Stories of Asian Pacific American Youth as Language Brokers

Posted by Catherine Stifter  June 17, 2009

http://www.cacf.org/blog/?p=477

A new report released today by the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families (CACF), Recording Voices: Stories of Asian Pacific American Youth as Language Brokers in New York City, finds that Asian Pacific American families often rely on children and youth to be translators and interpreters when accessing public services. These bilingual children and youth are known as “language brokers,”who are forced to translate or interpret for limited English proficient (LEP) parents in daily situations without any special training.

To ensure diverse perspectives from New York City’s Asian Pacific American community, CACF conducted the research with youth, parents, and providers from the Bangladeshi, Chinese, Filipino, Indonesian, Korean, Nepali, Tibetan, and Vietnamese communities.

While other research shows there are positive impacts of being a language broker, youth identified negative impacts including the 1) increased burden when providing language assistance; 2) heightened anxiety, stress, and fear of miscommunication; 3) conflict with the family unit; and 4) role-reversal between parents and youth. Youth who were surveyed for the report indicated that:

  • 49% of youth translate for their parents “always/a lot.”
  • 61% of foreign-born youth translate “always/a lot”, compared to 43% of native-born youth.
  • 83% of youth translate notes and letters from school.
  • 49% of youth translate forms from the doctor’s office.
The report was released today at a community briefing co-sponsored by the CUNY Asian American/Asian Research Institute (AAARI) and held at the CUNY Murphy Institute for Worker Education and Labor Studies.

Topics: Family, Health Care Access, Immigrants, Language, Mental health, Public Health, Translation, Youth