"Mama, Sign This Note": Young Refugee Children's Brokering of Literacy Practices

One afternoon in 2006, I visited a South- ern Sudanese family I worked with who often asked me to help them with English texts. During this visit, the father of the family, Amin, asked for help with some forms so that his young son, Remon, could continue to receive nutri- tion benefits from the Women, Infants, and Chil- dren program. I attempted to word the questions in English so that he could understand, and his daugh- ter, Remaz, translated into Arabic when Amin did not understand my English. Several times, Remaz answered the questions on behalf of her father, par- ticularly when Amin did not understand what I was asking. Other times, he actively looked to her. Occa- sionally, Amin would correct Remaz's response. One question asked about medications Remon was taking, but Amin could not recall the medication's name. Remaz jumped up and ran into the kitchen, brought the prescription bottle to me, and pointed to the label, so I could copy the medication's name.Although this brokering event (in which sup- port for a text is provided by another) is similar to many that involve immigrant families (e.g., Anto- nini, 2010; Hall & Guery, 2010; Orellana, 2010; Morales & Hanson, 2005), it is noteworthy for sev- eral reasons. First and foremost, the broker in this situation was a kindergartner, and the brokering event described occurred two weeks before her sixth birthday. In the two and a half years that Remaz had been in the US, she had already acquired a great deal of English, and her father clearly valued the translations she provided. And while she was still emerging into print literacy, the brokering event demonstrates both her understanding of print's function and her ability to incorporate texts into brokering communication.Remaz represents two groups about which we know very little-young children and African refu- gees, particularly those who are Arabic-speaking. The English literacy brokering that she and other young Sudanese children provided to their families, particularly around issues of genre and culturally situated literacy practices, offers important insights for educators.Language and Literacy BrokeringAlthough it is very common for children and youth to provide translation in immigrant households (Morales & Hanson, 2005; Orellana, 2010; Orel- lana, Dorner, & Pulido, 2003), society often over- looks the practice (Antonini, 2010; Hall & Guery, 2010; Orellana, 2010). As Antonini (2010) notes,The form of invisibility experienced, described and, at times, suffered by those children who mediate linguisti- cally and culturally for adults . . . is not simply restrict- ed to their role as linguistic and cultural mediators, but exacerbated by the mere fact that they are children and thus, according to the traditional way in which they are viewed, muted and unperceived beings and subjects. (p. 7)Research has documented a) that children and youth provide many types of brokering of both oral and written language as well as navigation of cultural contexts (Hall & Guery, 2010; Orellana, Reynolds, Dorner, & Meza, 2003; Trickett, Sorani, & Birman, 2010; Weisskirch, 2010), b) that the nature of brokering differs across cultural and insti- tutional contexts (Chao, 2006; Weisskirch, 2010), and c) that brokering contributes to academic and social developmental trajectories for children (Dorner, Orellana, & Jimenez, 2008; Hall & Guery, 2010; Weisskirch, 2010) and supports parents' development of English and cultural competence (Perry, 2009; Weisskirch, 2010).Research into brokering often focuses broadly on oral and written language practices; when stud- ies include a specific focus on printed texts (e.g., Morales & Hanson, 2005; Weisskirch & Alva, 2002), they tend to focus on oral translation of texts. However, Orellana and her colleagues (Orel- lana, Reynolds, Dorner, & Meza, 2003) argue that brokering written texts is an important aspect of family literacy in many immigrant communities and exposes children to a wide variety of genres that they might not expe- rience in their classrooms. …