The authors’ style is, to a great extent Informal; as it is written by Bilingual parents & addressed to Bilingual parents as well. It addresses the bilingual families in a very friendly manner. Actually, what the authors aim at is to help, inform,& reassure parents by making available to them the experiences of a number of other families; the authors, also, define the word ‘family’ as “the social unit formed by any parent(s) plus children”. Moreover, the authors admit that their style is informal ,saying that “we have no particular theoretical or psychological axe to grind: this is not a set of dogmatic, hard & fast rules, but rather a practical discussion of some of the basic issues that we hope will help parents in their own particular situation”. Thus, it is ,indeed, a parent-to-parent discussion ,not a harsh or formal rules for the bilingual parents to follow in the process of bringing up their children bilingually. what gives the book a sort of credibility is that “The Bilingual Family” presents sixteen case studies of bilingual families which illustrate a wide range of different & various ‘solutions’ for the problems facing bilingual parents everywhere. The book, also, provides an alphabetical reference guide which provides answers to the most frequently asked questions about bilingualism. The authors, also, interviewed bilinguals & they found that nearly all of them valued & enjoyed their bilingualism & they have found in it a source of interest & enrichment.Actually, the book is well-organized & easy to read. It is also very much applicable to the readers & suitable to the audience; as it is an advice from parents who have been through the process all themselves. Reading the book is recommended by the authors for all the bilingual families all over the world, as well.Also, the authors emphasize that although they are both professional linguists, this book is “the direct, personal & daily experience of bilingualism in our own families”. They ,also, says, “we simply tried to formulate what our first-hand experience ,over many years, has taught us”.
COMMENTS: It seems like the authors made your task very easy. They said it explicitly: it is a discussion. SEE the answer to Reem's first question above.
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Hi Dr.Khaled,you have asked me about the question of this part.This is part(c)"consider the authors information" which is optional.
Actually, “The Bilingual Family” is written by two professional linguists: Edith Harding-Esch and Philip Riley. Edith Harding-Esch is French. She is a Senior Research Fellow in Language Education at The University of Cambridge and a former member of Centre de Recherchés Et d’Applications Pédagogiques en langues (CRAPEL) at the University of Nancy. She has various academic researches and studies in the applied linguistics, second language learning ,Bilingual acquisition, Bilingual education, Multilingualism, factors of language change, comparative education, pedagogical cultures and plurilingualism . She published many publications. For example: in the Hong Kong University Press she wrote “The Autonomy and Language learning”. Also, she wrote a book entitled “Beyond Language Teaching: Towards Language Advising”. Edith Harding-Esch’s husband is an English Mathematician and they have two children. The family’s language is French but they only use English at work and studies. They themselves undergo the process of Bilingualism.Philip Riley is an English author and linguist. He taught in Universities in Finland and Malta before setting in France. He, now, works at CRAPEL at the university of Nancy. He has many published books on linguistics and language teaching. He married a Swedish-speaking Finn and they have three children. While the children were young they spoke English and Swedish at home and French at school. Thus, there is a strong connection between the authors’ life experience, philosophy and education on the one hand and writing “The Bilingual Family” on the other hand.
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