Original scientific paper
Croatian Migrant Workers’ Children in European Countries: Emigration, Motivation for the Maintenance and Preservation of the Mother Tongue and for Return to the Country of Origin
Andrina Pavlinić
; Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies, Zagreb, Croatia
Josip Anić
; Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The first part of the work contains demographic information on migrant workers and an introduction to the questions to be dealt with. Next, arguments for the promotion of mother tongue and original culture in the context of Europe's integration are put forward, followed by some findings from the authors' research project, focussing on the group of Croatian respondents. The variables observed are tentatively classified as: socioeconomic ones, language practice and language competence, and interests and plans concerning return to the home country. On the equivalent sample of migrant workers' children (N = 342) in eight European countries of immigration, aged 10-18, who were attending supplementary education in the Croatian or Serbian, analysis was performed so as to determine whether the respondents of the Croatian nationality (116) differed from the rest of them (226) with regard to their mother tongue maintenance and preservation and their intentions concerning return to the homeland. The same analysis was carried out at the level of a reduced sample of respondents, including only those in four countries (Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Sweden). That sample was made up of 178 respondents (91 of the Croatian nationality, 87 of other nationalities). The empirical results thus obtained point out to the fact that supplementary school pupils, from the standpoint of their nationality, show no differences regarding their mother tongue maintenance or their intentions to return. Such results may be conditioned by: the respondents' comparable socioeconomic status, as well as similar parents' and students' attitudes towards supplementary school.
Keywords
children of migrants; mother tongue; supplementary school; return
Hrčak ID:
127351
URI
Publication date:
31.12.1991.
Visits: 1.693 *