Foreigners Living in Mainz: Linguistic Choices and Motivation for Learning German

Abstract

The current M.A. Thesis investigates the main patterns of foreigners’ language usage in Mainz and discusses the reasons for using one language over another in certain communicative situations. The study also aims to find out how the linguistic diversity and social structures affect foreigners’ language choice in Mainz and their motivation to learn and use the German language. The focus of the study lies on foreigners currently living in Mainz for not less than six months. The study is based on the framework of language ecology which focuses on languages and their interaction with the surrounding environment, i.e. it allows analyzing the presence of languages in the specific area and speakers’ linguistic choices. The study is carried out by using a triangulation model (a combination of both quantitative and qualitative research methods). The online survey is created and used as the main tool for data collection. The survey data is later supplemented by interviews which help to get a closer look into and a better understanding of foreigners’ attitudes towards the German language and their linguistic behavior in Mainz in general. The total number of participants includes 203 respondents in the online survey and 4 interviewees. Results of the study indicate that the majority of participants are multilingual and are able to speak not only German but also English and other languages. German is most frequently used by them in the spoken domain, official institutions or when communicating with their work and study colleagues. Other languages are often used in other domains, such as writing emails, reading newspapers or magazines, communicating with friends, etc. Thus, Mainz could be considered a multilingual city but only from the foreigners’ point of view since they find possibilities of using other languages which do not necessarily are visible to native speakers of German. In addition, factors affecting foreigners’ decision not to learn and use German include diversity of languages in one’s environment, lack of time for investing in learning the language or difficult and exhausting language courses. Moreover, foreigners’ linguistic choices are influenced by the social structures of local context and social networks, even though the presence of broader society plays an important part as well. The parts of the thesis are as follows: Chapter 1 introduces the problem of the study. Chapter 2 provides the theoretical background necessary for further discussion of the study and introduces the concepts of multilingualism and language choice. Chapter 3 poses the main research questions, whereas Chapter 4 introduces the theoretical framework and the main data collection methods used in the study. The parts for results and discussion are provided in Chapter 5 and Chapter 6. The thesis is concluded with Chapter 7 by summarizing the main results and giving suggestions for further research.