Foreign Language Motivation

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With the rapid growth of Chinese economic power and increasing demand for foreigners to communicate with Chinese people, the learning of Chinese language as a foreign language among non-Chinese speakers has gained popularity in many countries around the globe (Scrimgeour, 2014, cited in Chen & Yeung, A.S.2015).
Although Linnell, (2001; cited in Shum, Ki & Leong, 2014) noted that outside of China, Chinese is taught as a second (L2) or foreign language (FL) for general purposes in schools such as public, private schools and universities; it is currently being taught as a second language in China, and it is compulsory for all international students regardless of their majors. Nevertheless, the time allocated for each Chinese language class depends …show more content…

Consequently, research into motivation in foreign and second language learning has been researchers’ focus in recent years. It is regarded as a basic and essential part of learning. Hence, it is believed that the learner whose intention is to be motivated, will obviously necessitate, require and need to come up with something to anticipate and learners’ expectations are linked with their aim or target. Various researches were conducted on students’ motivation in language learning. This field has been extensively explored with the major emphasis on the learners. Various factors that were linked to students’ motivation in language learning were considered during these researches. For instance, …show more content…

This family is also referred to as Trans-Himalayan. Sino Tibetan languages, according to The KryssTall Website, (2017) is one of important Asian languages family. This is due to the fact that it contains Chinese language (Mandarin ) which is the world's most spoken language. It is the family of above four hundred languages spoken in Asia and apart from it, there are also Burmese and Tibetic languages that both cover the total speakers of around 41millions. James A. MATISOFF of The Sino-Tibetan Etymological Dictionary and Thesaurus, (2017) noted that by any criterion such as number of speakers, antiquity of documented written history, cultural implication, and impact on other languages) Chinese language remains one of the crucial languages.
Chinese writing system is non-alphabetic in its nature. This unique nature has brought about challenges for the historical linguists who have been interested in reconstructing the phonological features of earlier stages of the language. Additively, it has raised issues in establishing a genetic connection between mandarin and others languages. Bernhard Karlgren, is a Swedish Sinologist, who faced the similar challenges when he spent thirty five years to reconstruct the phonological aspect of thousands of Chinese language characters pronunciation (Karlgren 1923, 1954,

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