The Chinese as an Emerging Linguistic Resource in the Education Sector of Pakistan

Abstract

Investment in a new language restructures the prevailing ideologies through its potential as an alternative resource in the future linguistic market. This resource modifies the learners’ existing identities with the imagined identities of this new resource. This study aims to explore how learning Chinese language evolved as an investment in the education sector of Pakistan to construct an alternative identity in the future linguistic market. Under thematic analysis, in-depth interviews of the stakeholders investing themselves at various levels in promoting, learning, and teaching Chinese were analyzed with power discourse as the theoretical framework. Darvin and Norton’s (2015) model of investment was used as analysis model to investigate how investing learners in Chinese is reshaping their current identities in a structured habitus of shifting ideologies. The findings show a corresponding relationship of Chinese with a powerful economy, innovative technologies, and higher education. The major themes focus on the Chinese as an alternative resource with better employment potential in the future job market. This serves as a better alternative linguistic resource to improve the learners’ social and economic capital. This is where learners of this language invest themselves at different levels of the education sector in Pakistan to re-envision their future identities.