Persian Language Learning by Iranian Children in Finland : Parents' Reasons and Challenges

Abstract

Preservation of ethnic identity and heritage language is one of the concerns of immigrants who are far from their country. This research was done with the aim of finding the reasons and challenges of Persian-speaking Iranian parents living in Finland for sending their children to Persian language classes as their family language policy. For this purpose, first similar previous researches were reviewed and categories of reasons and challenges raised in those researches were extracted. Then a semi-structured interview was conducted with eight parents and their reasons and challenges were categorized according to the thematic analysis method and presented in a chart. This research could be used for the policy of teaching minority languages in countries, especially Persian in Finland.