| Despite the suggested significance of maintaining ethnic language for the formation of ethnic identity, there are few institutional efforts in the U.S. to preserve these language resources except within the ethnic community itself. For the most part, ethnic language communities have undertaken a primary responsibility for the maintenance of ethnic languages. Nevertheless, the contribution these ethnic communities can make to the maintenance of languages other than English is often overlooked.;An ethnographic study was conducted to gain insights into how a Chinese language school is initiated, implemented, and perceived in a Chinese community. To consider the broader range of influences on the maintenance of ethnic language, special attention was paid to both the macro-level sociocultural contexts in which the Faith Chinese school exists and the micro-level analysis of interactions in the classroom between students and teacher. In addition, a discourse-centered approach was used to explore how the Chinese language class is carried out to retain the ethnic language and examine the language use patterns in the Chinese language school and Chinese language class.;This study suggests that the experience of being Chinese in the American context has a profound impact on the retention of ethnic language. For the Chinese American youths, being Chinese American means being a high achiever in the academic realm. The informants readily embraced the model minority stereotype. Their parents wanted them to attend prestigious universities and obtain professional careers. Inadvertently, these pressures diverted students' attentions from the maintenance of the ethnic language and culture. The Chinese American youths did not see the relevance and did not have much motivation to study the Chinese language. Irrelevance of Chinese language learning compounded with the teacher's over emphasis on vocabulary retention motivated students to gain control over the Chinese language class, to negotiate down the intended learning, and to construct English interactions among themselves.;The study recommended that the Chinese language school tailor the program to the pragmatic needs of Chinese American youths, such as the pressures to excel in the public school, the desires to communicate efficiently with parents, and the interests in interacting with peers. |
