ERIC Number: EJ1441661
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2024
Pages: 17
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0143-4632
EISSN: EISSN-1747-7557
'The Culture of China Is Broad and Profound, with All Rivers Flowing into the Sea': Plurilingual and Pluricultural Competence and Identity among University Students in China
Fei Tang; Raees Calafato
Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, v45 n8 p3028-3044 2024
As part of its ambitious Belt and Road initiative, the Chinese government, cognizant of the fact that establishing strong people-to-people bonds locally, regionally, and internationally will be key to the initiative's success and that languages will play a pivotal role in facilitating this, has called for the diversification of language programmes beyond English at the tertiary and pre-tertiary levels. The aim is to boost the plurilingual and pluricultural competence (PPC) of Chinese citizens, who are often already multilingual because of their knowledge of Chinese dialects and minority languages. This article reports on a study involving 248 university students from over 20 provinces in China that explored the interactions between their reported PPC, translingual dispositions, interculturalism, orientations toward cultural differences, and identity-related views. The results revealed that the participants' translingual dispositions entailed engaging in language negotiation practices to a greater extent than in resisting linguistic norms or exploring language. Moreover, the more multilingual the participants were, the more fluidly they reported moving between languages and the greater was their PPC, which was also positively and statistically significantly predicted by their age, ethnic background, acceptance of cultural differences, and views about their personal identity.
Descriptors: Foreign Countries, Multilingualism, Second Language Learning, Self Concept, Language Proficiency, Student Attitudes, Cultural Differences, Cultural Awareness, Intercultural Communication, International Relations, Language Role, College Second Language Programs, Second Language Instruction, Dialects, Language Minorities, Age Differences, Ethnicity, Student Characteristics, College Students
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: China
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A