The purpose of this study was to comprehend the motivations and learning experiences of Chinese Heritage Language Learners (CHLLs) who study in Chinese programs in California public high schools where Chinese American students are under-studied and their voices are not heard. The study used Gardner's Socio-educational Model, Fishman's Reversing…

The study aimed to explore the evidence of first language (L1) mediation in second language (L2) word associations and the L2 learner-related factors affecting the extent of L1 mediation with the following approaches. First, different from previous research, word association tests (WATs) embraced both receptive and productive word associations in…

This study fills a gap in the literature by exploring how Teochew graduates experience language maintenance while enrolled in higher education. Teochew is both an identity and less commonly spoken language that falls within the Chinese umbrella, and little is known about the Teochew population in the U.S as Asian American data is seldom…

This study approaches multilingualism on Phuket Island by means of a linguistic landscape (LL) analysis. The data in this study consists of 185 photographs of shop signs taken from popular streets on the island. They were analyzed via a mixed-methods approach. It was found that different languages were purposely chosen to indicate or showcase the…

This article presents a narrative inquiry of a Chinese heritage mother to theorize and explicate how historical, relational, and spatial processes impacted her negotiation with power and agency in relation to her own heritage language (HL) identity development. A narrative approach enables us to draw on participant counter-stories against master…

This study aims to explore how a group of Chinese American families transcend essentialist thinking through negotiating with different ideological orientations toward their heritage language and how these families' different ideological profiles could influence the home language maintenance. Data were collected through three rounds of…

Despite the range of varieties of Han Chinese, Mandarin is the most widely studied variety in research on Chinese as a heritage language (CHL) around the world. To better understand the role of other varieties of Han Chinese in addition to Mandarin, this article presents a synthesis of research on the learning of Chinese varieties in formal and…

The manuscript describes Chinese immigrant children's literacy and identity in online and in-person Chinese heritage language classrooms. The theoretical perspectives on multimodality and positioning theory are utilized as theoretical perspectives. The data were collected with the same heritage language teacher and the students during the COVID-19…

Word recognition is a fundamental reading skill that relies on various linguistic and cognitive abilities. While executive functions (EF) have gained attention for their importance in developing literacy skills, their interaction with domain-specific skills in facilitating reading among different learner groups remains understudied. This study…

This study investigates the subjectivities of tertiary students in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (GZAR) of the People's Republic of China. Specifically, we investigate self-reported language practices and attitudes in relation to identities in a language ecology with three prominent languages (Zhuang, Standard Chinese [Putonghua], and…

Using transnational literacies as the theoretical framework, this qualitative case study explores the transnational language and literacy practices of one female China-U.S. transnational adolescent, Meiyi, and her family. The data corpus includes critical ethnographic data generated over 3 years. Through data generation and analysis guided by…

Drawing on Asian Critical Race Theory, this qualitative case study analyzed first-generation Chinese immigrant parents' language ideologies on their children's heritage language (HL) maintenance in the United States. The findings revealed parents' persistence in preserving their HLs for their children, as they considered HLs to be an integral…

Characterised by media saturation and hypermobility, contemporary society has presented polymedia as an integral element of family life. The expansion and recognition of polymedia in language learning calls for exploring its role in heritage language (HL) maintenance. However, despite growing research interest in polymedia in diverse realms, there…

Theories of reading comprehension have widely predicted a role for syntactic skills, or the ability to understand and manipulate the structure of a sentence. Yet, these theories are based primarily on English, leaving open the question of whether this remains true across typologically different languages such as English versus Chinese. There are…

Phonics instruction, originating in English-speaking countries, has gained considerable momentum in China, both within and beyond formal classroom settings. Despite its popularity, certain limiting factors arise when implementing phonics instruction for native Chinese speakers. These factors include the lack of prior exposure to lexical…