A multi-case investigation into trilingualism and trilingual education in Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture

Chengyu LIU, Hongdi DING, Hong WANG, Lijuan YU, Mingzhong YANG

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapters

6 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Among the 55 officially recognised ethnic minority groups in China, the Yi are the seventh largest, with a population of about 7.7 million, unevenly distributed across the mountainous regions of southwest China, primarily in three provinces, Yunnan, Sichuan and Guizhou. This chapter focuses on the Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture, home to speakers of Nuosu. Nuosu is not an endangered language but it is becoming vulnerable because of the power of Chinese and changes to the demographic makeup of society. The chapter uses an educational linguistic approach to investigate trilingualism and trilingual education in Liangshan. It finds that, in common with many other ethnic minority languages in China, the maintenance of Nuosu is hindered by historical, political and sociolinguistic factors, and suggests a number of measures to improve the situation. Copyright © 2015 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationTrilingualism in education in China: Models and challenges
EditorsAnwei FENG, Bob ADAMSON
Place of PublicationDordrecht
PublisherSpringer
Pages141-171
ISBN (Electronic)9789401793520
ISBN (Print)9789401793513
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2015

Citation

Liu, C., Ding, H., Wang, H., Yu, L., & Yang, M. (2015). A multi-case investigation into trilingualism and trilingual education in Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture. In A. Feng & B. Adamson (Eds.), Trilingualism in education in China: Models and challenges (pp. 141-171). Dordrecht: Springer.

Keywords

  • Trilingualism
  • Language policy
  • China
  • Sichuan
  • Chinese
  • English
  • Yi

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