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The Relationships Among Heritage Language Proficiency, Ethnic Identity, And Self-Esteem, Shu-Chun Yu

College of Education Theses and Dissertations

Language plays an important role in linking with the past, with national origins; it is an indispensable tool for communication. With the trend toward globalization and the continual change of the ethnic composition of the U.S. population, there is increasing awareness in the U.S. that not every child is raised in an English-only family. The purpose of this research was to explore the relationships among heritage language proficiency, ethnic identity, and self-esteem in the American-born Chinese (ABC) children who went to the Chinese language schools for Chinese language learning on weekends. There were three research questions to be answered in …