While having served to help immigrant children develop a sense of ethnic identity and belonging, heritage schools have also been documented to reproduce an essentialised understanding of heritage culture by teaching heritage culture as fixed, stable, and homogenous. To help students move beyond an essentialised conception of heritage culture, the…

This study explores factors related to the language learning strategies of second language learners, specifically Generation 1.5 Korean immigrant students--the seventh-largest and one of the fastest growing foreign-born groups in the USA. Participants in this study were members of the Korean communities located in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia who…

In this study we explore Korean immigrant parents' attitudes toward heritage language maintenance for their children and their efforts to help their children maintain Korean as their heritage language in Montreal. Some implications for mainstream school policies and classroom practices are touched on briefly. Data were collected from nine Korean…

Examines the role of cultural identity and heritage language maintenance among the lives of 40 second-generation Korean-American university students in the United States. Analyses of questionnaire data showed that most second generation Korean-Americans achieve some level of Korean proficiency, but they overwhelmingly agree that it is not enough.…

Investigates how second-generation Korean-American students form and transform their senses of ethnicity through their participation in Korean language classes. An ethnographic study was carried out at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where most Korean language courses were populated by second- and 1.5-generation Korean Americans.…

This study examined one group of adults attempting to develop their heritage language to discover their motivation for studying the language and the challenges they encountered. Twenty-four Korean American students enrolled in beginning to advanced levels of Korean in one heritage language program were surveyed. (Author/JL)