Chinese DLL’s Chinese-English bilingual vocabulary development in the face of discrimination

Abstract The COVID 19 pandemic emergency is over; however, the impacts of pandemic-related discrimination on child development are unclear. This mixed-methods research aimed to understand Chinese Dual Language Learners’ (DLLs’) Chinese-English bilingual vocabulary development in the face of discrimination. Specifically, it examined the interrelationships among COVID-related and Pre-COVID discrimination, person-, home-, community-, and school-level literacy factors, and language and Chinese DLL’s bilingual vocabulary profiles. Data were gathered via a questionnaire survey with 162 parents and semi-structured interviews with 10 parents. Thematic analysis, latent profile analysis, and multinomial logistic regression modeling were conducted. It was found that Chinese DLLs had diverse bilingual vocabulary profiles ranging from Balanced High, to Chinese Dominant, or English Dominant, or Balanced Low. Furthermore, Pre-COVID discrimination was a risk factor for Chinese DLLs to develop Balanced High bilingual vocabulary profile, while a child’s interest in reading Chinese, father’s Chinese proficiency, interactive activities in English, weekend school attendance were resilience factors associated with Balanced High biliteracy profile. The major implications are that Chinese DLLs should not be treated as a homogenous group; and that it really takes collective efforts for Chinese DLLs to develop linguistic resilience against historical discrimination.