Speaking or being Chinese: the case of South African-born Chinese
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Ke Yu
und
Elmé Vivier
Abstract
Language is often seen as an important symbol and marker of identity. The relationship between the two especially comes to the fore in the experience of immigrants who often must negotiate competing pressures on their identities and language usage. In this article we examine the link between language and identity through an exploration of the lived experiences of four Chinese individuals in South Africa. Drawing on interview data, we examine their language and identity shifts and the factors driving such shifts (or lack thereof). Our analysis reveals multiple degrees and expressions of Chinese identity, of which language is sometimes but not always relevant. We find that social and historical contexts shape the needs and motivations of the individual, who often uses language strategically and flexibly to emphasise or understate particular identities. We conclude that the situational view of the language-identity relation is more appropriate to explain the weak and strong language-identity links that occur at the micro-level.
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©2015 by De Gruyter Mouton
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Language research and language community change: Italian Sign Language 1981–2013
- UK university students’ folk perceptions of spoken variation in English: the role of explicit and implicit attitudes
- Speaking or being Chinese: the case of South African-born Chinese
- Predictors of immigrants’ second-language proficiency: a Dutch study of immigrants with a low level of societal participation and second-language proficiency
- Second language development in a migrant context: Turkish community in the Netherlands
- The linguistic and political orientation of young Belarusian adults between East and West or Russian and Belarusian
- Studying sustainable bilingualism: comparing the choices of languages in Hungary’s six bilingual national minorities
- The language of power: a content analysis of presidential addresses in North America and the Former Soviet Union, 1993–2012
- Variation in Macau Cantonese: the case of initial and final segments
- Perceptions about being Japanese and Christian in Canada
- Language attrition, language contact and the concept of relic variety: the case of Barossa German
- Language competition: an economic theory of language learning and production
- Book Review
- Nancy C. Dorian: Small-language fates and prospects. Lessons of persistence and change from endangered languages
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Language research and language community change: Italian Sign Language 1981–2013
- UK university students’ folk perceptions of spoken variation in English: the role of explicit and implicit attitudes
- Speaking or being Chinese: the case of South African-born Chinese
- Predictors of immigrants’ second-language proficiency: a Dutch study of immigrants with a low level of societal participation and second-language proficiency
- Second language development in a migrant context: Turkish community in the Netherlands
- The linguistic and political orientation of young Belarusian adults between East and West or Russian and Belarusian
- Studying sustainable bilingualism: comparing the choices of languages in Hungary’s six bilingual national minorities
- The language of power: a content analysis of presidential addresses in North America and the Former Soviet Union, 1993–2012
- Variation in Macau Cantonese: the case of initial and final segments
- Perceptions about being Japanese and Christian in Canada
- Language attrition, language contact and the concept of relic variety: the case of Barossa German
- Language competition: an economic theory of language learning and production
- Book Review
- Nancy C. Dorian: Small-language fates and prospects. Lessons of persistence and change from endangered languages
