heritage speakers
Family-tongue acquirers naturally
Heritage speakers are people who grew up hearing or speaking a language at home but were educated primarily in another language.
The term usually describes children of immigrants who understand their parents' native tongue but may speak it imperfectly or with limited vocabulary: Many heritage speakers of Spanish can follow conversations but struggle with formal writing.
Heritage speakers occupy a middle ground—more proficient than classroom learners, less fluent than native speakers raised in monolingual environments.
- bilingualSpeaking two languages
- mother tongueLanguage acquired from birth
- home languageLanguage acquired from birth
- native speakerOne who grew up speaking it
- language maintenanceSustaining a speech system
language acquisition · fluency · linguistics · minority language · code-switching · Saturday school · ancestral language · immigrant · cultural identity · ethnic identity · immersion · Spanish · language preservation · diaspora · childhood · family · accent · reconnecting
- language learnersbeginner, beginners, intermediate, advanced learner, advanced learners
- language educationbilingual, language teaching, biliteracy, language learning, immersion
- Asian diasporaVietnamese Americans, Japanese Americans, Filipino Americans, Korean community, ethnic enclaves
- French AmericaCajun, Creole, French Quarter, New Orleans, Cajun French
- immigrant educationrefugee students, bilingual education, migrant children, language barriers, immigrant families
- language groupsbilingual communities, bilinguals, bilingual community, Romance languages, Celtic languages
heritage, inheritance, inherited, speakers, inheriting, heritages, inheritances, disinherited, inheritable