Language Tamers: Methods of Overcoming Language Barrier by Immigrant Students at Czech Schools

Kristýna Strnadová Thesis name: Language tamers: methods of overcoming language barrier by immigrant students at Czech schools Abstract The thesis 'Language tamers: methods of overcoming language barrier by immigrant students at Czech schools' deals with a phenomenon of overcoming language barrier through acquisition of the host language for immigrants who move to a new country. The aim of this work is to monitor the progress of overcoming language barrier from the perspective of immigrant students with regard to various factors that affect the process (cultural and social capital, language, age etc.). The theoretical part describes the fundamental importance of the host language as a means of communication in the context of immigrant integration to the new society, outlines the specifics of the intercultural communication between people of different nationalities, summarizes the factors which influence the acquisition of the host language, and acquaint with the situation in Czech schools in conjunction with the language barrier. The empirical part is based on semi-structured interviews with immigrant students of three different nationalities (Ukrainian, Vietnamese and Romanian). Collected interviews are analysed via descriptive and evaluation coding and on their basis are reached characteristics of the..