Family dynamics towards heritage language maintenance: The case of Indian transnationals in Northern Ireland.

This article examines Family Language Policy (FLP) among first-generation Indian migrant families in Northern Ireland (NI), focusing on their efforts to maintain heritage languages (HLs) amid dominant English-language pressures. Drawing on ethnographic observations and focus groups with eight Belfast-based families, it highlights how parents act as grassroots language planners by explicitly teaching HLs, fostering literacy environments, and linking language use to cultural and religious identity, despite limited institutional support and experiences of social othering in schools. The study situates these family practices within Ruiz's (1984) tripartite framework of language orientations—language-as-problem, language-as-right, and language-as-resource—showing how parents negotiate between assimilationist pressures and cultural loyalty. Ultimately, the article underscores the complex, negotiated nature of HL maintenance in a sociopolitical context where official language policies prioritize indigenous languages and English, leaving migrant languages reliant on community and familial agency.