Emocje i mediacje językowe w wypowiedziach polskich dzieci wielojęzycznych podejmujących się „brokeringu”
Emotions and language mediations in the micro-accounts of Polish teenage brokers

Summary/Abstract: The paper discusses the aspect of emotions seen through the eyes of Polish bilingual and multilingual children living in the United Kingdom, ex¬pressed in short pieces of writing (called ‘micro-accounts’). It is a part of the PhD project, comprising semi-structured interviews with 55 language mediators (aged 8–18). 36 of the respondents aged 11–18 agreed to express their feelings in black and white. The data were collected in the years 2015–2016 in the United King¬dom by the author and the 36 teenage brokers were selected on the basis of their age and thus presumed maturity, as well as their readiness to participate in the additional part of the study. All data were transcribed and analysed by the au¬thor in person. The preliminary results of the interviews reveal that when asked how they feel brokering for others, the majority of the interviewees admitted to having experienced positive emotions, such as pride, happiness, the need to be helpful, needed and smarter. Since the interviews were video recorded, eliciting emotions turned out a true challenge at times and the author had suspected that her presence might impact the answers to some extent. Thus, in order to check whether the same feelings would be confirmed in writing, when young people are left unattended, without the intimidation related to the presence of a camera, the open-ended question “When I translate for others I feel…” was asked. The study complements the picture that is unveiled from the oral accounts given by the brokers on such aspects as brokering context, emotions, national identity and perception of Polish vs English (Żytowicz, 2017). Interestingly, the prevailing feelings that the teenage brokers give accounts of turn out to be positive – 62 out of 82 – 75% (which correlates with the results of the analysis of the interviews, ibid.). Even in those instances when negative emotions were expressed – 20 out of 82 – 25%, they tend to be strongly related to pressure, anxiety and guilt they might not accomplish what is expected of them, and thus disappoint their parents.

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