledge for a Transnational Chinese Family

• In Event: Multiliteracies in Diverse Contexts: New Possibilities for School and Community Collaboration

Abstract

(Im)migrants all engage in transnational/translingual/transcultural realities at home and in their (trans)local communities. Hence, the purpose of this presentation is to illuminate the multiliteracies practices that are deeply rooted in a China-U.S. transnational family’s migration experiences, and how these practices function as their intergenerational and transnational funds of knowledge. This question guides my inquiry: In what ways do the multiliteracies practices of a transnational family function as their intergenerational and transnational funds of knowledge?

The guiding theoretical frameworks of my presentation are multiliteracies, transnational literacies, and funds of knowledge. From the multiliteracies perspective, language and literacies are not just acts of acquisition but rather the “multiplicity of meanings” (New London Group, 1996, p. 71) that crosses boundaries and relies on multimodal communication forms. In this study, I operationally define multiliteracies as the translingual and multimodal literacy practices of multilinguals that are situated in specific historical, cultural, social, political, and geographical contexts, for the purpose of communication and meaning-making. Building on my conceptualization of multiliteracies, transnational literacies are (im)migrants’ multiliteracies that engage their background knowledge, identities, border-crossing communicative practices, and relations across national borders (Skerrett, 2015; Warriner, 2007). I also draw on the construct of funds of knowledge to understand the bodies of knowledge that my research partners acquire, sustain, and (re)construct as they travel across geographical locations. Funds of knowledge is defined as “historically accumulated and culturally developed bodies of knowledge and skills essential for household or individual functioning and well- being” (Moll et al., 1992, p. 133). These three theoretical frameworks inform each other and jointly helped me make sense of my research partners’ intergenerational and transnational multiliteracies practices.

I draw from a larger critical ethnographic case study (Kirkland, 2014; Patel, 2016; Yin, 2017) aimed to explore migrant youths’ transnational, multimodal, and translingual literacy practices. The focal youth, Meiyi, arrived in the U.S. from mainland China in 2017. She lives in the southern suburbs of a Southeastern metropolitan city in the U.S. with her aunt, Kai, and grandparents, Yeye and Nainai. The data corpus includes semi-structured and artifact-elicited interviews, field notes, researcher memos, video recordings of family events, and Meiyi’s photovoice journals, social media posts, and poetry. I used thematic analysis (Miles et al., 2014) to explore Meiyi and her family’s multiliteracies grounded in their transnational mobility.

The findings suggest that Meiyi, Yeye, Nainai, and Kai regularly engage in family (his/her)story-telling as they engage in intergenerational multiliteracies practices such as cooking, walking, eating around the kitchen table, and picture-taking. Their multiliteracies practices are shaped by their funds of knowledge that continuously evolves as they migrate across geographical locations across time. In turn, their intergenerational and transnational funds of knowledge is mobilized as they navigate their lived experiences in new contexts and continuously refine their multiliteracies practices.

This study contributes to the ongoing scholarly conversations that strive to honor the rich literacies of transnational migrants. Moreover, I challenge teachers and researchers to (re)visit, value, and sustain (im)migrants’ out-of-school lived realities in language and literacy education.

Author

• Tairan Qiu, University of Houston
  Presenting Author