Relationship Between Translingual Practices and Identity Performance and Positioning on the Swedish-Finnish Border

Abstract

AbstractIn this chapter, the four bilingual (Finnish/Swedish) adolescents’ translingual practices, and identity performance and positioning are explored in informal pair conversations and semi-structured individual interviews with the researcher on the Swedish-Finnish border in Tornedalen. The aim is to investigate whether there is a link between the adolescents’ language use and identity performance and positioning. The data revealed that the four young people brought different performances of language use and identity positionings to the interactions during a period of five years. The study provides examples of dramatic changes in the case of one pair of participants’ mutual language use from using predominantly Finnish resources to using exclusively Swedish. As the pair’s language use changed, so did their identity positioning: They went from positioning themselves as Finnish-speaking and bilinguals to positioning themselves more and more as Swedish-speaking.