LINGUIST List 25.1379
Fri
Mar 21 2014
Review: Applied
Linguistics; Discourse Analysis; Pragmatics;
Sociolinguistics: Kinginger (2013)
Editor for this issue:
Rajiv Rao <rajivlinguistlist.org>
Date: 13-Dec-2013
From: Maria Gomez Laich
<mapiagomezlaich
gmail.com>
Subject: Social and Cultural
Aspects of Language Learning in Study
Abroad
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Book announced at
http://linguistlist.org/issues/24/24-3207.html
EDITOR: Celeste Kinginger
TITLE: Social and Cultural Aspects of Language
Learning in Study Abroad
SERIES TITLE: Language Learning & Language
Teaching 37
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2013
REVIEWER: Maria P Gomez Laich, Carnegie Mellon
University
SUMMARY
Celeste Kinginger’s “Social and Cultural
Aspects of Language Learning in Study
Abroad” offers a rich collection of empirical
studies that portray the
diversity of contemporary, socially-oriented
research on study abroad in a
variety of languages and countries. The volume
is divided into three parts.
Part I consists of a topical orientation in
which the main aim of the book is
stated. In the introductory chapter “Social and
cultural aspects of language
learning in study abroad,” Kinginger offers a
brief summary of recent research
on language learning in the study or residence
abroad environment and argues
for the “need to frame language learning as a
dialogic, situated affair that
unfolds in intercultural contexts and includes
significant subjective
dimensions” (p. 5). The author also states that
a primary aim of the volume is
to expand the range of student populations,
languages, and methodologies for
research on language and culture learning in
study abroad contexts.
In Chapter Two, entitled “Researching whole
people and whole lives,” James A.
Coleman argues that second language acquisition
(SLA) study abroad research
should see subjects not just as language
learners, but as “rounded people with
complex and fluid identities and relationships
which frame the way they live
the study abroad experience” (p. 17). He claims
that the sociolinguistic
networks that students develop during study
abroad -- with fellow-nationals,
with other outsiders, and with locals--, their
degree of immersion and
engagement with the target language community,
the pattern of their contacts
with home (Coleman & Chafer, 2010), their
learning objectives, their
individual differences (e.g., motivation,
attitudes, and goals), and aspects
of learners’ identities (e.g., religion,
gender, or social class) all
influence the outcomes of the sojourn. Coleman
also presents data from a
recent long-term research project involving
U.K. students in Senegal. The
study highlights the significance of valuing
the agency of the individual in
order to have a better understanding of the
study abroad experience.
Part II features six qualitative case studies
adopting a variety of
theoretical research paradigms, such as
poststructuralist, activity
theoretical, sociocultural, and language
socialization. In Chapter Three,
entitled “Self-regulatory strategies of foreign
language learners: From the
classroom to study abroad and beyond,” Heather
Willis Allen takes a
sociocultural and activity theory perspective
to trace the development of
motivational self-regulation strategies,
including motivation maintenance,
goal-setting, and language learning strategies
(Dörnyei, 2001) of three U.S
college students of French during and after a
six-week study abroad experience
in France. Data were collected through blogs,
semi-structured interviews, and
questionnaires over a four-year period (before
study abroad, during study
abroad’s final week, and three years after
study abroad). The study shows how
learners use motivational self-regulation
strategies and suggests that the
college-level foreign language curriculum
should assist learners in developing
these strategies.
In Chapter Four, “‘Opening up the world’?:
Developing interculturality in an
international field experience for ESL
teachers,” Elizabeth Smolcic employs
assumptions from sociocultural theory and
activity system analysis to explore
the development of intercultural awareness of
U.S English as a Second Language
(ESL) teachers during a seven-month long
program that included an
international field teaching and
culture/language learning experience in
Ecuador. The data included semi-structured
interviews, journal entries,
written reflective papers, and researcher field
notes, and were collected at
three different phases of the program: before
departure for Ecuador, during
the experience abroad in Ecuador, and up to
three months after the end of the
program. The author presents data from one
participant in the program and
shows how the cultural and linguistic immersion
experience led to the
participant’s identity re-configuration,
intercultural growth, and sensitivity
to learners’ needs. She also highlights the
importance of reflective practices
and the need for teacher education to move
teacher-learners towards
interculturality.
Fred Dervin’s contribution, “Politics of
identification in the use of lingua
francas in student mobility to Finland and
France,” tackles the theme of
identity and language use by exploring the use
of English and French as lingua
francas (ELF and FLF hereafter) by mobile
European students in Finland and
France. The chapter reports on two studies: a
macro level study of the
politics of identification in relation to ELF
based on data from a
questionnaire distributed to Erasmus students
in Finland, and a case study of
a Finnish university student of French who
studied in France for a period of
six months. On the whole, students’
representations of ELF in the macro level
study appear to be quite negative and there is
an indication that “ELF
modifies the way students identify with others
-- and thus their self-images”
(p. 120). As far as the case study is
concerned, the Finnish student’s
representations of FLF were positive; the
student could be “herself” with FLF
users and could project a desired
self-image.
In Chapter Six “An American in Paris: Myth,
desire, and subjectivity in one
student´s account of study abroad in France,”
Timothy Wolcott presents a case
study of an American undergraduate who spent a
semester in an island program
in Paris. The program was geared toward “the
American-style academic study of
selected aspects of French and European
history, society and culture” (p.
132). Although several critics suggest that
such programs lead students to
cocoon themselves in an isolated community that
impedes full cultural
immersion and negotiation of difference, the
student’s testimony did not
confirm these predictions. Adopting a
poststructuralist orientation to
identity, Wolcott shows how living in Paris
triggered deeply personal and
subjective reactions in the student in
question.
In Chapter Seven, “Exploring the potential of
high school homestays as a
context for focal engagement and negotiation of
difference: Americans in
China,” Dali Tan and Celeste Kinginger examine
the experiences of high school
sojourners in a summer study and home stay
program in China. Two interesting
features of the program are that it functions
“in loco parentis” for the
students and discourages students from
gathering with their co-nationals after
school. Drawing on interview data collected
over a seven-year period, the
authors examine the potential of high school
home stay experiences for
engagement both in the routine communicative
practices of the host communities
and in “negotiation of difference” (Block,
2007) in encounters with Chinese
hosts. The results show that students conceive
of the home stay as a rich
learning environment. The findings also suggest
that a high school study
abroad experience can be quite different from
that of college-aged students
since high school students tend, among other
things, to have more intensive
engagement with their host families.
In Chapter Eight, “The transformation of a
“frog in the well”: A path to a
more intercultural, global mindset,” Jane
Jackson examines one Hong Kong
Chinese student’s intercultural competence
development before, during, and
after a study abroad experience in Canada. The
student showed an inflated
sense of intercultural competence before he
left his native country, which
could have had some negative effects on his
motivation to try to interact with
English speakers. During his time abroad, he
did not take advantage of many
opportunities to practice speaking English
because of his own negative
attitudes towards the host country and
personality attributes such as
ethnocentricism. Upon return to China, the
student participated in an elective
course aimed at expanding and extending
learning after study abroad through
guided, critical reflection. The course helped
him realize more about himself
as a “whole person” and why he avoided such
communicative opportunities. At
the end of the course, the student showed an
improved level of intercultural
competence. The results of this study
demonstrate the importance of intensive
reflection before, during, and after an abroad
experience.
Part III of the volume features four chapters
that illustrate a variety of
methods in research on the pragmatic competence
of sojourners in relation to
the construction of self and identity through a
second language. In Chapter
Nine, “I joke you don’t: Second language humor
and intercultural identity
construction,” Maria Shardakova reports on a
cross-sectional experimental
study that explores the effects of proficiency
and study abroad on sojourners’
identity construction through L2 humor. The
study focuses on the relationship
between the intended identities American
learners of Russian wish to convey
through L2 humor, and the identities attributed
to them by native speakers as
well as learners of Russian. Data were
collected in two stages. During the
first stage, humor samples from American
learners of Russian were gathered.
These learners completed discourse completion
questionnaires, submitted their
responses in writing (pretending to reply in
the form of an email), and were
asked to describe the self-portrait they
intended to construct. During the
second stage, new participants -- Russian L1
speakers and learners of
Russian-- evaluated the humorous emails and
indicated their reactions to the
emails. The results show that the examined
variables -- proficiency and study
abroad -- did not affect learners’
self-positioning. Both variables, however,
affected the perception of L2 humor by the
interlocutors. Increases in
proficiency, for example, resulted in learners
being perceived as less rude,
more polite and more humorous.
Chapter Ten, “Getting over the hedge:
Acquisition of mitigating language in L2
Japanese,” by Noriko Iwasaki, reports on an
often neglected, yet socially and
interpersonally significant aspect of learners’
language -- hedges. Employing
pre- and post- study abroad Oral Proficiency
Interview data, the study
quantitatively and qualitatively examines five
L2 Japanese speakers’ use of
hedges. The quantitative analysis shows that
the L2 learners drastically
increased their use and repertoire of hedges
after studying abroad. The
qualitative analyses show that learners use
hedges to socially package
interpersonal functions more often after their
study abroad experience, and
that some students chose to use hedges that are
often associated with young
native speakers of Japanese, therefore indexing
a youthful identity.
In Chapter Eleven, “Identity and honorifics use
in Korean study abroad,”
Lucien Brown analyzes quantitative (i.e.,
discourse completion tests) and
qualitative (i.e., recordings of natural
conversations and retrospective
interviews) data to chart four male second
language learners’ acquisition of
Korean honorifics. The students chosen for the
four case studies were of
different ethnic backgrounds and were all
participating in a one-year study
abroad program in Korea. The findings revealed
a gap between the students’
knowledge of the prescriptive native-speaker
norms of how honorifics should be
used to express social meanings and the way
they actually used them. These
results demonstrate that study abroad context
is an arena in which new
identities are sought and constructed and that
individuals will ultimately
make linguistic choices that match their
desired identity in a given
situation. Another important finding is that
the participants sometimes
encountered situations in which native-like
patterns of interaction were not
available to them; their position as exchange
students and foreigners resulted
in the belief on the part of some Korean
interlocutors that the norms of
honorific use were not needed in interactions
with them.
In the final chapter “A corpus-based study of
vague language use by learners
of Spanish in a study abroad context,” Julieta
Fernandez uses a cross-sectional
learner corpus to analyze the use of general
extenders by four English L1 learners
of Spanish after a year abroad in Spain.
General extenders (GEs) are “typically
phrase- or clause-final expressions with the
basic syntactic structure,
conjunction + noun phrase, which extend
otherwise complete utterances” (Overstreet,
2005, p. 1847).
The analysis of individual learner data
revealed “wide individual differences in
the
frequency, types and functions of GEs”
(Fernandez, p. 325). By complementing
quantitative
data with an analysis of learners’ narratives
of their study abroad experiences, the
author
also gained insights about the types of
activities learners were involved in while
abroad
and the opportunities they had to engage in
communication with members of the host
community.
By combining these two sources of data, the
author provides a rich analysis of the
participants’
language development in study abroad.
EVALUATION
In the introductory chapter, Kinginger states
that the volume is intended to
“showcase the value of contemporary
socially-oriented approaches in research
on language learning in study abroad” (p. 9)
and to “expand the representation
of student populations and languages beyond the
usual focus on American
undergraduates studying French, Spanish, or
German” (p. 13). The volume
fulfills this need to expand the range of
student populations, languages under
scrutiny, and research methodologies for
research on language and culture
learning in study abroad contexts. Although two
of the studies, namely, Willis
Allen’s and Wolcott’s, portray the experiences
of American college students of
French, they do so applying novel research
methodologies and theoretical
frameworks. Willis Allen takes a sociocultural
and activity theory perspective
to trace the development of motivational
self-regulation strategies. Wolcott,
on the other hand, adopts a poststructuralist
orientation to identity to show
how living in Paris triggered deeply personal
and subjective reactions in his
focal student.
Another strength of the volume is that its rich
collection of empirical
studies succeeds in addressing the need to
consider individual differences,
localized aspects of context that influence
language development during study
abroad, and identity issues that develop when
learners move across
geographical and sociological borders. In its
scope and complexity, this
volume reaches out to a wide target audience,
including researchers in the
field of applied linguistics, and language
educators and professionals
involved in the design of study abroad programs
as well as in the design of
curricula attending to the pre- and post- phase
of the study abroad
experience.
One of the weaknesses of the volume is that
although the author states that
there is a “need to frame language learning as
a dialogic, situated affair
that unfolds in intercultural contexts and
includes significant subjective
dimensions” (p. 5), the empirical studies
presented do not include the voices
of the hosts. Overall, however, “Social and
Cultural Aspects of Language
Learning in Study Abroad” is a
reflection-provoking and stimulating volume
that updates the portrayal of study abroad in
the applied linguistics
literature.
REFERENCES
Block, (2007). The rise of identity in SLA
research: Post Firth and Wagner.
“Modern Language Journal”, 91, 863-876.
Coleman, J.A., & Chafer, T. (2010). Study
abroad and the Internet: Physical
and virtual context in an era of expanding
telecommunications. “Frontiers: The
Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad”, 19,
151-167.
Dörnyei, Z. (2001). “Teaching and researching
motivation”. Harlow, England:
Longman.
Overstreet, M. (2005). And stuff und so:
Investigating pragmatic expressions
in English and German. “Journal of Pragmatics”,
37, 1845–1864.
ABOUT THE REVIEWER
Maria Pia Gomez Laich is a first year Ph.D
student in Second
Language Acquisition at Carnegie Mellon
University. She is interested in how
learners develop pragmatic competence in a
second language, what internal and
external factors (i.e. transfer from the native
language, insufficient
knowledge of the target language and its
communicative practices,
opportunities to interact with native speakers
of the target language through
observation and legitimate peripheral
participation, attitudes towards the L2,
length of stay in the target language
community) affect its development, and
how second and foreign language speakers
sometimes deploy a repertoire of
pragmatic routines that differs from the target
language in order to maintain
a sense of L1 self- and cultural identity.
Page Updated: 21-Mar-2014