Sinhalese Learning Experiences in Sri Lanka: A Case of Chinese University Students

Against the background of China’s increasing cooperation with South Asian countries and the strong demand for multilingual talents, less commonly taught language education has been increasingly valued in higher education. This study focuses on three Chinese Sinhalese majors during their study‑abroad period, aiming to explore how they develop Sinhalese language proficiency in Sri Lanka. The study finds that Chinese students are confronted with significant communication challenges in the multilingual context in Sri Lanka, where colloquial forms, dialectal variations, and frequent mixing of Sinhalese and English constitute daily and academic interactions. To overcome these communication barriers and enhance their practical language skills, Chinese students actively draw on diverse resources and strategies, using English as a resource, participating in volunteer and social activities, learning collaboratively with peers, and employing digital tools and flexible multimodal communication. Despite the supportive role of English in facilitating basic daily communication, it poses noticeable constraints on in-depth interaction, since local English is marked by heavy accents and uneven proficiency, accompanied by clear social stratification in use, and fails to fully convey culture-loaded meanings in cross-cultural communication. This study contributes to a better understanding of less commonly taught language learning in study-abroad contexts. It emphasizes the importance of multilingual and multimodal resources and provides implications for curriculum design, pre-departure training, and cross-cultural support.