|
Abstract:
|
The Korean community in Australia is interesting to study as it is a relatively small group and has not to date attracted much attention from sociolinguistic researchers. Because the Korean language was relatively unknown to all but a few non-native speakers in Australia the Korean community was less accessible than other groups such as the Chinese community. This inaccessibility was further reinforced by the small size of the Korean community. Although this demographic trend (accordingly geographic locations and size of the Korean centres) has changed greatly in the recent years, sociolinguistic interests in the Korean community have not been much explored, if explored at all. Studies on language maintenance are not exception.
I am interested in whether and to what extent Koreans (migrant children here), who are a minority group among the ethnic communities in Australia, have maintained their first language (L1). In particular, I want to examine in what ways the Korean community, as individuals and as a corporate group, is attempting to maintain its L1; to what extent the community resources to that end have been utilised; and the implications for language maintenance. This type of research has been done for other ethnic groups in Australia, e.g. the Lebanese (Taft and Cahill 1989), the Russians (Kouzmin 1988) and the Poles (Janik 1996), and in other parts of the world, e.g. the Russian-Jewish immigrants (Schwartz 2008). These and other studies (e.g. Gilhotra 1985) indicate that the members of minority communities support the learning of their own language to identify with their own ethnic group and to develop better opportunities like occupational advantages. Language policy-related documents (e.g. NALSAS Taskforce 1998; Shin S-C 2008) recognise the value of ethnic schools and their important roles in the community. This study aims to address issues of Korean migrant children’s language use and maintenance that are faced by the Korean community in multicultural Australia. It also intends to examine whether or how “Hallyu” or Korean Wave, which is a vigorous socio-cultural phenomena in Asia and beyond, has impacted on the maintenance of language and cultural practices... |