The language needs analysis in teaching Turkish to foreigners: An example of Bosnia Herzegovina

This study aims to analyze the language needs of the Bosnia Herzegovinian students learning Turkish in Sarajevo Yunus Emre Turkish Culture Center. The main scope of the tehesis is to describe language needs of Turkish learners at different course levels, and to analyze these language needs according to age, sex and educational background variables. The study was carried out on the basis of Turkish courses organized by Sarajevo Yunus Emre Turkish Culture Center. The data was collected using a questionnaire adapted from Iwai et al?s (1998) Japanese language needs analysis. The questionnaire consisted of two parts. The first part was devoted to gather background knowledges, and the second part contained language need-related questions. Before administring the questionnaire a pilot study was carried out with 17 participants in Foynitsa Yunus Emre Turkish Culture Center.At the time this study was planned there were 286 students in Foynitsa and Bosnia-Herzegovina Yunus Emre Turkish Cultural Centers. The Bosnia-Herzegovina Yunus Emre Turkish Cultural Center was the sample of this study with its 168 students. The data gathered form the questionnaire was first transtleted into Turkish, and then computerized. SPSS 21 (Statistical Package for Social Science) was used to analyze the data. Percentage, arithmetic mean, t-test and f-test for variance analysis were used to analyze the language needs of participants.According to the needs analysis questionnaire, the language needs of the students learning Turkish in Sarajevo Yunus Emre Turkish Culture Center were divided into four sub-dimensions including ?merchandising, education and business opportunity, individual interests and needs and communication inside class?. Especially, the need of merchandising was important for the students. For the dimension of individual interests and needs, it was found out that males in Bosnia Herzegovina needed learning Turkish more than females did, and that the older the students get, the more they needed learning Turkish for Education and Business Opportunity. It was also figured out that there was no significant relation between the language needs and educational background of participants. Key Words: Teaching Turkish to Foreigners, Language Need Analysis, Bosnia Herzegovina, Yunus Emre Turkish Culture Center