Li, Wei (1993) Mother tongue maintenance in a Chinese community school in Newcastle Upon Tyne: developing a social network perspective. Language and Education 7 (3), pp. 199-215. ISSN 0950-0782.
Abstract
Following Cochran & Riley's (1990) argument that children's school achievement is influenced by their immediate social environment of which adults, particularly parents, are a significant part, this paper presents findings from a case of study of a Chinese community school in Newcastle upon Tyne where a group of 20 British‐born Chinese children of similar age (between 12 and 14 years old) were examined in terms of ability to use their mother tongue and of social network structures. It is found that children whose parents have contracted relatively more non‐Chinese ties as part of their social network and have better command of the English language maintain their ethnic language better than those whose parents have confined themselves to the immediate family and to their ethnic community both socially and linguistically. It is argued that in order to make community language education more effective, parents and children should be brought closer together socially, starting perhaps by encouraging the parents to interact and make friends with members outside their immediate family and community.
Metadata
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| School: | Birkbeck Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > School of Creative Arts, Culture and Communication |
| Depositing User: | Administrator |
| Date Deposited: | 05 Jul 2012 14:46 |
| Last Modified: | 09 Aug 2023 12:31 |
| URI: | https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/4899 |
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