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Article published In:
Language Problems and Language Planning
Vol. 45:1 (2021) ► pp.1–30

Bilingual students’ attitudes toward the Tibetan language

A structural analysis

ORCID logo | Shantou University
| Minzu University of China

This study investigates bilingual students’ attitudes toward the Tibetan language, examining the structural models of the attitudes of Tibetan students and the differences in attitudes between living communities and as moderated by learning years (comparing Tibet-based and Han-based communities). The participants were 1,118 Tibetan students in the Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, China. The results indicated the following: (i) the data supported the three components of attitude (Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral) in terms of bilingual students’ perception of the Tibetan language; (ii) the five lower-level domains of the attitudes toward the Tibetan language can be grouped into two categories – Cognitive (self-concept of the Tibetan language and social status) and Affective (friendliness, helpfulness, and identification) – and there is a causal relationship between them; and (iii) there are significant differences in attitudes toward the Tibetan language dependent on living community and learning year. Practical suggestions for educators in schools for bilingual students learning the Tibetan language are discussed.

Keywords: bilingual Tibetan students, structural model, language attitudes, community differences, learning years
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
    • 2.1Structure of attitudes toward Tibetan language
    • 2.2Intergroup contact, community differences, and Tibetan students’ attitudes toward their mother tongue
    • 2.3Learning year and its effect on students’ attitudes toward the Tibetan language
  • 3.Research method
    • 3.1Participants
    • 3.2Data collection
    • 3.3Data analysis
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Structural models for students’ attitudes toward Tibetan language
    • 4.2Differences between communities in students’ attitudes toward the Tibetan language
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Structure of attitudes toward the Tibetan language
    • 5.2Community differences influencing Tibetan language attitudes
    • 5.3Chinese-Tibetan students’ attitudes toward the Tibetan language
  • 6.Conclusions
  • References
Published online: 12 July 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lplp.20005.gan
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