Children’s Narratives of the Emotional Impact of Child Language Brokering
10.6092/issn.1974-4382/15269
Child Language Brokering (CLB) is a very common, yet unseen form of language and cultural (inter)mediation performed by bilingual children and adolescents to help their family, peers and other involved parties interact with members of the host society in a wide variety of formal and informal settings and domains (Antonini 2016). Extant literature provides a detailed description of various aspects of CLB, including, inter alia, who children translate for, where they do so, what they translate, how they feel when they language broker, as well as the impact that CLB has on various aspects of their life and development. Past research focussing on the emotional impact of this practice have reported that child language brokers may experience mixed feelings (Corona et al. 2012). They may perceive CLB either/both as a cause of stress and a burden and/or an experience that they find enjoyable (Hall and Guéry 2010; Parke and Buriel 1998; Suárez-Orozco and Suárez-Orozco 2001; Weisskirch 2007) and which they are proud to undertake (Love and Buriel 2007). This article presents a thematic analysis of the over 600 visual and written narratives by children and adolescents collected by means of three editions of the school contest “Traduttori in Erba” that took place in Emilia-Romagna (Italy). The results show how the affective responses of child language brokers may be shaped by age, setting and the people for whom children language broker, but are also indicative of broader feelings related to their migration experience and the dynamics of family relationships (Crafter and Iqbal 2022).
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Children’s Narratives of the Emotional Impact of Child Language Brokering
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Emozioni: sentirle, parlarne, tradurle                                     mediAzioni 33 (2022)
                                                                                ISSN 1974-4382




   CHILDREN’S NARRATIVES OF THE EMOTIONAL IMPACT OF
              CHILD LANGUAGE BROKERING
                                           RACHELE ANTONINI
                                         UNIVERSITÀ DI BOLOGNA


rachele.antonini@unibo.it


Citation: Antonini, Rachele (2022) “Children’s narratives of the emotional impact of Child
Language Brokering”, in Greta Zanoni, Serena Zuccheri Emozioni: sentirle, parlarne,
tradurle, MediAzioni 33: D132‒D154, https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.1974-4382/15269,
ISSN 1974-4382.



Abstract: Child Language Brokering (CLB) is a very common, yet unseen form of language
and cultural (inter)mediation performed by bilingual children and adolescents to help their
family, peers and other involved parties interact with members of the host society in a wide
variety of formal and informal settings and domains (Antonini 2016). Extant literature
provides a detailed description of various aspects of CLB, including, inter alia, who children
translate for, where they do so, what they translate, how they feel when they language
broker, as well as the impact that CLB has on various aspects of their life and development.
Past research focussing on the emotional impact of this practice have reported that child
language brokers may experience mixed feelings (Corona et al. 2012). They may perceive
CLB either/both as a cause of stress and a burden and/or an experience that they find
enjoyable (Hall and Guéry 2010; Parke and Buriel 1998; Suárez-Orozco and Suárez-Orozco
2001; Weisskirch 2007) and which they are proud to undertake (Love and Buriel 2007).
This article presents a thematic analysis of the over 600 visual and written narratives by
children and adolescents collected by means of three editions of the school contest
“Traduttori in Erba” that took place in Emilia-Romagna (Italy). The results show how the
affective responses of child language brokers may be shaped by age, setting and the people
for whom children language broker, but are also indicative of broader feelings related to
their migration experience and the dynamics of family relationships (Crafter and Iqbal
2022).

Keywords: Child Language Brokering; feelings; empathy; awareness; linguistic mediation.




Copyright © 2022
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1. Introduction

The aim of this paper is to offer a preliminary reflection on how the practice of CLB
impacts the emotional sphere of the children and adolescents who are involved in
mediating linguistically and culturally for the families and peers.
     Child language brokering (henceforth CLB) is a very common yet unseen aspect
and consequence of migration, a phenomenon “resulting from a variety of historical
and social factors, but that it has occurred for thousands of years, as long as cultures
have migrated across the globe” (Alvarez 2017: 12). It is a form of language and
cultural (inter)mediation performed by bilingual children and adolescents to help
their family, peers and other involved parties interact with members of their new
country of residence in a wide variety of formal and informal settings and domains
(Antonini 2016). Although not limited to bilingual children and adolescents with a
migrant background, research has focussed mostly on this category of language
brokers (Orellana 2017).
     CLB is a largely unacknowledged aspect of immigration. Despite being a very
common alternative to professional interpreting and translation in all those
domains in which immigrant families need to interact with the host society and
institutions, CLB has been largely invisible in modern times until recently
particularly from “political, educational, research, policy and, inevitably, adult
perspectives” (Hall and Guéry 2010: 29). It is often regarded as an ad hoc solution
“aimed at overcoming linguistic barriers when they occur and with no specific
guidelines on how to deal with such barriers” (Antonini 2015: 100). In fact, through
schooling and socializing in the school setting, first and second generation
children/adolescents with a migrant background often learn the language of their
new country of residence before their adult family members (parents and
grandparents) (Weisskirch 2007). Consequently, when professional mediators or
bilingual adults are not available to mediate, bilingual children are likely to be
entrusted with the role of the language broker.
     In Italy too CLB is a common practice (Ceccoli 2018; Pugliese 2016), yet often
hidden even to the eyes of those who rely on it as it is a practice rarely mentioned in
official directives and regulations and its use in lieu of professional linguistic and
cultural mediation services is often considered a necessary evil even in those
contexts where sensitive information is discussed or conflictual situations may arise
(Antonini 2016; Valletta 2015).
     The data presented and discussed here are part of broader project, the In MedIO
PUER(I) research project (https://inmediopueri.it/il-progetto/), a multi-method
study that pioneered CLB research in Italy. For the purposes of this paper the focus
will be on three dimensions of the affective response to CLB that are pertinent to
this study: positive and/or negative feelings, the emotional impact of CLB on family
relations and dynamics, and CLB as an expression and tool of empathy.


2. An overview of studies on the perception of CLB

In the past four decades CLB studies have contributed to bring to the fore various
aspects of CLB, including, inter alia, who children translate for, where they do so,

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what they translate, how they feel when they language broker, as well as the impact
that CLB has on various aspects of their life and development. Children/adolescents
language broker conversations and translate various kinds of documents and texts.
CLB occurs in a wide array of formal and informal domains ranging from the home,
the school, public offices, shops and health care settings. Children and adolescents
mediate culturally and linguistically for family members, members of their social
network and community as well as their peers. Therefore, the language brokering
activities they may be involved in can range

      from the relatively trivial, maybe just writing out a note for the milkman, to the
      massively complex, like helping a father fill out a tax form, but at the higher level
      the children are responding challenges that their fellow students are unlikely
      to meet until they are adults (Hall and Guery 2010: 41).

CLB is thus a practice that is socially and contextually situated (Eksner and Orellana
2012; Crafter and Iqbal 2022) that requires children/adolescents to navigate or
manage potentially challenging or, at times, conflictual situations (Crafter and Iqbal
2020) that can trigger a variety of affective responses.

2.1. The affective response to CLB

There is a growing body of literature on feelings attached to CLB, which stems
mostly from studies in educational studies, psychology and sociology and, more
recently, interpreting and translation studies.
     Research on feelings associated to CLB has yielded mixed or contradictory
results (Corona et al. 2012). As argued above, the reason for these contrasting
findings lies on the fact that the emotional dimension of CLB is multi-layered and
influenced by several factors and variables, such as age, personality traits, power
relations, settings, the people involved in the mediated interaction, and the
languages involved. Moreover, feelings, alongside behaviour and cognition, are one
of the three components that affect and shape attitudes and identities and can thus
affect “(a) the performance of brokering itself, (b) child language brokers’
psychological development, (c) their relationship with their families, and (d) the
communicative success of the brokered interaction” (Ceccoli 2022: 4).
     CLB has been described in negative terms when it is perceived as a cause of
stress and a burden (Weisskirch and Alva 2002; Kam and Lazarevic 2014: Tomasi
and Narhcal 2021). Weisskirch (2007) reported a negative perception of CLB which
was described as not enjoyable nor helpful particularly in the relationship with
parents or in learning the language spoken at home, but also when language brokers
are required to take on responsibilities in situations in which adults would normally
be in control, they may experience mixed feelings (Corona et al. 2012).
     A negative perception and experience of CLB has also been associated with a
decline in psychological well-being, as language brokers may be at risk of adverse
health outcomes, which can range from higher levels of depression, anxiety, somatic
complaints, and withdrawal (Chao 2006; Valtolina 2010).
     CLB is described as an enjoyable and positive experience (Hall and Guéry 2010;
Parke and Buriel 1998; Suárez-Orozco and Suárez-Orozco 2001; Weisskirch 2007)
which children are proud to undertake (Love and Buriel 2007). A positive
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experience associated with language brokering has been associated with higher self-
esteem (Acoach and Webb 2004) and correlated with a strong parent-child bond
(Love and Buriel 2007). has also been linked to improved cognitive and
metalinguistic abilities (Acoach and Webb 2004), academic performance (Dorner et
al. 2007) and bilingual and bicultural developments (Tse 1996). In this respect,
Buriel et al. argue that when language brokers “are better adapted to their dual
cultural environment” they are less likely to be affected by “the detrimental effects
of acculturation, such as psychosocial and behavioral disorders” (1998: 7).

2.2. The impact of CLB on family dynamics

The impact of CLB on family dynamics has been reported in mixed and often
dichotomous terms. CLB can impact family dynamics when it leads to role reversal,
adultification or parentification. Role reversal has been associated to negative
feelings when it is described as a cause of disruption of the hierarchical order within
the family household (Umaña-Taylor 2003; Titzmann 2012). Conversely, it is
viewed in a positive way when children perceive CLB as a normal task within the
context of household chores and as part of a parent-child performance team (Valdés
et al. 2003). Adultification and parentification are constructs that describe parents’
emotional and instrumental dependence on their children’s language brokering
(Trickett and Jones 2007; Weisskirch 2010; Cline et al. 2017; Crafter and Iqbal
2022). They are generally related to adverse emotional responses within the context
of problematic family relationships, whereby CLB leads to parental dependency on
their children and role-reversal (Umaña-Taylor 2003; Shen and Dennis 2019), but
also to problems caused by a different level of acculturation (Martinez et al. 2009).
     Conversely, some studies have hinted that, through adultification and
parentification, language brokers can acquire attributes and skills that can be used
to their advantage (Trickett and Jones 2007; Alvarez 2017).
     A growing body of studies calls for a more comprehensive and multidimensional
approach to the study of perceptions of CLB and their impact on the life and health
of language brokers (Kam and Lazarevic 2014; Shen and Dennis 2019).

2.3. Developments in the study of CLB and emotions

CLB does not occur in a vacuum and in particular situations it can expose
children/adolescents to the attitudes, expectations, prejudice and stereotypes that
might be held by the general populations and the people for whom they translate.
Recent developments in the study of CLB have focussed on the adverse affective
response caused by often intersecting factors and variables, such as age, class,
gender, local and national attitudes and politics, power relations, race and setting in
shaping the children’s/adolescents’ identity and attitudes toward their native and
acquired languages and cultures. For instance, Reynolds and Orellana (2009)
address CLB in terms of issues of race, class, and ethnicity while García-Sánchez’s
(2014) study of CLB practices performed by Moroccan immigrant children in Spain
takes a gender- and race-related perspective. While Kwon (2014) observed how
working-class children may experience an adverse impact of CLB practices and
develop a buried sense of inadequacy and desire. Nash (2017) explored avoidance,

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defiance, or socializing strategies used by Arab American language brokers when
they are confronted with stereotypes and discrimination.
      The study of CLB as an empathetic practice represents a significant
development in the study of CLB. The role played by empathy in the affective
response to CLB had already been observed in the literature. For instance, De Ment
et al. (2005) reported how through language brokering children and adolescents
learn about and understand the daily struggles that their parents experience and the
sacrifices they make, and they develop empathy for them, and show appreciation
(i.e. reciprocate care) by doing well in school (Love and Buriel, 2007). However, the
need to reframe the study of CLB and locate it “along a ‘caregiving continuum’”
(Bauer 2016: 34) is a more recent development. Care is defined as the provision of
practical or emotional support” (Milligan and Wiles 2010: 737) that is practiced
through “interdependency, reciprocity and multidirectionality” (ibid.), which aptly
reflects the new approach to the study of CLB in “conceptualizing children as social
actors” (García-Sánchez 2018; Bauer 2016).


3. Method: In MedIO PUER(I) and Traduttori in Erba

In MedIO PUER(I) is a multi-method project1 that was founded in 2006 to
investigate child-mediated exchanges between migrants and the host country and
filling a gap in research on CLB in Italy. Its main aims are to:
1. map out and confirm CLB practices among linguistic and ethnic communities that
live in Emilia Romagna and Italy at large;
2. describe the participants involved as well as the situations and contexts in which
it takes place;
3. assess the impact it has on various aspects of the life and development of language
brokers;
4. gather data on attitudes and perception held by children, parents, teachers and
institutional representatives towards this practice;
5. raise awareness on CLB by making it visible to all involved parties.
      Over a time-span of 15 years data has been collected by means of a variety of
ethnographic and qualitative methods comprising semi-structured interviews,
questionnaires, focus groups, visual and written narratives, and participant
observation, that allowed the research group to observe and analyse the
phenomenon from the widest perspective possible.
      One of the tools used to collect data was a school competition, Traduttori in Erba
(Translators in Bud) that took place for three editions in the 2010/2011,
2011/2012 and 2016/2017 school years. The analysis presented in this paper
focuses on narratives purposely selected from a pool of 620 visual and written
narratives collected by means of three editions of the school competition. The
narratives were produced by 6- to 14-year-old children and adolescents attending
primary and middle schools in the Forlì-Cesena province, who chose to either write



1 In MedIO PUER(I) stands for Intermediazione Linguistica e Culturale ad Opera di Giovani Utenti in
Emilia Romagna e in Italia.
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a text or present a drawing describing their own experience as a language broker or
a language brokering event they had witnessed.2
     The school contest was organised with a set of rules and an official jury that had
the task of selecting the winners. The rules of the contest were explained to the
participating pupils by the teachers without the presence of the researchers. The
rules stated the topic of the contest (to describe a CLB event that the children had
either performed or witnessed) and how the visual and written narratives were to
be submitted (see Figure 1).




               Fig. 1. The leaflet explaining the purpose and rules of the competition3.


The narratives were submitted mostly in paper, but also in digital form (emailed to
the researchers).
    For the purposes of this study, the texts that made reference to affective
responses to CLB were selected, pseudonymized, and digitalized into Word files.
They were then imported in an nVivo project and codified in order to carry out a
thematic analysis with the aim of identifying, analysing and interpreting patterns
across selected narratives (Braun and Clarke 2006, 2021; Nowell et al. 2017;
Floersch et al. 2010) within the qualitative dataset of narratives collected with
Traduttori in Erba.
    The 47 selected narratives were written by primary and middle school pupils
between 8 and 14 years of age. This wide developmental span was chosen following
Antonini (2016) who observed that the age at which the children/adolescents


2 In order to be able to participate in the competition, schools acted in loco parentis and submitted a
release form for the use of the narratives and drawings exclusively for academic purposes. The three
editions of Traduttori in Erba took place before the GDPR came into effect.
3 https://inmediopueri.it/traduttori/

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language broker may be a factor in determining a positive or negative perception of
this practice.
     The selection of the narratives was based on two main criteria: i. they were full
compositions (thus excluding captions and short description added to drawings); ii.
the narratives had to contain a clear statement of emotion (thus excluding those
narratives where some sentiment could be inferred but was not mentioned
directly). In order to provide the appropriate context, the length of the unit of
analysis ranged between one sentence and longer stretches of text. However, this
increased the chance of having to attribute the same item to two or multiple nodes
as one sentence often contained references to different aspects and/or causes of the
affective response to CLB.
     The responses were categorized by using the qualitative analysis software
NVivo in a two-step process. First, the author coded all the selected narratives by
creating code category sets, which were then compared with those produced by
another independent coder in order to develop a single framework and ensure
coding coherence and consistency.
     The following sections will provide a description of the main themes that
emerged from this analysis and will include excerpts from the selected narratives.


4. Analysis

This paper stems from the following research questions:
1.     In what ways does CLB affect child/adolescent language brokers?
2.     How do language brokers describe the affective impact of CLB?
     The visual and written narratives submitted by the children/adolescents who
took part in Traduttori in Erba, included or described their experience as language
brokers in an array of situations and contexts. Not all of them dealt with the affective
response to CLB. Therefore, the thematic analysis carried out on the itemized
narratives and the subsequent coding identified themes were then organized into
hierarchies when connections became apparent. This led to their categorization into
five umbrella themes (as illustrated in Figure 2).
     The analysis identified five distinct (though often interconnected) core themes:
awareness, empathy, family dynamics, positive and negative feelings.
     Awareness, empathy and family dynamics are linked to the first research
question dealing with the affective impact of CLB on the language brokers’ lives and
perceptions of their role, their relationship with their peers and with their family
(mainly their parents), while positive and negative feelings relate to the second
research question exploring how the children/adolescents described their
experience as language brokers.
     For all themes, with the exception of empathy, a varying number of subthemes
was identified with the aim of further organizing and aggregating the identified
items. Figure 3 shows the parent-child hierarchy for the emotional impact of CLB.




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                                        Fig. 2. Core themes.




                                     Fig. 3. Coding hierarchy.


It is important to note that most of the selected items in the narratives can be
attributed to multiple sub-themes as they describe emotions linked to different
aspect of the CLB practice.
     The following sections provide a more in-depth analysis of the results framed
by the research questions.




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4.1. How CLB affects child language brokers

The narratives that were the object of this study highlighted three main themes that
revolve around the issue of the impact of CLB practices: emotional impact of CLB on
family relations and dynamics, awareness of the impact of CLB, and empathy.

4.1.1. Emotional impact of CLB on family relations and dynamics

As already mentioned in §2, CLB can impact family dynamics in different ways. The
items included in this theme have been grouped into three categories: parental
language competence, role reversal and duty, and representation of how the
children/adolescents in this study sample perceive these aspects.
    Examples 1, 2 and 34 show that language brokers are aware that the lack of
language competence in Italian is a barrier that makes their parents dependent on
them for communicating and interacting with society and institutions:

      (1): It is more difficult for adults, because they have only attended school in
      their country. Children, who will attend school [in the new country], will not
      experience the same difficulties as adults, especially if they were born in Italy.
      Children can thus help their parents a lot by translating for them or suggesting
      words, or even by teaching them something about the new country. With time
      the parent will learn to speak Italian, even just those few words that will allow
      them to communicate in daily life. (Female, 14)

      (2): Generally speaking, I can say that my experience as a language broker has
      been simple, especially because this task was divided between my sister and I
      and, with the passing of time, my job as a language broker has become
      increasingly less necessary since my parents are learning the basics of the
      Italian language even if in some cases they still need me. (Male, 14)

      (3): I tried to teach her [the mother] Italian, I hoped I could do so but […] I did
      not succeed. She didn’t want to learn and kept watching het films, she didn’t
      care. (Male, 11)

All three examples clearly describe how the responsibility of acting as language
brokers falls on children because, through schooling, they learn Italian before their
parents. However, they also highlight that language brokers are not always allowed
to relinquish this responsibility because the linguistic competence acquired by their
parents is not sufficient to enable them to become independent of their children’s
help.
     Role reversal refers to CLB being perceived as the responsibility of the
child/adolescent in helping their parents/family interact with the host society and
the feelings associated with it are generally negative. Examples 4 and 5 express
feelings that emerge in all the cases that describe language brokering for one’s
parents.

4 All the examples from the narratives are presented in the English translation provided by the
author. The information in brackets at the end of each excerpt indicates the gender and age of the
child/adolescent who wrote the narratives from which it was taken.
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       (4): Once I went with my mum to her Italian class to help her understand what
       her teachers were saying about her: I was like a mother, she was like my
       daughter and I felt slightly ashamed. (Female, 14)

       (5): My parents are those kind of people who, even if they have been living in
       Italy for many year, sometimes do not know how to write or say words, for this
       reason, despite my poor knowledge of both languages, they come to me to ask
       how to write or day a word or a sentence and, even if at times I find it boring, I
       help them and the situation becomes like the one between “a teacher and a
       pupil”, where I’m the teacher even if I find this quite distressing. (Male, 14)

More positive feelings are described in relation to language brokering for other
relatives, e.g. siblings or aunts and uncles, especially when children/adolescents
take on the role of teachers:

       (6): When I was in primary school I helped children who spoke Arabic and I
       liked it a lot, I felt like a teacher. (Male, 12)

    Lastly, example 7 illustrates how the allocation of roles and responsibilities
within the family for some migrant groups language brokering is seen as the
children’s duty:

       (7): Our experience helps you understand that being ‘translators’ means doing
       things that boys and girls of our own age would not normally do. It is not easy
       to spend a whole afternoon at the trade union’s or at the Police station, because
       we have to do something important for our family; but we have to do it because
       it is our duty! (Female, 14)

4.1.2. Awareness

Four subcategories have been identified within this theme and they are linked to
role (15), impact on learning and personal growth (12), terminology (6), and
language competence (5). The examples that will be discussed below contain the
children/adolescents’ reflections on the role of the linguistic mediator, the
perceived impact of CLB on their education and learning, but also their awareness
of what it takes to be a language broker.
     Language brokers are aware of the fact that they are filling a gap in the provision
of professional linguistic mediation and that without their help many people would
not be able to access key services (example 8). Moreover, when they talk about the
role of the language broker as a linguistic and cultural mediator they unknowingly
use images and metaphors that have been employed for decades in academic
literature to describe the role of the interpreter/translator (examples 9 and 10):

       (8): l think that the role played by “young mediators” is just as important as the
       one played by a real mediator because without “us” many unpleasant things
       would have happened. For instance, many foreign people would not have
       understood which document they needed to present to the police station or,
       even worse, which medicine to take for some disease. (Male, 14)


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      (9): I liked it that someone asked me to translate a letter, I became aware of
      the fact that “Language is like a bridge that connects the two banks of a river”.
      (Male, 12)

      (10): I think that helping to translate can open a window for children from
      another country and bring light, colour and joy in their life. (Female, 8)

The awareness subtheme is also linked to the realization that acting as a language
broker can contribute to facilitating inclusion:

      (11): This is what it means to be a translator: to give words to those who do not
      have a voice, to those who cannot defend themselves, because to be able to
      speak means knowing ones’ rights and ones’ duties. To give help to those who
      need it: this is the translator’s task. (Male, 14)

      (12): Translator: a word loaded with meaning. It is sometimes attributed to
      very young people who, like me, help their parents or acquaintances avoid
      being left alone in situations that could be quite embarrassing. Being unable to
      write or speak marginalizes you from society, it isolates you, and, slowly, makes
      you feel useless. Many people who don’t know how to speak are unwittingly
      mocked and humiliated. (ibid.)

The category related to the impact of CLB on learning and personal growth is linked
to both positive and negative emotions and often encroaches what the
children/adolescents say about their duty as language brokers (as in §4.1.1). CLB is
described in positive terms when linked to improved and more rapid language
learning and proficiency in both Italian and the language spoken at home,
acquisition of vocabulary and the awareness, when mediating linguistically, of
having to go beyond a verbatim translation (example 13). Other statements of
positive emotion were linked to having to take on more responsibilities than their
peers and how this contributed to their personal growth (example 14).

      (13): Translating is a very important thing for foreign people living in a country
      where a different language is spoken. The role played by children is important
      because, from what is my experience, a child/youth who is still very young, is
      able to learn languages quicker, and this is particularly true for foreign kids.
      (Female, 12)

      (14): I think that it’s fantastic that some kids help their parents by translating
      languages and not only Italian because it helped me grow by giving me
      responsibilities and made me mature. (Male, 14)

Language brokers report negative emotions linked to learning and personal growth
when CLB activities obliges them to miss lessons or school days:

      (15): Sometimes I have to miss school because I’ve got to go with them, I am
      sorry about this but there is nothing I can do when they need me. (Female, 14)

      (16) The other kids who are my age play, relax or go out the whole afternoon,
      but I always have to go out with my mum, often I have to do my homework late
      in the evening before going to bed, but I have no other option because my

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       parents don’t speak [Italian] very well and what in theory they should do, I have
       to do, I don’t have a choice. (Female, 13)

The reflections on language competence highlighted the fact that language brokers
are aware of their limited and uneven competence in the languages they use for their
language brokering activities either because they are not fully proficient in one or
both of them, or because of the complexity of the language they need to interpret or
translate:

       (17): I realized that I did not know how to translate some words because I was
       only nine years old and I only knew basic things in Chinese. (Male, 13)

       (18): But I am not always able to translate everything: even if the Italian
       language is similar to Rumanian, sometimes it is hard for me to understand the
       text or individual words. This happens for instance with all utility bills; they are
       and will remain a mystery to me, I will never be able to translate them. (Female,
       14)

This awareness can also be the cause of stress and anxiety:

       (19) When I do it, I feel afraid because I’m afraid of making mistakes and if I
       made a mistake it would be very embarrassing, (even if I do not think that
       anyone would notice it), but anyway, everyone would exclaim: ‘Ah, ah, ah …, she
       doesn’t even know her own language!’ But this is not the only thing I feel when
       I translate, there are others: I feel important at that moment, I understand how
       useful my act is (without me there would be total chaos because the teacher
       would not be able to communicate with the pupil and vice versa). (Female, 10)

This example is not only indicative of mixed feelings attached to CLB, but also of the
complexity of this emotional response, which can be caused by a variety of factors
and variables that intersect and cannot be analysed as separate units (in this case
the awareness of the uneven competence in the languages used, and thus of making
mistakes and being judged for them by her peers and the teacher, coupled with the
awareness of the key role played by language brokering in ensuring
communication).

4.1.3. Empathy

Care and compassion are expressed through the empathetic perception of CLB and
they cut across all the categories analysed in this study. As already emerged in
several of the examples above, empathy is displayed in relation to various situations
and people involved in the mediated interaction. Language brokers show
understanding for what the people they help with their interpreting/translating
experience and for aspects that go beyond language and include other aspects of
inclusion too (examples 19 and 20):

       (19): Another example that might seem trivial is that of a newly arrived
       classmate who, by not understanding the rules of the game, might get excluded.
       By writing and reflecting on this topic I have been able to understand that a
       small gesture is enough to achieve much more. (Female, 10)

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      (20) That day having to translate for a person for whom I care a lot was
      undoubtedly a fantastic experience. It made me feel what it means to love and
      help to live those who need help. She is my mum. (Male, 13)

Empathy is also expressed by children who are or have been the recipients of
language brokering (example 21), but is also present as a direct expression of
care and compassion in the narratives produced by children without a migrant
background reflecting on the linguistic challenges that their peers have to
overcome when they arrive in a new country (example 22):

      (21): I felt strange thinking that about two years ago I was in her same situation.
      At the same time, I was proud of myself because in these two years I have
      learned a lot and now I too can help other people. (Female, 13)

      (22): I think it is important to make our language understood to those who do
      not speak it, because for those who do not understand what we are saying it’s
      like being in the dark, inside a house with all the shutters closed, where not even
      a ray of light manages to get through. On the other hand, when another child
      arrives and shows friendly gestures that he can understand, like hugs and
      smiles… he can see that we don’t want to avoid him that we want to be friends
      with him, and the world for him is coloured again (Female, 9)

The reflections in these two examples perceptively point to two interesting and
uncharted aspects of the study of feelings towards CLB: the affective response of
children/adolescents who benefit from language and cultural brokering, and the
empathetic response to CLB on behalf of children who are not language brokers but
have learned about it by either observing their classmates perform it or by reflecting
on it when they are made aware of it. In the latter case, as described in (22), the
school contest became the occasion for teachers to start a conversation on the
challenges faced by newly arrived pupils who do not speak Italian, on the role played
by child language brokers in helping their inclusion in the class, and on the
importance of a caring approach to help them feel welcome.

4.2. Positive and negative feelings towards CLB

The diagram in Figure 3 above shows the categories of emotion associated with a
positive and/or negative perception of CLB that were expressed by the authors of
the narratives. All the feelings described in the narratives correlate with the range
described in the literature (as illustrated in §2.1 but also by Weisskirch 2007 and
Orellana 2017).
    In terms of frequencies, indicated in brackets, as illustrated in Table 1 (in §4.3)
more positive feelings (52) where expressed as opposed to negative feelings (37).

4.2.1. Positive feelings

The positive emotions reported by language brokers in the sample were related to
feeling Useful (12), Happy/Pleased (16), Proud (6), Important (5), but also Gratified
(4) and Heroic (4).


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     Happy and pleased are adjectives used in the narratives in association with
feelings of satisfaction with one’s role as a language broker:

       (23): I was happy because I like helping my uncle. (Male, 11)

       (24): Even though I often have to translate for my parents and friends’ words or
       sentences that I know and can explain, I am always happy to do it and I never say no.
       (Female, 14)

Given that all the narratives were collected as part of a school activity for the
Traduttori in Erba competition, references to feeling useful are mostly linked to the
role played at school in helping the teachers communicate with non-Italian speaking
pupils and to a lesser extent when helping a family member:

       (25): By going to school, I have learned Italian and English on top of the language I
       already speak, that is Arabic. For this reason, in the past years. I have been very useful
       to the teachers. (Female, 10)

Other statements of positive emotions associated to CLB express how language
brokers feel important and proud of having become proficient in Italian (often in
just a few months) so that they can help their parents and friends, and they
sometimes describe themselves as the hero who saves the day.

       (26): I feel proud because few Chinese were able to translate after just ten months in
       school and I was happy because it seemed to me that all the effort I had put in in those
       ten months had resulted in satisfactory results; even if I was not excellent, I had made
       a huge progress. (Female, 12)

One other interesting aspect is the sense of gratification expressed whenever they
describe their parents’ or teachers’ gratitude for their language brokering:

       (27): I am happy I can translate every now and then because every time I do it my
       mum always says “thank you so much!!” (Female, 14)

       (28) I also had to translate at school where there was a child who did not speak Italian
       but knew the language I speak so I translated everything the teacher was saying. The
       teacher was very pleased by what I had done and as a reward gave me an extra good
       mark. (Male, 13)

4.2.2. Negative feelings

Statements of negative emotion refer to feelings that have been described
extensively in extant literature. The adverse responses that were reported in the
narratives that were the object of this study are associated with similar feelings:
    challenging (9)
    fear and anxiety (9)
    burden (6)
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        Uneasiness (4), shame (2)
        Other feelings: helplessness (3), tiresomeness (2), regret (1), frustration (1)

CLB is perceived as challenging (with a negative connotation) when it occurs in
public service and health care settings (e.g., the trade union, the police station, the
doctor’s) and when children/adolescents have to translate complex texts. Example
28 clearly illustrates all these challenges:

        (28) We have to go to the police station too and in that case we have to deal
        with very important things and responsibilities as the document that we usually
        help to request or renew is the residence permit: we stand in long queues, as
        we do at the doctor’s, to talk to different officers until it is our turn, then we try
        to deal with it in the best possible way and when we get it done we can breath
        a sigh of relief because this time too “we did it”… but what a challenge! (Female,
        14)

Fear and anxiety are associated with making mistakes when speaking either Italian
or their other language(s) and being judged for that, but also with the awareness
that are not fully competent in the language from and into which they translate.
Children and adolescents who language broker (especially when involved in
facilitating communication for the loved ones in the healthcare setting) are always
very aware of the responsibilities they have and do not take their role lightly as they
are fully aware of the implications and consequences (see for instance Antonini and
Torresi 2021). Hence, language brokers may experience the fear of mistranslating
or misunderstanding what is being said, and, as a result, causing harm to family
members:

         (29) Once the doctor told me that my grandmother was very ill and that she
        had to take important medicines: he started saying all these difficult words and
        I got very confused, I was afraid for my grandmother’s health. (Female, 14)

As also illustrated by other examples included in this paper, CLB is considered a
burden when the responsibility of language brokering falls on only one child, when
it is protracted over the year because parents do not learn the language or do not
feel confident enough to go to offices on their own, when children/adolescents do
not translate just for their parents but for other family members or acquaintances.
     Less frequently expressed negative feelings in relation to CLB are helplessness,
tiresomeness, regret and frustration.

4.3. Preliminary pattern exploration

A previous study on the Traduttori in Erba data had already detected the correlation
between age and emotions and the fact that younger children (in primary school)
generally expressed “more carefree and happy feelings towards their roles as
language brokers, which may be a result of the fact that they have not yet been
involved in complex and emotionally burdensome situations” (Antonini 2016: 11)
compared to older adolescents of middle school age.
    In order to confirm these findings, all the narratives included in the sample were
classified according to the school attended at the moment of the submission of the
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narrative: Primary school (which for this sample corresponds to the 8 to 10 age
group) and Middle school (which includes the 11 to 14 age group). A matrix coding
query that cross-referenced these two classifications with the five coded themes and
respective subthemes showed that age can be viewed as a causal variable in how
CLB is perceived and described. Table 1 below summarizes the results of the Matrix
Coding Query that was carried out on the data.

         POSITIVE FEELINGS                 Middle school             Primary school
         Happy&pleasing                         12                         4
         Useful                                  8                         4
         Rewarding                               4                         0
         Proud                                   4                         2
         Important                               3                         2
         Hero                                    2                         2
         Fun                                     5                         0
         Total occurrences                      38                        14
         NEGATIVE FEELINGS                 Middle school             Primary school
         Uneasy                                  3                         1
         Tiresome                                2                         0
         Shame                                   2                         0
         Regret                                  1                         0
         Helplessness                            1                         2
         Frustration                             0                         1
         Fear&anxiety                            5                         4
         Challenging                             7                         2
         Burden                                  6                         0
         Total occurrences                      27                        10
         FAMILY DINAMICS                   Middle school             Primary school
         Role-reversal                           6                         0
         Language knowledge                      9                         1
         Duty                                    5                         1
         Total occurrences                      20                         2
         AWARENESS                         Middle school             Primary school
         Terminology                             5                         1
         Role                                   12                         3
         Positive Impact                         8                         0
         Negative Impact                         4                         0
         Total occurrences                      29                         4
         EMPATHY                           Middle school             Primary school
          Total occurrences                      2                         6
                          Tab. 1. Affective response to CLB by age group.


Older children (those in the 11 to 14 age range) tend to describe a wider array of
feelings and to provide more comprehensive descriptions that contain references to
various dimensions of the emotional impact of CLB, while younger children tend to
report single events or experiences. The results of the query indicate that the
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affective response to CLB may be influenced by age for all the themes except for
Empathy. Care and compassion is often described within the school setting and
emerges also as part of the reflection that was enthused by taking part in Traduttori
in Erba, particularly in primary school.
    A cluster analysis of word similarity (in Figure 4) detected some associations
between the different themes and subthemes.




                             Fig. 4. Cluster analysis of word similarity.


With the premise that a more in-depth analysis is required to investigate the
correlation between affective responses and the dimensions presented and
discussed in this paper, it is however possible to provide a preliminary explanation
for the associations detected by the cluster analysis.
     The influence of Negative feelings on Awareness is linked to being aware of the
responsibilities of language brokering and of the limitations posed by a limited
knowledge of the specific terminology needed in specific interaction (e.g., in
healthcare settings), but also, to a lesser extent, to the negative impact on school
attendance. Conversely, Positive feelings are associated with improving one’s
linguistic competence in the languages used by the language brokers and their
personal growth (e.g., becoming more responsible).
     The influence of Negative feelings on Family dynamics appears to be connected
with a protracted role-reversal caused by their parents’ lack of independence based
on their unwillingness or inability to become more fluent in the Italian language. It
is also linked to the burden of responsibility in specific settings (e.g., healthcare) and
the fear of making mistakes that would have dire consequences on their loved ones.
     Contrariwise, the influence of Positive feelings on Family dynamics seem to be
associated with feelings of satisfaction with one’s role as a language broker and with
having their work as language brokers acknowledged and praised by the adult
recipients of CLB, namely parents and teachers.


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    Another interesting connection is the influence that Awareness has on Empathy
and how this reinforces Positive feelings. Being aware of the positive impact that
language brokering has on the lives of other people (their parents or peers) appears
to be conducive to positive empathetic feelings, which are also engendered by
previous experiences as a recipient of CLB or, as is the case of Italian children who
learn about this practice, by becoming privy to this aspect of the migration
experience.


5. Limitations of the study

Before concluding this study and discussing the implications of the findings, it is
necessary to describe its limitations. This study offered a description of the
emotional response to CLB as described by a small sample of children/adolescents
with a migrant background living in Italy, hence, the findings cannot be generalized.
Secondly, this is an exploratory and qualitative study that will need to be the object
of a more in-depth analysis. Thirdly, the analysis should be integrated with other
influential factors that contribute to the shaping of a positive or adverse response to
CLB and this can be achieved by embedding this analysis into the broader context of
the analysis of all the narratives that were collected by means of Traduttori in Erba.
Finally, while the matrix coding query of data indicates that age is an influencing
factor in the shaping of emotions related to the CLB experience, there are
associations and variable correlations that need to be further explored to better
understand how the affective response to CLB intersects with other aspects of the
children’s life and migration experience.


6. Concluding remarks

This qualitative study was carried out with the aim of contextualizing CLB within
the area of affective responses to this practice and to answer the two main research
questions that were the object of this study: how CLB affects child/adolescent lan-
guage brokers and in what terms they describe it.
    The qualitative research that is reported here confirms the multidimensional
and overlying nature of affective responses to CLB particularly with regard to the
themes identified in this study (as emphasized by Hall and Sham 2007 and Orellana
2017).
    The thematic analysis that was carried out with 47 narratives written by
primary and middle school pupils between 9 and 14 years of age afforded a valuable
insight into the feelings related to this dimension of their migration experience and
the dynamics of family relationships.
    The analysis focussed on three dimensions of the affective response to CLB,
positive and/or negative feelings, the emotional impact of CLB on family relations
and dynamics, and CLB as an expression and tool of empathy, which were further
categorized into five interconnected and, in some cases, mutually influenced core
themes: i. the emotional impact of CLB on family relations and dynamics, ii.
awareness, iii. positive and/or iv. negative feelings, and v. CLB as an expression and
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tool of empathy. The first three themes are linked to the first research question
dealing with the affective impact of CLB on their relationship with the people for
which they language broker (peers and family members), while the second research
question explored positive and negative feelings associated with CLB.
     These findings on the emotional impact of CLB on family relations and dynamics
align with what has been observed in the literature in terms of role reversal (Umaña-
Taylor 2003; Titzmann 2012), adultification (Cline et al. 2017; Crafter and Iqbal
2022) and the burden of the responsibilities that come with their duty and role as
language brokers (Weisskirch and Alva 2002; Kam and Lazarevic 2014). However,
the analysis of the narratives also detailed the emotions attached to having to
translate for their parents and family members, which include, most notably,
frustration at their parents’ lack of or limited language competence (and sometimes
their refusal to learn Italian) that makes them dependent on their children, but also
acceptance of CLB as the children’s duty within the family (Valdés 2003).
     The analysis of the awareness category yielded interesting results that show
that language brokers are aware of the issues and situations that lead to resorting
to CLB and are thus aware of the fact that they are filling a gap in the provision of
professional linguistic mediation and facilitating inclusion. They are also aware of
the benefits of acting as a language broker in terms of the impact this practice has
on their learning and personal growth, as well as the development of better language
skills and competence (Corona et al. 2012; Dorner et al. 2007). This corroborates
with previous research on the children’s awareness of their own mediation and the
impact of having an inexperienced and untrained (child) mediator language broker
(see for instance Hall and Sham 2007; Guo 2014). Moreover, child mediators’ self-
awareness is also correlated to the positive and/or negative attitudes and feelings
they develop about their experience as language brokers (Guo 2014).
     The findings on the role of empathy add to the research not only within CLB
studies, but also within the broader context of Interpreting Studies, in which the
study of the role played by empathy in linguistically and culturally mediated inter-
actions in emerging (Merlini and Gatti 2015). Empathy is performed and perceived
as i. a form of awareness of another’s experience (a peer or family member); ii. an
interpersonal activity, whereby “the empathizer shows and communicates empathy
to a receiver” (Merlini and Gatti 2015: 140), but also as iii. an incentive on behalf of
the receiver to show empathy to others. In CLB empathy has also been viewed as an
expression or consequence of care and compassion (Garcia-Sanchez 2018; Crafter
and Iqbal 2022). In the present study, the narratives showed that children/adoles-
cents empathize with the recipients and beneficiaries of their language brokering
activities, i.e. their classmates and friends, parents, family members and teachers.
However, the results also point to another interesting aspect that is the incentive,
after having been a recipient of CLB, to become language brokers in order to be able
to help others.
     The findings of this study point to the need to further research on the affective
response to CLB by the beneficiaries of language brokered interactions. Research
has taken mostly the perspective of language brokers on CLB, and to a lesser degree
of adult participants and recipients of mediated interactions, i.e. parents (Corona et
al. 2012), teachers (Cirillo 2017) and public service workers (Cirillo and Torresi
2010). Such research could assess and analyse the emotions and perspective of the
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children who are at the receiving end of this practice and determine how CLB can
affect and be affected by care and empathy.


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