Understanding Ethnic Minority Students’ Multilingual Motivational Selves through Narrative Inquiry

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Wednesday 9:45 am - Gold 1
  In Roundtable Session: Voices Across Borders: Identity, Displacement, and the Edge of Belonging

Abstract

This narrative inquiry explores the multilingual motivational selves of ethnic minority students receiving supplementary tutoring in Hong Kong. Drawing on the Multilingual Motivational Self System, the study examines how 30 ethnic minority students construct their ideal and ought-to multilingual selves across Chinese, English, and their native languages. Through three rounds of in-depth interviews supplemented by motigraphs and informal conversations with parents and tutors, the findings reveal complex motivational dynamics shaped by societal integration pressures, academic gatekeeping, and cultural identity preservation. Students’ language learning experiences in tutoring interact dynamically with their future selves, creating both empowering and constraining forces. The study illuminates how tutoring support enhances confidence across languages while highlighting the contextual factors that influence multilingual motivation among marginalized learners.

Author

• Kevin Yung, The Education University of Hong Kong