‘Teams came and stayed’ – Language learning practices with digital media in transnational families in Luxembourg

Abstract Transnational families offer their members unique safe spaces for language learning. With the growing availability of digital technologies, many of these families draw on digital media in their language learning endeavours. Yet, as of today, there is little systematic knowledge on how digital media are used by transnational families to facilitate language and literacy learning. Focusing on the context of multilingual Luxembourg and applying Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological System Theory, this article addresses this knowledge gap by exploring how language learning practices with digital media come into being in five transnational families in Luxembourg. Based on a qualitative content analysis of a dataset consisting of interviews, screenshots, and recordings of learning practices of our participants, we show that the language learning practices with digital media are complex, happen in several types of interactions, using a host of different structures and are modulated by the agency of the research participants.