Heritage language maintenance in the Inner Circle: a scoping review of Chinese and its varieties

Studies on heritage language have emerged from second language acquisition studies in recent decades. Researchers have become increasingly interested in attitudes, practices and challenges toward heritage language maintenance. This study examines this domain with a focus on Chinese and its varieties in Inner Circle countries, which include United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. This study follows research synthesis framework of a scoping review, systematically searching and examining research contexts, focused population, research trend, and the use of the term "Chinese" in existing empirical research in heritage language maintenance domain. Through a systematic search of six databases, 28 empirical studies (all journal articles) were included in this review for meeting eligibility criteria. Two reviewers along with the author individually screened and coded this sample using the coding scheme modified for this review, then cross-checked coding. Frequencies and percentages of quantitative data were then calculated, followed by the examination of qualitative data. Among other results, this study revealed a keen research interest in home, community and/or heritage language school context compared to formal governmental school settings across Inner Circle countries. The imprecise use of the term "Chinese" in the sample of this study also indicated the evident "Chinese equals Mandarin" discourse and conflation of people's multifaceted cultural and linguistic identities. This review attempts to depict this growing domain by highlighting research trends in Inner Circle countries, identifying research gaps, and pointing potentially fruitful directions for future research.