| Ethnic identity is part of one’s self-concept,derived from an individuals’ awareness of their membership in a social group(or groups)and the values and emotional significance associated with that membership.Chinese Descents or racially mixed Chinese descents,which are born and raised in the host country,have more complexities in their ethnic identities.Of Chinese descent students studying in China,people with different ethnic identity categories have different performance in daily life,and this difference will be reflected in Chinese language classroom as well.In this paper,the different categories of ethnic identity of Chinese descents in China are considered as factors affecting their performance in Chinese language class.Through questionnaire survey and comparative analysis,this paper investigates the influence of different categories of Chinese-ethnic identity on Chinese language classroom performance.The first part of this paper mainly analyzes the distribution of three different ethnic identities from three different aspects: the region of Chinese students,whether they are racially mixed,and of which generation of Chinese they are in their host country.The results show that the proportion of Chinese descents with ambiguous identity is the largest,and the proportion is similar between whether they are from Eastern or Western countries.What follows are Chinese descents with overlapping identity,and most of them are from Western countries.Lack of(Chinese)identity accounted for the least while most of them came from Eastern countries.In addition,the proportion of racially mixed Chinese descents with ambiguous ethnic identity is the highest and the proportion with lack of identity is much higher than that of non-mixed Chinese descents.Finally,the proportion of Chinese descents with lack of(Chinese)identity in the third generation is 0,and that of ambiguous identity in the second and third generations is similar,and the proportion that of overlapping identity in the third and fourth generations is close.The second part of this paper mainly analyzes Chinese descent students’ Chinese classroom performance through eight aspects in relation with the three categories of ethnic identity.The results show that,large proportions of Chinese descent students with overlapping and lack of identity in positive performances are higher than that of students with ambiguous ethnic identity.At the same time,the negative performance proportion of Chinese descent students with ambiguous identity in Chinese language class in subcategories such as speech,participation,seeking help,confidence,self-expression and classmate relations are much higher than the other two categories.In addition,Chinese language classroom learning performance and homework situations is less affected by ethnic identity.The last part of this paper discusses the internal reasons to why the differences of ethnic identity affect classroom performance and the possible effects on Chinese language acquisition.Chinese descent students with lack of(Chinese)ethnic identity and overlapping identity categories both have a strong sense in their own identity and a clear positioning in the classroom and thus it shows in their classroom performances.However,Chinese descent students with ambiguous identity show a lot of less positive performances due to their inability to accurately position themselves within a Chinese classroom.Positive and active performance in Chinese language classrooms can have a positive impact on Chinese language acquisition.On the contrary,inactive and passive performance makes students miss many opportunities to practice and use Chinese in the classroom,which has a negative impact on Chinese language acquisition as a whole. |
