Czech heritage language education: Systematic support by the government of the Czech Republic and Involvement of the Faculty of Arts, Charles University
Abstract
This paper presents an example of a systematic support of Czech heritage language education by a national government. It has two goals: 1) to inform about the structural support of Czech heritage language learners to systematically develop their language competencies in Czech as their heritage language, 2) to present some activities of the Faculty of Arts of Charles University related to heritage language education.
We will first present information about the Czech legislation, how Czech compulsory schools are involved in supporting the maintenance of Czech as a heritage language, and explain the situation in the Czech Republic with examples from practice. Then we will give a brief description of two international grants of the Faculty of Arts of Charles University and mention selected activities related to the education of heritage language users.
In the area of grants, we will focus on the Institute of Czech Studies at the Charles University in Prague, where in 2022 its researchers formed two international teams to explore selected areas of "heritage linguistics" (by which we mean the linguistic discipline that deals with the study of heritage language). This presentation represents one of the possible models of systematic support of heritage language education in a national language and discusses its advantages and disadvantages.