Heritage Language Web Site Links
The Alliance is compiling a list of helpful Web sites with information relating to heritage languages.
Links
Partner Organizations
Asia SocietyAsia Society is the leading global and pan-Asian organization working to
strengthen relationships and promote understanding among the people,
leaders, and institutions of the United States and Asia. It seeks to
increase knowledge and enhance dialogue, encourage creative expression,
and generate new ideas across the fields of policy, business, education,
arts, and culture. Founded in 1956, Asia Society is a nonpartisan,
nonprofit educational institution with offices in Hong Kong, Houston, Los Angeles, Manila, Melbourne, Mumbai, New York, San Francisco, Shanghai, and Washington, DC.
Under its Education Division, there are three major areas of work: International Education, Chinese and World Language Initiatives, and the
Asia-Pacific Forum. Through materials and programs for policy makers,
students and teachers, lectures, seminars and conferences, publications,
art exhibitions and performances, films, Web sites, and assistance to
the media, the Asia Society not only presents the uniqueness and
diversity of Asia to the American people but also prepares Asians and
Americans for a shared future.
To learn more, visit the Asia Society Web site.
Additional information can be found at
http://www.internationaled.org/, and http://Askasia.org/Chinese.
The National Foreign Language Center
The National Foreign Language Center (NFLC) is a research institute of the University of Maryland, dedicated to promoting a language-competent America by developing and disseminating information that informs policy makers at the federal, state, and local levels. The mission of NFLC is to improve the capacity of the U.S. to communicate in languages other than English through intensive and innovative strategic planning and development with globalized institutions, organizations, and enterprises throughout the U.S. Through research, collaborations, consultations, and projects such as STARTALK and LangNet the staff and the fellows of NFLC are dedicated to improving the nation's ability to understand and communicate with people around the world and to manage the unprecedented flow of information resulting from globalization.
Learn more at the NFLC Web site.
The National Heritage Language Resource Center
The NHLRC, established in 2006, is one of 15 National Language Resource Centers funded by the U.S. Department of Education. The Center focuses on the language development of heritage language learners and defines such learners as those students who speak another language but are dominant in English --an increasingly common type of student in "foreign" language classrooms throughout the U.S. The abilities, needs, and motivations of these students, when studying their heritage language, differ from those of non-heritage students, but research to explore these differences is in the early stages.
The Center promotes such research and takes as its mission the development of "effective pedagogical approaches to teaching heritage language learners, first by creating a research base and then by pursuing curriculum design, materials development, and teacher education." To meet these goals, the NHLRC has mapped out a range of projects over the next few years.
Full
details can be found on the NHLRC Web site.
Other Organizations Working with Heritage Languages
California Tomorrow's mission is to help create a just and inclusive multiracial, multicultural and multilingual society by promoting equal access to social, economic and educational resources and equal participation in major institutions, and by embracing diversity as a great strength.
To learn more, visit the California Tomorrow Web site.
Minority Languages and Cultures Program (ML&CP)
Housed within the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies at Indiana University, the ML&CP brings together scholars who share the aims of revitalizing subordinate languages in Latin America, documenting the cultures of the communities that speak them, and monitoring the play of language and culture in the ethnic and regional politics of this zone.
To learn more, visit the ML&CP Web site.
National Council of Less Commonly Taught Languages
The CouncilNet website is the hub of CouncilNet, the World Wide Web based network for organizations representing the less commonly taught languages (LCTLs) in the United States. More specifically, this website is designed to address the communication and information needs of the members of the National Council of Organizations of Less Commonly Taught Languages (the Council), as well as those of other organizations, institutions, and individuals interested in the teaching and learning of the LCTLs in the United States.
To learn more, visit the NCOLCTL Web site.
