Language education in a national school abroad in a bilingual society: a case of Japanese school in Catalonia. Makiko Fukuda
Published online: 16 Apr 2018 This paper explores language education in a Japanese school in Catalonia from the viewpoints of language policy with special attention to ideology. Our main goal is to identify the major factors which influence over the school’s language education. As a national school abroad, this school should include national, local and global viewpoints in its education. Language education is one of the methods to respond to this expectation. The results of data analysis, collected through semi-structured interviews with the vice-principal and principal of the school as well as parents, suggest that home country ideologies have an important influence over the school’s and sojourner families’ views on language and language education. Our study has demonstrated that an ideology-loaded, top-down LEP is not appropriate for the current situation. Therefore, it proposes a need to update and revise the language education of Japanese schools abroad. This may ultimately lead to suggesting an involvement of the agents (principals, teachers and parents) and participants (students) who are absent from the design of the LEP.