Discourse in the Novel

Preface Introduction 1. Fact and fiction in language learning 2. Researching identity and language learning 3. The world of adult immigrant language learners 4. Eva and Mai: Old heads on young shoulders 5. Mothers, migration and language learning 6. Second language acquisition theory revisited 7. Claiming the right to speak in classrooms and communities Afterword by Claire Kramsch

Identity and Language Learning: Extending the Conversation

By extending the notion of metroethnicity, this paper proposes the notion of metrolingualism, creative linguistic practices across borders of culture, history and politics. Metrolingualism gives us a way to move beyond current terms such as ‘multilingualism’ and ‘multiculturalism’. It is a product of modern and often urban interaction, describing the ways in which people of different and mixed backgrounds use, play with and negotiate identities through language. The focus is not so much on language systems as on languages as emergent from contexts of interaction. Looking at data from workplaces where metrolingual language use is common, we show how the use of both fixed and fluid linguistic and cultural identities is part of the process of language use. The notion of metrolingualism gives us ways of moving beyond common frameworks of language, providing insights into contemporary, urban language practices, and accommodating both fixity and fluidity in its approach to language use.

Metrolingualism: fixity, fluidity and language in flux

This article reviews recent scholarship in language, identity, and education. It critically reflects on developments in sociolinguistics as researchers have engaged with the dynamics and complexity of communication in superdiverse societies where people from an increased number of territories come into contact with one another, and where people have access to an increased range of online resources for communication. The authors focus in particular on recent scholarship on “translanguaging,” examining research that has viewed identities as socially constructed in interaction and considering the relationship between language and identities in contexts where communication is mobile and complex. This article offers a critical summary of the implications of these developments for education in the 21st century. In order to illustrate these theoretical points, the authors present an empirical example of the performance of language and identity in education from their recent research.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0267190514000233

Translanguaging and Identity in Educational Settings

Separate and flexible bilingualism in complementary schools: Multiple language practices in interrelationship

In this paper we question key terms which appear frequently in discussions of language teaching and learning: ‘language’ and ‘heritage’. The paper draws on empirical data from one of four linked case studies in a larger project funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), ‘Investigating Multilingualism in Complementary Schools in Four Communities’ (RES-000-23-1180). In our analysis we argue that the relationships between ‘language’ and ‘heritage’, far from being straightforward, are complex in the way they play out in classroom interactions. The data raise a number of questions in our attempts to understand how the linguistic practices of students and teachers in Bengali schools are used to negotiate young people's multilingual and multicultural identities. First, participants articulate attitudes and values which raise questions about what constitutes ‘language’. Second, participants express views and attitudes, and perform interactional practices, which raise questions about what constitutes ‘heritage’. Our analysis finds that multilingual young people in complementary school classrooms use linguistic resources in sophisticated and creative ways to negotiate subject positions which appear to contest and subvert schools’ attempts to impose upon them ‘heritage’ identities (Creese, A., A. Bhatt, N. Bhojani, and P. Martin. 2006. ‘Multicultural, heritage and learner identities in complementary schools,’ Language and Education 20/1: 23–44).

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Contesting ‘Language’ as ‘Heritage’: Negotiation of Identities in Late Modernity

Despite its potential influence on the standard language, there is still relatively little written about the language of the young. This book gives new insight into some important areas of their language, such as identity construction reflected, for instance, in prosodic patterns and language choice, the use of discourse markers and slang in a contrastive perspective, the pragmatics of fixed expressions and the impact of English on the teenage vernacular. Most of the articles are corpus-based, and all represent naturally occurring spontaneous conversation. The book will be of interest to linguists, university students and anyone interested in today’s adolescent language and language change.

Multilingual practices and identity negotiations among Turkish-speaking young people in a diasporic context

Language practices, language ideologies and identity construction in London Turkish complementary schools

Here is cutting edge research on complementary schooling in Britain. The book brings together new and innovative language-focused research on complementary schools that serve the linguistic, cultural and social needs of a wide range of ethno-linguistic communities in Britain. It examines the language and literacy practices, the policy and curricular innovation that pertain in complementary schools in Britain today, and the experiences of the children who attend them. Complementary schools have been on the margins of educational policy as research sites in their own right but recently this has changed. Now recognized as 'safe spaces' in which young children can explore their identities, they are seen as central to policy initiatives for promoting the languages of Britain. This book picks up on the spate of recent research to explore: the range of language and literacy practices in complementary schools; their innovations in policy and curriculum; and, how the pupils, teachers and parents negotiate social identities and affiliations. The book demonstrates the importance of complementary schools in the lives and learning of bilingual pupils. "Sites of Multilingualism" is essential reading for researchers and students in the fields of bilingual education and bilingualism, sociolinguistics, sociology and anthropology. It will also be relevant to teachers and teacher educators in complementary and mainstream schools and also to policy makers.

Taşkin Baraç

Papers

Separate and flexible bilingualism in complementary schools: Multiple language practices in interrelationship

Contesting ‘Language’ as ‘Heritage’: Negotiation of Identities in Late Modernity

Multilingual practices and identity negotiations among Turkish-speaking young people in a diasporic context

Language practices, language ideologies and identity construction in London Turkish complementary schools

Investigating the intersection of multilingualism and multimodality in Turkish and Gujarati literacy classes